Amazon Fire HD 10 Kids Pro Review (2023): Child-Friendly Tablet

Amazon’s largest pill aimed toward children is available in a chunky plastic case, however this exterior armour isn’t the one safety it presents. The pill’s software program is locked into Amazon Children and has parental controls baked in, that means you’ll be able to go away it within the fingers of beloved little ones within the information that they gained’t be capable to set up 5 Nights at Freddy’s and provides themselves nightmares.

At £50 greater than the usual Hearth HD 10, you would possibly surprise what you’re getting on your cash. The reply is a bumper case with a pleasant built-in stand, a two-year assure, and a 12 months’s subscription to Amazon Children, which might be £38 in the event you’re already a Prime member, and £68 in the event you’re not.

This transforms right into a month-to-month subscription as soon as the preliminary 12 months is up, so be warned.

Design & Construct

• Chunky case
• Stand turns into a deal with
• Controls alongside one edge

There’s one situation I all the time have with Amazon tablets, and that’s the place of the buttons. In principle, every part must be very straightforward: all of the interactive bits – quantity rocker, lock swap, headphone socket, charging port – are on one finish of the pill, neatly grouped.

In observe, the muscle reminiscence accrued from years of utilizing different Android and Apple gadgets takes over, and I discover myself reaching for buttons in locations they aren’t.

Foundry / Ian Evenden

It’s a smart determination to position them like this: the pill is designed for use horizontally, so the entrance digicam is on the lengthy edge, the case’s built-in stand holds it on this place, and so having the controls on the finish makes numerous sense, and the mint-green case on the Children Professional model even colors them orange for straightforward discovering. Is it Amazon’s engineers and legions of customers who’re unsuitable, or is it me?

Past this, it’s a reasonably bland design though extra jazzy instances can be found within the type of Nebula and Glad Day, every with a big mural on the again. Extra decisions wouldn’t go amiss although.

The case covers the sides of the display, however the bezels are fairly thick regardless of this. The stand is properly built-in and clicks strongly into place to carry the pill up in an excellent viewing place. As a pill made with media consumption in thoughts, that is precisely what you want, and the case makes it simpler to carry too – Amazon’s tablets are fairly slender and lightweight, so it’s good to see smaller fingers given one thing to seize onto.

The stand clicks out farther from its upright place to transform right into a helpful carrying deal with, making it right into a suitcase of cinema or trunk of tomfoolery that may be taken on automotive journeys or journeys to the grocery store.

Foundry / Ian Evenden

See also  How to Sync iMessages Across Your Apple Devices

Display & Audio system

• 10in display
• Vivid LCD
• Cheap sound high quality

The touchscreen is the most important level of interplay with any pill, and there aren’t any complaints concerning the Hearth HD 10 Children Professional on this respect. It’s a shiny and responsive display that’s best for streaming video or taking a look at vibrant pages in an image ebook. There’s auto-brightness too, to chop down on twiddling with the slider or repeatedly being handed the pill to kind it out on your baby.

It’s an excellent display for watching video on, so far as tablets go. The scale and facet ratio means you’ll maintain it at a distance as a substitute of squinting at it like a telephone, and regardless of being nothing particular by way of expertise (no OLED or fancy refresh charge right here) it’s sharp and vibrant sufficient to fulfill the younger person, placing out a great degree of brightness meaning it’s potential to make use of in a lit room while not having to shade it.

Foundry / Ian Evenden

There’s even an affordable pair of audio system hooked up to the Hearth HD 10 Children Professional. With the very best headphones or Bluetooth audio system in all probability out of attain and even undesirable for youngsters, that is one space wherein I’d count on the built-in audio system to really be used moderately than ignored in favour of one thing exterior. So that you get a good quantity of quantity, can hear dialogue over the background noise, and there’s even a little bit little bit of bass presence including thickness to the sound.

In case you don’t need the Bluey theme blasting out for the ten,000th time then get a pair of the very best children headphones. 

Specs & Efficiency

• Primary specs regardless of being ‘Professional’
• Acceptable efficiency
• Doesn’t should be extra highly effective

Mediatek’s MT8183 is described as an entry-level pill chipset, and its presence right here underlines that this can be a pill for media consumption moderately than top-end gaming or work-related actions.

