Amazon Kindle Paperwhite’s waterproof edition has been launched in India at a starting price of INR 12,999. The new e-reader is thinner and lighter in design and pre-ordering one will also get you three months of Kindle Unlimited subscription for free.

The first waterproof Kindle by Amazon comes with an IPX8 rating that protects it against immersion in up to two metres of fresh water for up to 60 minutes.

In addition to the free three months of Kindle Unlimited, all the pre-ordered devices will also come with 2-year extended warranty.

The new Kindle Paperwhite is available in two variants of 8GB WiFi model, which will retail at INR 12,999, and 32GB 4G+WiFi model, which will retail at INR 17,999.

While the 8GB variant will start shipping from November 14, the 32GB model will ship in the following months — exact dates for it haven’t been disclosed yet.

“Our gold standard for Kindle continues to be a piece of paper. We are constantly improving the design to help customers stay immersed in the story. Today, we are excited to bring even more premium features—like a thinner and lighter flush-front design, additional storage, waterproofing — to our most popular Kindle,” said Jayshree Gururaj, Director, Amazon Devices.

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Waterproof Kindle Paperwhite features

Storage: The all-new waterproof Kindle Paperwhite comes with double the amount of storage as seen on the previous generation models.

Display: Both the variants will sport a 6-inch high-resolution 300 ppi display. It also includes five LEDs and an adjustable front light for a uniform, glare-free display in any setting — providing better legibility even under direct sunlight.

Homescreen: The home screen will now display recommended reads for you based on your reading history. These will include free books from your Kindle Unlimited as well as Prime Reading subscriptions.

Personalisation: You’ll also be able to save multiple reading settings including font, boldness level and orientation settings — all from the main menu and you’ll also be able to seamlessly switch between those settings.

Both of these features mentioned above will also be available on Kindle Paperwhite generation 6 that was released in 2013, after the over-the-air update following the release of the latest waterproof Kindle Paperwhite.

In addition to all of this, the following features have also been added to the new Kindle Paperwhite:

Whispersync: This feature will enable your Kindle to save and synchronise your last page read, bookmarks, and annotations from your Kindle eBooks across all of your devices with Kindle apps — making it easy for you to pick up from where you left.
Goodreads: The world’s foremost site for over 50 million readers that provides book recommendations and has over 47 million book reviews, has now been added to Kindle.
X-Ray: Explore the “Bones of the Book”—see all of the passages across a book that mention relevant ideas, fictional characters, historical figures, places, or topics of interest.
Word Wise: Available on many popular English language titles, Word Wise makes it easier to enjoy and quickly understand more challenging books. It provides short and simple definitions that automatically appear above difficult words.
Smart Lookup: Integrates a full dictionary definition with other reference information via X-Ray and Wikipedia.

You can also purchase a variety of covers for the waterproof Kindle Paperwhite that are available in the following material and colours:

Premium leather covers in rustic tan for INR 2999
Leather covers in black, merlot, red and purple for INR 2399
Water-safe fabric covers in charcoal black, canary yellow and marine blue for INR 1799

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