Often overlooked in the eReader marketplace, the Kobo is actually one of the major competitors. It may not have the fame of either Barnes and Noble’s Nook or Amazon’s Kindle, but it’s still going strong in the face of such adversity.
In this in-depth Kobo Glo Review, we’ll take a closer look at the Kobo Glo, a popular e-reader that has been making waves in the e-reading community for its sleek design, advanced features, and exceptional performance.
From its ergonomic design and high-resolution display to its customizable reading settings, impressive battery life, and seamless integration with online bookstores, we’ll explore every nook and cranny of this innovative device.
Kobo Glo Review
Features and Performance:
The Kobo Glo offers a range of features that enhance the overall reading experience. One of the standout features is its customizable reading settings. You can adjust font size, font type, line spacing, margins, and more, allowing you to tailor the reading experience to your personal preferences. This is especially beneficial for users with visual impairments or those who prefer a specific font style or size.
The device also offers a built-in dictionary, which allows you to look up words instantly while reading. This is a handy feature for avid readers who come across unfamiliar words or want to improve their vocabulary. The Kobo Glo also offers highlighting, note-taking, and bookmarking functionalities, allowing you to personalize your reading experience and easily revisit your favorite passages.
Another notable feature of the Kobo Glo is its Wi-Fi connectivity, which allows you to connect to the Kobo bookstore and access a vast library of e-books. You can browse and purchase e-books directly from the device, making it convenient and hassle-free. The device also supports a wide range of e-book formats, including EPUB, PDF, MOBI, and more, ensuring compatibility with a variety of e-books from different sources.
In terms of performance, the Kobo Glo does not disappoint. The touchscreen is responsive and smooth, making it easy to turn pages, navigate through menus, and interact with the device. The front-lit display provides even and glare-free lighting, allowing for a comfortable reading experience even in low-light conditions. The device also boasts a fast and reliable performance, with quick page-turning and minimal lag time when navigating through menus or accessing books from the online bookstore.
Design and Build Quality:
The Kobo Glo is a beautifully designed e-reader that is sure to catch your eye. It features a sleek and slim form factor with dimensions of 157 x 114 x 10 mm and a weight of 180g, making it lightweight and easy to hold for extended reading sessions. The device has a comfortable grip and its soft-touch finish adds to the overall tactile experience.
One of the standout design features of the Kobo Glo is its 6-inch high-resolution E Ink Pearl touchscreen display, which offers a resolution of 1024 x 768 pixels. The display is not only crisp and clear but also boasts an impressive 16-level grayscale, allowing for sharp text and vivid images. The touchscreen is responsive and offers a smooth and seamless navigation experience.
The Kobo Glo also features a front-lit display, which sets it apart from other e-readers in the market. This feature allows you to read comfortably in the dark or low-light conditions without straining your eyes. The front light is adjustable, allowing you to customize the brightness level according to your preference, making it ideal for reading in different lighting environments.
In terms of build quality, the Kobo Glo feels sturdy and well-made. It has a solid construction and is designed to withstand daily wear and tear. The device also comes with a microSD card slot, which allows you to expand the storage capacity up to 32GB, providing ample space for your e-book library.
Screen and Resolution
The screen is undoubtedly the centerpiece of any e-reader, and the Kobo Glo does not disappoint in this regard. The device features a 6-inch Carta E Ink touchscreen display that provides a high-resolution reading experience. The Carta E Ink technology is known for its exceptional contrast, sharpness, and readability, making it ideal for extended reading sessions without causing eye strain or discomfort.
One of the standout features of the Kobo Glo’s screen is its front light technology, known as ComfortLight. The ComfortLight front light is designed to provide a soft, even illumination across the screen, making it easy to read in various lighting conditions, including low-light environments. The front light can be easily adjusted to suit your preferences, allowing you to find the perfect reading setting for your eyes.
The ComfortLight front light is a game-changer for avid readers who love to read in bed or during nighttime hours. Unlike traditional backlight screens that emit blue light, which can disrupt sleep patterns and cause eye strain, the ComfortLight front light emits a warm, amber glow that mimics the natural light of a traditional book. This makes the Kobo Glo an excellent choice for those who prioritize their eye health and sleep quality while indulging in their favorite literary works.
Immersive Reading with Impressive Resolution
In addition to its high-quality screen, the Kobo Glo boasts an impressive resolution that adds to the immersive reading experience. The device has a resolution of 1024 x 758 pixels, with a pixel density of 212 pixels per inch (PPI). This results in sharp and clear text that closely resembles the print quality of a physical book.
The high resolution of the Kobo Glo’s screen allows for crisp and detailed text, making it easy to read even small fonts or complex layouts. Whether you’re reading a classic novel, a graphic novel, or a technical manual, the Kobo Glo’s screen resolution ensures that you can enjoy an immersive reading experience without straining your eyes.
The Kobo Glo also offers a range of font options, including various font sizes and types, allowing you to customize your reading experience to your liking. You can easily adjust the font size and type to suit your preferences and reading environment, ensuring a comfortable and enjoyable reading experience.
