I decided to jump into the world of e-book readers, starting with one of the most popular e-paper devices on the market – the PocketBook Verse Pro. Here is my quick and honest review, along with everything I discovered during my first few weeks of using it. This is what the device has to offer if you’re just getting into e-book readers like me.
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The Specs Sheet
| Display Type: | 6″ E Ink Carta™ HD |
| Resolution: | 1072 × 1448 / 300 PPI |
| Frontlight: | SMARTlight (Adjustable brightness & color temperature) |
| Processor: | Dual-Core (2 × 1GHz) |
| RAM: | 512 MB |
| Internal Storage: | 16 GB |
| Battery: | 1500 mAh (Li-Ion Polymer), up to 1 month of battery life |
| Connectivity: | Wi-Fi (dual-band 2.4/5 GHz), Bluetooth, USB-C |
| Water Protection: | IPX8 (submersion in 2m of fresh water for up to 60 mins) |
| Audio: | Text-to-Speech, Audiobook & Music Player (via Bluetooth & USB-C adapter) |
| E-book Formats: | ACSM, AZW, AZW3, CBR, CBZ, CHM, DJVU, DOC, DOCX, EPUB (DRM), EPUB, FB2, FB2.ZIP, HTM, HTML, MOBI, PDF (DRM), PDF, PRC, RTF, TXT |
| Audio Formats: | M4A, M4B, OGG, OGG.ZIP, MP3, MP3.ZIP |
| Dimensions: | 156 × 108 × 7.6 mm |
| Weight: | 186 g |
| Features: | G-sensor/Auto-rotation, Physical page-turn buttons, Dark Mode, PocketBook Cloud, Dropbox, Pre-installed Dictionaries |
What Will You Find Inside The Box?
The PocketBook Verse Pro comes in an eco all-paper packaging (very fitting for a device like this).
Inside the box you can find the quick start guide, the USB-A to USB-C charging cable, and the e-book reader, conveniently wrapped in a protective layer of paper. That’s really it when it comes to the unboxing.
First Impressions & The Build Quality
Upon handling the Verse Pro for a few minutes, I’ve come to realize that it was probably for the best that I chose it over the Kobo Clara BW, which I initially considered, and which I had a chance to quickly test out at the store.
The build quality here is very much on point, with the device being made from hard plastic which doesn’t feel cheap or creak or bend under pressure. The overall weight of the device (~186g), so about the weight of an average smartphone is really a nice thing to experience when you’re not yet used to handling e-readers.
All in all, while the reader is quite sturdy, I’d wager you should always get a compatible protective case alongside it, just because of how easily e-ink displays can get damaged.
The back of the PocketBook Verse Pro is covered with a fine parallel-groove finish, which makes the reader feel really good in hands. As the display is recessed, when the device lies flat as shown on the image above, the screen doesn’t touch the surface below, provided that it’s perfectly flat of course. This is a design choice that I very much enjoy.
Also, it’s important to mention that the Verse Pro is IPX8 certified, which means that while it’s not protected against dust, it’s rated to be submerged in water up to 2 meters, for up to 60 minutes.
On the bottom of the reader, we can find the USB-C charging port, and the LED status light. Don’t worry, this light can be freely disabled from the system settings menu, so that it never bothers you either during your reading sessions, or when the device goes into the sleep mode.
Another thing worth mentioning here, and visible on the photo above, is the edge of the reader being blue. As there is no full-on black version of the Verse Pro available, this is the closest option you have if you’re like me and like your electronics dressed exclusively in dark colors. In truth, however, the blue edge is hardly noticeable, especially when you’re using the reader anywhere else than in a very brightly lit area.
The buttons, which are one of the most important features of the PocketBook Verse Pro, are also of very high quality. They don’t wobble in place and feel really good to use, with the middle page turn buttons being shaped in such a way that makes positioning your page-changing hand on the bottom of the reader more comfortable when it comes to most standard grips. Of course, you can also easily turn the pages using the device’s touch display, which we’re going to talk about later.
