Hopefully hardware upgrades are on the menu, too
Summary
- Customers will soon have the ability to repair common components in Kobo e-readers themselves.
- Kobo is leading the way in sustainable e-readers with 85% recycled plastics and carbon offsetting.
- Major OEMs are embracing device sustainability, providing more options for consumers to repair rather than replace.
Unless you’ve been looking, you might have missed that the e-reader underdog Kobo has quietly become the greenest e-reader device maker on the market. The Canadian company has a reputation for releasing products with the health of the planet in mind. Since 2022, all of its e-readers have been made with 85% recycled plastics. It even offsets the carbon emissions associated with its shipping through the Great Bear Forest Carbon Project. Its three newest devices are no exception to this and take that commitment further by being packaged in 100% recycled packaging. But Kobo isn’t just good to the planet; it turns out it’s also good to its customers with plans for iFixit support.
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Tucked away on Kobo’s Sustainability page is a brief note about how the new Kobo lineup will be repairable by consumers (via Good E-Reader). Kobo will be partnering with iFixit to allow customers to repair “common components” themselves. According to Kobo, more details will be coming soon, so for now we can only speculate as to what components will be repairable. On the other hand, we can celebrate as another major OEM embraces device sustainability over manufactured obsolescence.
Last year, Google made some waves when it promised seven years of software updates for its newest flagship phone, the Pixel 8. Samsung followed Google’s lead shortly after and promised the same for its S24 line of phones. Of course, both companies were just following in the footsteps of Fairphone, which beat both giants to making the seven-year promise when it announced last summer that its 2019 Fairphone 3 would receive regular updates until 2026.
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All this is indicative of a subtle sea change within the industry. Not only do the large OEMs recognize and pay lip service to the fact that many consumers want to fix their broken or damaged devices rather than throw them away, but they’re actively making it easier to do so. Central to the repair scene are sites like iFixit, which provide not just hundreds of guides on how to repair consumer electronics but the tools and parts to get the job done. It already has partnerships with Google, Samsung, Motorola, and HTC, so it’s not too shocking to see Kobo added to its list of collaborators.
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