In addition to its impressive resolution and font options, the Kobo Glo also offers adjustable line spacing and margins, giving you full control over the appearance of the text on the screen. This level of customization allows you to create a reading experience that matches your personal preferences and enhances your overall enjoyment of the book.
Read also: Kindle vs Nook vs Kobo and Kobo vs Kindle.
Navigation
As is the current trend for eReaders, and in fact all personal devices, the Glo has a touch screen. It’s very responsive thanks to the powerful processor inside this device, meaning that at the touch of a finger you can zip around menu systems and flick through pages.
Touch screens are a great feature, not least because they appeal to the immense popularity of such technology. They’re also practical and efficient and create a very enjoyable user experience. The physical interaction offered in this way does go some way to alleviating the loss of holding a physical book in the hand. It certainly has a nice feel to it.
Touch User Interface: Anyone familiar with existing Kobo products will have experienced the custom user interface. The Kobo Glo continues with the same user interface which is great for those who own a previous model and don’t want to have to learn a new interface. Plus, the interface is great anyway, and those new to the system will find it pleasing to use.
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Library Management:
The Kobo Glo offers robust library management features that make it easy to organize and manage your e-book collection. The device allows you to create custom shelves or collections to categorize your books based on your preferences, such as genre, author, or reading progress. You can also add tags to your books, making it easy to search and filter your library based on specific criteria.
The device also offers a search function that allows you to quickly find books by title, author, or keywords. The search function is fast and efficient, making it easy to locate specific books in your library, especially if you have a large collection.
In addition, the Kobo Glo offers seamless integration with online bookstores, such as the Kobo bookstore, allowing you to easily browse and purchase e-books directly from the device. The bookstore offers a vast selection of e-books, including bestsellers, new releases, and popular genres, giving you access to a wide range of reading options right at your fingertips.
Connectivity and Syncing:
The Kobo Glo offers Wi-Fi connectivity, allowing you to connect to the internet and access the online bookstore, sync your reading progress across devices, and download firmware updates. The Wi-Fi connection is stable and reliable, allowing for smooth syncing of your e-books and reading progress.
The device also offers a built-in web browser, although it should be noted that the browsing experience is basic and limited compared to full-fledged web browsers on other devices. The web browser is primarily designed for accessing the online bookstore and checking for firmware updates, rather than for extensive web browsing.
Kobo Glo Battery Life
One of the main shortcomings of the Kobo Glo against both the Nook and Kindle is battery life. The Glo offers only 55 hours of continuous reading with the ComfortLight switched on. Without the light, the Kobo Glo lasts for up to a month of casual use. Both of these fall short of the battery life in the Kindle Paperwhite and Nook Simple Touch GlowLight.
Read more: Kobo Arc review
Kobo Mini review
Book Store
Naturally, the Glo reader has access to the online Kobo book store. This store offers over 3 million eBooks, including a huge range of self-published material as well as all the classics, hits, and niche choices you’d expect.
Interchangeable Covers.
Interchangeable Covers: A small but nice touch is the introduction of interchangeable covers for the Glo. These covers go on the back of the device and come in five different colors. More designs are likely to come from third-party developers adding further to the customization options.
Custom Reading Experience
One of its big selling points has always been a customizable reading experience. The device retains this feature, giving 12 font types, 24 font sizes, font darkening and lightening, and much more besides. You can really find a setup that suits you with the Glo.
Expandable Storage memory
This device only offers 2GB of storage space. This is fairly standard for the lower-priced eReaders including the Kindle and Nook options but is still something of a disappointment.
However, a great feature that’s becoming increasingly common is the inclusion of a memory card slot. This lets you expand the storage space of your device by up to 32GB giving you as much space as you could ever want.
Reading Life And Pulse
One of the unique things about this device are Reading Life and Pulse, two social aspects of the user experience. Reading Life gives you a range of social media options that allows you to do things like automatically post highlighted sections of your book to Facebook, while Pulse gives you the chance to chat to other readers of the same book – with a special option that lets you avoid spoilers by only chatting with others who have read the same amount of the books.
Kobo Glo Pros and Cons
Pros
- Resolution. Crisp and clean image quality.
- Fast processor.
- The Book Store.
- Expandable Memory Space.
- Interchangeable Covers.
- Custom Reading Experience.
Cons
- Small Battery Life.
- On board storage space.
Verdict
No Amazon Content. Although you can access the Kobo book store online, you’re unable to read books from Amazon on the device. Given that Amazon offers more eBooks than any of the competition, this is quite a drawback.
Other than that the Glo is a very nice eReader with plenty going for it, including a nice screen and the new ComfortGlow technology. It’s also fast and pretty sleek. However, it’s not perfect and does suffer from some drawbacks, especially against the Kindle Paperwhite. It does make for a good quality alternative to the big two competitors though, and you’re unlikely to be disappointed with this purchase,