It’s power-efficient and comes with eight cores, break up between 4 Cortex A73 ‘Massive’ cores and 4 Cortex A53 ‘Little’ cores all working at 2GHz. There’s a Mali GPU working at 800Mhz, and 3GB of RAM. It’s a spec that pales towards the Snapdragon chips present in current flagship telephones, nevertheless it’s additionally a less expensive system that’s primarily aimed toward displaying static pages and streaming video.

For what it will likely be used for, this spec is totally appropriate however with a lot just like the common Hearth HD Children, the pill isn’t actually worthy of its ‘Professional’ moniker within the conventional tech sense. The important thing distinction is the slimmer design right here aimed toward older youngsters (6-12) who’re much less accident-prone.

As a result of pill being restricted to the Amazon app retailer, solely the Geekbench 5 benchmark was out there. Its results of 1515 within the multi-core check and 520 within the single core check places it above the 2021 Hearth HD 10, and within the realms of telephones such because the Google Pixel 3 (2018) and OnePlus 5T (2017). It’s not a very performant pill, however then it doesn’t should be, particularly on the value.

Within the fingers of an precise baby, as soon as the complaints about it not being an iPad had been out of the way in which, it was quickly put to make use of taking part in video and video games, the slender vary out there apparently not an issue.

There’s no lock display PIN code for a kid account, and nor have they got entry to the Settings app, so utilizing the pill is only a faucet of the lock button away, and whereas I want it had tap- or raise-to-wake like different Android telephones and tablets, this would possibly really not be best for a kid’s system that’s going to get tapped and waved round so much. 

Foundry / Ian Evenden

See also  LG C4 OLED Review: Brighter with Added AI

Cameras

• 5Mp rear, 2Mp entrance
• Restricted video calling
• Enjoyable for selfies

Being a pill, it’s not normally anticipated {that a} system like this might be any good for taking photographs. However children love something with a digicam in it, so the snapper is more likely to get extra use than it will if this had been a ‘regular’ Hearth HD system.

The 5Mp sensor behind the lens on the again of the pill is okay, sufficient to document one thing cool and attention-grabbing to point out others later, nevertheless it’s not going to rival any trendy telephone digicam. Likewise, the 2Mp entrance digicam, which is okay for a video name or a enjoyable selfie and comes with a primary enhancing app, however exhibits washed-out colors. 

Foundry / Ian Evenden

Youngsters utilizing the Children mode can entry Skype or Zoom with parental permission, however can’t obtain it with out, limiting the makes use of the cameras might be put to except you set it up first. A Name app means that you can make voice or video calls to different accounts in your Amazon household group, and there’s an Announce app that allows you to make voice bulletins by any linked Echo audio system.

Battery Life & Charging

• 10-hour battery
• 15W charging
• 9W charger in field

There’s round 10 hours of life within the pill as soon as it’s absolutely charged, which is about common for a pill on this sector, although Amazon quotes 13 hours. In fact, it would depend upon issues like display brightness.

Amazon features a 9W charger within the field, together with a USB-A to C cable, which can juice it up from empty in about 4 hours. In case you join the pill to a extra highly effective adapter, it would cost at 15W, knocking about an hour off the time.

Sooner charging can be good concept, particularly while you realise your baby goes to wish it for an outing and the battery is low.

Foundry / Ian Evenden

Software program & Apps

• FireOS
• Parental controls and cut-off dates
• Amazon App Retailer solely

The setup of the Amazon Hearth HD 10 Children Professional is simple. You flip it on, hook up with Wi-Fi, log into your Amazon account (or create a brand new one), after which obtain any system updates. Then it slams the door on you. You’ll be able to’t use the pill with out activating the free 12 months’s subscription to Amazon Children it comes with, which then turns right into a month-to-month subscription as soon as the preliminary interval is up.

This isn’t a pill you’ll be able to choose up and use as a general-purpose machine, it’s tied into Amazon’s ecosystem and has all types of controls to cease children with hacker tendencies from breaking out of it.

When you’ve arrange your children’ profile, it’s potential to change out of it utilizing a PIN you set throughout the setup course of to a profile hooked up to an grownup Amazon account. On this method, the pill can do double obligation between members of the family with out trapping adults in a world of leisure aimed toward beneath tens, however in the event you’re on the lookout for a pill with out restrictions it’s nonetheless not best, and cheaper options can be found.

