Question about Amazon Kindle/Fire Tablets

Bigity

Quick question about the Amazon tablets that run Fire OS. I found an article stating Office apps were added to them last year, but wanted to see if someone could confirm. We were going to pick one up for a young person (attending college) that our family 'adopted' - aka providing Christmas gifts to kids who wouldn't get any otherwise.

This young woman attends college in Durango, CO and requested an 'electronic tablet for school'. An iPad is out of our range, at least paired with the more mundane items she asked for.

I haven't seen a Kindle since they were only for digital books.

wunderbar

Sorry this is a bit late, but yes, Microsoft has their apps on the Fire Tablets. Word, Excel, Outlook, OneNote, Onedrive.

The Fire Tablets are based on Android, though don't have the Google Play Store, just Amazon's App store. So the selection is more limited than you'd see on a Samsung tablet. But Microsoft does put their apps there.

Gilgaron

You can install the Google Play store on a Fire device if you want to jump through a few hoops.
https://www.howtogeek.com/232726/how-to-install-the-google-play-store-on-your-amazon-fire-tablet/

I have always gone with the cheapo Fire tablets, which are fairly weak for anything productivity-wise, so in your case I'd recommend one of the newer more expensive models if she's going to use it for Office even while it isn't seen as a particularly taxing software suite.

Bigity

wunderbar wrote: »

Sorry this is a bit late, but yes, Microsoft has their apps on the Fire Tablets. Word, Excel, Outlook, OneNote, Onedrive.

The Fire Tablets are based on Android, though don't have the Google Play Store, just Amazon's App store. So the selection is more limited than you'd see on a Samsung tablet. But Microsoft does put their apps there.

Appreciate it. Always nice to get some affirmation for something outside of a random web article.

wunderbar

Gilgaron wrote: »

You can install the Google Play store on a Fire device if you want to jump through a few hoops.
https://www.howtogeek.com/232726/how-to-install-the-google-play-store-on-your-amazon-fire-tablet/

I have always gone with the cheapo Fire tablets, which are fairly weak for anything productivity-wise, so in your case I'd recommend one of the newer more expensive models if she's going to use it for Office even while it isn't seen as a particularly taxing software suite.

You can load the Play store, but that's not a super great experience to give to someone who isn't super tech literate. There are some apps that don't work properly, even with the Play store installed. There are certain things hard coded into the FireOS that aren't compatible with the way some Google Play store apps work. 99% of apps will be fine, but all it takes is one that doesn't work to ruin the experience.

Gilgaron

True, I tend to be more tolerant of difficulties when I know I'm pushing a $50 tablet in directions it isn't technically capable of. If one uses Chrome to save passwords it is almost worth that alone to get on the tablet, in my opinion, but the Fire tablets always feel particularly sparse on RAM, which doesn't help.