From left to right, we have the menu button which, depending on the app you’re in will bring out different settings menus, and when long-pressed will display a system tray with the options to turn the Wi-Fi and Bluetooth modules on and off, make quick full-screen screenshots, and do a few things more.
Then, after the page change buttons, comes the power button which when held down will power down the reader, when pressed two times will put it into the sleep mode, and will behave differently when pressed one time, once again depending on the app you’re currently in.
The Software Experience
When it comes to the PocketBook Linux-based operating system and pre-installed software, two things have to be said. The first thing, is that it’s pretty good, and if you don’t plan to install KOReader on your e-reader, you absolutely don’t have to (although it certainly can make your life a lot easier, as I’ll argue below).
Both the user experience, the design of the system menus, and the overall responsiveness of the device is really on point. With this being my very first e-reader that I’ve used for any meaningful amount of time, I must say that I didn’t expect an e-ink device to feel this smooth to use, given all what I’ve read about the technology online.
With a rather modest dual core 1GHz CPU with 512MB of RAM, the Verse Pro does what it’s supposed to rather well. Still, don’t expect large PDFs to load or process a quick zoom-in in a blink of an eye.
There are quite a lot of quality-of-life features available here, with one of my favorite ones being the quick screenshot shortcut in the task manager menu, and the Android-like top-down menu with quick display backlight adjustment options.
There are utilities in place to help you transfer your books to the device via Dropbox or email, but you can also move them to the device traditionally, via a USB-C cable connection. Oh, and there is also a web browser, if you ever need it.
What’s also pretty important, is that this reader has a built-in accelerometer, which means that it can automatically switch to the landscape mode. I really like this feature, but if it’s something that you feel would annoy you, you can easily switch the auto rotation off in the settings menu.
An important thing to mention here is that the Verse Pro supports both Bluetooth headphones, and headphones connected to it using a compatible USB-C to 3.5mm jack adapter.
This can come in handy, considering that it also has a dedicated app for music and audiobook playback, as well as the option to have the device read your books to you out loud using the local TTS system available in the native reader app.
This is where I need to mention the memory constraints. The Verse Pro, unlike the original Verse, doesn’t have a microSD card slot, most probably because of its IPX8 rating compliance. It features fixed 16GB of internal memory, which after taking away 2GB for the operating system, leaves you with 14GB of storage to use.
This is a plenty when we’re talking about traditional e-book files, but may be too little for people who tend to stash hundreds of large PDF files or audiobooks on their reader. For most users though, it will be quite enough.
Device Customization Options
When it comes to customization, there are a lot of great features here. One of them is the ability to change both the off screen image (the image that shows once you turn off your reader), and the startup image (the picture that briefly shows when the device powers up). You can also set the device to randomly alternate between a dozen of imported images each time it’s powered off.
You can also change the transparent sleep state indicator image which shows up on your screen when you double press the power button. This however, will require you to edit and prepare your custom transparent .png files yourself, as you can see in this short tutorial (you can use Google Translate to access it, as the guide is sadly only available in the Polish language).
If you want to tinker a little bit more, you can actually easily upload a port of the Simon Tatham’s Portable Puzzle Collection to your Verse Pro. All you need to do is to visit the PocketPuzzles GitHub repository (credit to SteffenBauer), and then download the .zip archive with the software, and move the SGTPuzzles.app file to the “applications” folder on your PocketBook. You should now be able to see the app with the set of games on your e-reader.
SMARTLight – The Display Backlight
The Verse Pro has built-in display backlight with color temperature adjustment, which is referred to as SMARTLight in the PocketBook advertising materials. It’s one of the strongest features of this device, and it works really well.
On the image below, you can see the coldest attainable backlight color at the highest brightness value, alongside the warmest setting at the same brightness setting. The pictures were taken in a brightly lit photo studio, and I tried to make the colors as close to the real thing as possible.