As an Amazon pill, there aren’t any Google companies and also you’re restricted to the apps out there on the Amazon App Retailer. This can be a restricted choice, however for a children’ pill maybe that’s a great factor. You’ll be able to set up Netflix, BBC iPlayer, and different streaming apps to go alongside Prime Video, and the Kindle library has a variety of appropriate eBooks.

Mother and father can arrange baby accounts on their fundamental Amazon account, then set the age vary for apps and media their youngsters can entry, each on the pill and utilizing an online browser interface. When a toddler requests an app not marked as 100% protected, reminiscent of a streaming service, an e-mail is distributed to the dad or mum’s account so it may be permitted earlier than obtain.

Foundry / Ian Evenden

As a substitute of apps known as Prime Video or Amazon App Retailer, there are apps with less complicated names, reminiscent of Retailer, Movies, Instructional and Net Browser. They convey up curated subsets of the complete variations, with Video displaying a choice of kid-friendly motion pictures and collection from Prime Video.

The exceptions to this are Amazon Music and Audible, which get their very own apps. The Sound Field app, which makes noises relying on which illustration you faucet (the canine makes a barking noise) might be cherished by children and hated by adults.

The pill rapidly picked up on the gender and age we’d picked out, recommending Barbie and Sesame Avenue content material in addition to Disney, Lego and Harry Potter. Instructional apps can be found, although a great distance down the record, and Photo voltaic System Explorer was supplied together with maths, spelling, and a digital tour of Yosemite Nationwide Park.

The age settings appeared to do their job, as I didn’t spot something objectionable, and the YouTube movies that had been accessible didn’t mean you can entry the YouTube homepage or search the location. The online browser supplied entry to YouTube Children, however rapidly popped up a web page asking a dad or mum to set it up, permitting that avenue to be closed off if wished.

The browser’s default search engine is Bing with strict SafeSearch enabled, and an online seek for ‘bums’ confirmed a listing of outcomes, however picture websites (Flickr, iStock, Getty Photographs) had been blocked by Amazon parental controls whereas information tales had been accessible. A picture search utilizing this time period confirmed no nudity.

Worth & Availability

The Amazon Hearth HD 10 Children Professional 2023 is definitely out there from Amazon. At £199/$189, it’s costlier than the usual Fire HD 10, but in addition comes with some extras: the case, the assure, and the 12 months’s subscription to Amazon Children.

In order for you a less expensive children’ pill, the Amazon Hearth HD 8 Children pill is on the market for £149/$100, although it’s not solely smaller however has even decrease specs.

To see what different choices can be found, try our greatest tablets chart. 

Must you purchase the Amazon Hearth HD 10 Children Professional (2023)?

The Amazon Hearth HD 10 Children Professional (2023 version) is a handy and cost-effective solution to ship video and gaming to your children.

There are strong parental controls, so long as you retain the PIN code to your self, and makes a great introduction to on-line companies for teenagers. The very fact it is available in a sturdy case with a kickstand/deal with together with a no quibbles two-year assure provides to the enchantment.

It’s not the pill to purchase in the event you intend to make use of it for anything however children’ stuff, nevertheless, as you may get the identical {hardware} for much less cash by shopping for a typical Hearth HD 10.

As such, it’s a tough suggestion for anybody apart from the demographic it’s focused at: mother and father with children between the ages of six and 12. For them, it’s a simple purchase, so long as they’re pleased with shopping for into the Amazon ecosystem and perceive that the parental controls should be arrange and often reviewed to get the very best out of the pill.

Specs

• Chipset: MediaTek MT8183
• RAM: 3GB
• Storage: 32GB + Micro SD
• Display: 10.1in, 1920 x 1200px, 16:10 ratio, 60Hz, five-point multi-touch
• Rear digicam: 5Mp
• Entrance digicam: 2Mp
• Connectivity: USB-C (2.0), headphone socket, Wi-Fi 5, Bluetooth 5.0, 
• OS: FireOS 8 (Android 11)
• Dimensions: 190 x 256 x 17mm
• Weight: 718g