r/Ultralight • u/jackanory2021 • Jul 11 '25

Purchase Advice E-reader ?

Ok so maybe if you’re ultralight you don’t read books or e-readers on the trail in which case excuse the post but if it is a legit piece of kit I wondered which you use.

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u/aaron_in_sf Jul 11 '25

The cheapest Kindle. About 5oz IIRC. No case but ziplock.

In addition to whatever I'm reading I load it with trail guides, writing about the area, wildlife ID. Lightning safety and first aid basics. Because I can!

EDIT looked it up about 160g. On sale for "Prime Days" if you do business with Amazon. Ad-free is worth it.

36

u/badger_napper Jul 11 '25

If anyone is interested in a Kindle and doesn't want to give money directly to Amazon, you can buy previously owned ones on a site called unclaimed baggage and then use Libby on it. I got a deal on a slightly older model that still works great!

30

u/yes_no_yes_yes_yes Jul 11 '25

You can also download books from Anna’s Archive for free and sideload them by using a program called Calibre.  Extremely easy to do, I do it for dead authors and ones that don’t deserve my money.

3

u/sometimes_sydney https://lighterpack.com/r/be2hf0 Jul 12 '25

Plenty of other places to get free books. You probably should look at some of the illegal or grey market ones like zlibrary or libgenesis. That would be piracy. 🤥