Comment by fmajid | Hacker News Reader

Comment by fmajid | Hacker News Reader

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Well, I don't have a Kindle, so I can't verify this, but I am basing this from reporting:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c98k91yy4z4o

"The move will mean owners of older Kindles, including its earliest models such as the Kindle Touch and some Kindle Fire tablets, will be unable to download new e-books."

For a more tech-oriented site, according to Ars Technica Amazon removed the ability to upload over USB:

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2026/04/starting-in-may-pre-...

"Previously, owners of old Kindles could have worked around this loss of functionality by downloading books locally and transferring them via USB. But Amazon removed the ability to download books to a PC or Mac in February of 2025."

I don't like to brag "I told you so" but I saw this coming 16 years ago:

https://blog.majid.info/why-i-will-never-buy-a-kindle/

Nothing you've quoted is wrong per se, but it's also not the full story.

Amazon removed the ability to download files from them to your computer. And they will soon be removing the ability to download files from them directly to older kindle devices. You can still download a MOBI or EPUB from anywhere else online (though I think some older kindles don't support EPUB) and transfer it via USB, and will still be able to after they EOL those older devices.

Interesting. Once again, I don't have a Kindle so I can't verify any of this. I do have a PocketBook Versa with stock firmware and a M5Stack Paper S3 running Crosspoint Reader, but hardly use either as I prefer reading on LCD or OLED tablets. The only formats I care about are DRM-free ePub and PDF.

Totally fair. I don't read much on Kindles either (mostly on my OLED phone). There's just a lot of dis/misinformation around these deprecations that I feel should be corrected. I worked on Kindles earlier in my career and still have a soft spot in my heart for them.

Even new Kindles don't support EPUB, per-se. The Send-to-Kindle service started supporting EPUB, and converts them to AZW3 or KFX for actual delivery to your Kindle.

But you cannot just USB an EPUB onto your Kindle without any conversion process. (Calibre does make it very simple, though.)

Does anyone know if the send to kindle getting sunsetted as well?

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