You can easily adjust both the backlight brightness and temperature directly from the reading app, which I find to be really convenient.
Although I’ve read some reports online of some PocketBook readers having uneven backlight problems, my unit doesn’t seem to have this problem, at least after a quick inspection in a fully darkened room.
Overall, I’m really positively satisfied with the quality of the backlight and both the brightness and temperature adjustment range. My only wish would be that the temperature scale would be a little bit more uniform, instead of the backlight color being mostly cold throughout all of the slider travel, and changing to the orange tones only at the very end of the adjustment range. While it’s really a non-issue as some might argue, I thought it would be good to mention it here.
The Battery Life
As this is an e-reader, quite obviously my expectations when it comes to battery life were quite high. The reality of it is, that while the Verse Pro in theory could last you close to a whole month with moderate usage, if you’re making the most of the device using all of its features, the battery life will be slightly less.
Features such as Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, audio via USB-C headphone adapter, as well as the display backlight will eat up a little bit more juice, which is quite understandable. With all of them off, or used in moderation, you can easily expect to go throughout your month without worrying about being close to an outlet.
Regarding the sleep/suspend mode, while the battery use is significantly lower when it’s active, it will still drain a few percent per day if you prefer not to turn off your reader when taking a longer break from reading.
This is why there is a neat setting that allows you to specify how long after your device is left unused in sleep mode it should power down completely. I personally have this set to 24 hours, just in case I forget to shut the reader off and then go on to have a few busy days when I don’t have much time to read. You can also set the device to enter the sleep state automatically after set time.
It’s important to note, especially for new e-book reader users, that when you power down the device by holding the power button for a few seconds, the screen won’t go blank as on many other devices you might own. Instead, the display will display the default PocketBook Verse Pro logo screen, or any other image you upload to your device and tell it to use. Don’t worry, it doesn’t use any energy in that state. That’s the beauty of e-ink displays.
The Reading Experience and Screen Quality
The PocketBook Verse Pro features a 6-inch 1072×1448 300 PPI touch display, which honestly looks really good for my untrained eye, and when looked at from up close, doesn’t lose its sharpness. The letters are easily visible even with smaller font sizes, and overall it’s a huge upgrade in comparison to the original Verse’s 212 PPI panel.
Quite honestly, there isn’t anything bad I can say about this display, other than if you want colors in your comics, manga, or textbooks, you should get the PocketBook Verse Pro Color instead. All in all, it’s a very solid 10 out of 10 for me, despite it not being the latest e-ink tech available.
PocketBook Verse Pro & KOReader
If you don’t already know, KOReader is one of the best open-source software for reading e-books in various different formats, and it’s extremely popular both with jailbroken Kindle readers, and other compatible e-ink devices. It’s also available as an Android app, which is great considering one of its core features is enabling you to sync your book progress between different devices.
Not only does it offer tens of valuable quality of life features like extended font contrast adjustments, touch display macros and shortcuts and convenient notes/highlights system, but it also makes the general reading experience much smoother and faster on certain devices (Verse Pro being one of them). Installing KOReader on your PocketBook Verse Pro is really simple, and you can learn how to do that here, in this quick tutorial.
My Final Verdict – Here Is What I Think
Taking into account that this was my very first e-book reader, my expectations were fully met. After having tested a few different devices in a usual in-store setting (including the latest Kindle Paperwhite, and the aforementioned Kobo Clara BW), I must say I’m really glad I’ve decided to go with the Verse Pro.
If you’re looking for your first reader and are already considering the PocketBook Verse Pro, I would say go for it. Compared to the base Kindle (which supports much less e-book formats without a jailbreak) and the Kobo Clara BW (which lags behind the Verse Pro in build quality despite its newer E-Ink Carta 1300 display), it’s a really good all-around choice. Hope you found my thoughts here helpful.