Kindle owners are struck another blow as Send to Kindle is set to stop working on old devices

Kindle Paperwhite 2021 Signature Edition
The Kindle Paperwhite (2021) is still supported for now (Image credit: Future)

  • Pre-2023 Kindles will soon lose Send to Kindle support
  • This follows news that they'll lose access to the Kindle Store
  • The changes are set to happen on May 20

It’s fair to say that a lot of Kindle owners aren’t particularly happy with Amazon right now, as the company recently announced that pre-2013 models will no longer be supported from May 20.

The support page detailing this change initially just mentioned that these devices would no longer be able to access the Kindle Store or use Kindle Unlimited, but now — as spotted by GoodEreader — the page has been updated to say that Send to Kindle will also stop working.

Send to Kindle is a feature that lets you wirelessly transfer ebooks you bought elsewhere, as well as documents and other files, to your Kindle, but from May 20 the only way to get content onto affected Kindles will be via USB cable.

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So it’s a change that makes these older models even more useless than they were previously set to become.

Kindle Touch from 2011

The Kindle Touch is one of the affected devices (Image credit: TechRadar / Matthew Bolton)

Unhappy readers

There haven’t been many reactions to this Send to Kindle news yet, but in the days since Amazon first announced that these older models would lose access to the Kindle Store there has been no shortage of annoyed responses to that.

On Reddit this includes things like “I hate this”, “screwing the most loyal early adopters is extremely not cool”, and “this is a revolting waste.”

Amazon is offering a 20% discount off new devices, but given that the same fate might eventually befall those too, this could end up pushing users to rival services like Kobo, or perhaps to something with direct access to multiple ebook stores, like a Viwoods or Boox device.


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James is a freelance phones, tablets and wearables writer and sub-editor at TechRadar. He has a love for everything ‘smart’, from watches to lights, and can often be found arguing with AI assistants or drowning in the latest apps. James also contributes to 3G.co.uk, 4G.co.uk and 5G.co.uk and has written for T3, Digital Camera World, Clarity Media and others, with work on the web, in print and on TV.

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