Review | Storytel Reader

Storytel released their own e-reader last week: the Storytel Reader. I was one of the lucky ones who got to test the device! As many of you know, I am a huge fan of the service. Here in Belgium, before Storytel, we didn’t really have a service offering audiobooks. So I really like their app and their large selection of audiobooks.

In my previous reviews of the app, I always said that one of their downsides was that I could only read the e-books on my cell phone and could not transfer them to an e-reader. Now they have released their own e-reader, and I will let you know in this review what the positives and negatives of the Storytel Reader are.

Positives

Service

• You can listen to audiobooks as well as read e-books through the e-reader: this is a very strong plus for this e-reader, since most e-readers on the market do not offer audiobooks.
• If Storytel has both the e-book and audiobook, you can easily switch between the two. So if you like to listen to the book on the train, but like to read in bed at night, you can do so without losing your progress!
• You don’t have to buy each e-book or audiobook separately.
• You can download the books and read or listen to them offline.
• There is a great selection of books.
• On the e-reader, you can see what percentage of a book you have already listened to or read. (Yay!!!)
• You can upload your own e-books through the Storytel site: so if you’ve already downloaded e-books and want to read them, you can do so by adding them to your account.

Appearance

• The Storytel Reader has a 3.5 mm jack to connect headphones or earbuds, but also features bluetooth. So you can easily connect your wireless earphones or headphones to the e-reader and just put your device in your pocket while listening to an audiobook.
• The e-reader is very light and therefore easy to hold.
• The buttons on the sides of the e-reader are very handy to change pages.
• There is a built-in (cold/warm) light in the e-reader, and you can adjust the strength and even turn it off completely.

Negatives

• You need a Storytel subscription to use the e-reader.
• It is a bit slow, on the one hand, in downloading audiobooks, but also in navigating through the different tabs. (Note: there is no e-reader that is superfast because almost all of them have an e-ink screen)
• The categories are not as clear as on the app. For example, you can press the ‘Young Adult’ category, and you’ll get a long list full of books, but you can’t filter anywhere here. So you actually have to already know which book you want to listen to or read, because finding an interesting book is very difficult.
• The screen sometimes does not respond immediately.
• The chapters of the audiobooks are not clear, and you cannot easily rewind to the previous chapter. You can only rewind or fast-forward 30 seconds.

Not clear yet

I’ve only had the Storytel Reader for a short time, so I can’t say anything about the battery at the moment. After using the e-reader for a few weeks, I will update you on this!

Conclusion

The Storytel Reader is a very nice device if you are a fan of the service and already subscribe to it. If you are not already familiar with the service I would try it out before you buy the e-reader.

If you want to give the service a try, you can now listen and read for free for 30 days. You can do that through this link.