Testing the Onyx Boox Note Air 3C: an e-reader with a colour display and stylus

I generally use my e-reader for reading books in digital form. Although the Onyx Boox Note Air 3C is wonderful for this, it comes at a disproportionately high price. Still, the e-reader has a few aces up its sleeve, including its strength at creating colourful sketches.

Size and design: just right!

Thin and wieldy, the design is the first thing I notice about the Onyx Boox Note Air 3C e-reader. The device comes in at just under 6 millimetres thick, while the E Ink display measures 10.3 inches. In total, it’s 22.6 × 19.3 centimetres – somewhere between the size of a paperback and a DIN sheet of A4. It’s just the right size for me to pop it in my bag and devour everything from books to comics. Graphic novels are all the more beautiful when an e-reader can display them larger than a paperback book. At 430 grammes, it’s also quite light and comfortable to hold.

The USB-C port is positioned just where I’d like it to be: on the left side. Here, the cable’s least likely to get in my way while I’m reading or charging the device.

Hardware: colour display with Wacom technology

What makes the Onyx Boox Note Air 3C special is its colourful E Ink display. The colours aren’t punchy in the way you’re used to from your smartphone. But they’re there. This makes the device an interesting way of reading comics and doing sketches.

The greatest strength of devices with E Ink technology is their energy efficiency. In this respect, the Onyx Boox Note Air 3C fares really well, brushing off the challenges of its colour display and ultra-fast mode for games and videos. With ultra-fast mode activated, I get almost ten hours of battery life. If I mostly use the e-reader for reading or listening to audio books, I’m barely able to run down the battery. Even after reading every day for a week, it’s still more than 50 per cent full.

The display boasts two other plus points. One is the backlight, which I can adjust to suit my surroundings. It makes it possible to relax with a book both in bright sunshine and in the dark. The matt surface also protects against reflections and makes text appear sharper.

The device comes with 64 gigabytes of built-in memory. Since books tend to be 0.5 megabytes on average, I’ve got space for plenty of apps. If that turns out not to be enough, I can access 10 gigabytes of cloud storage. There’s also a microSD slot.

Software: numerous options with Android and app store

The Note Air 3C works with Android 12. Consequently, I can download any apps from the app store. In addition to the 17 e-book formats, I download my favourite e-book app Google Books. I can connect to the internet on the device via Wi-Fi or SIM card.

I chose Google Books because I can log into my Google account and download books I’ve already bought onto my device. A little patience is required when downloading, but the Note Air 3C runs very quickly for an E Ink tablet.

Using the pre-installed BOOXDrop app, I can also send files from my computer to the e-reader. You’ll have to go through a few steps to set it up; the exact instructions are available here.

Since the Onyx Boox Note Air 3C has a lot more to offer besides just its e-reader mode, there are various modes for different scenarios. In general, the faster and more complex the content, the greater the loss of detail and ghosting.

• HD: for simple blocks of text, books and strong contrasts
• Balanced: good for more complex documents, though causes more ghosting
• Fast: best for web browsing, but involves heavier detail loss
• Ultra-fast: best for videos, involves heavy detail loss

Reading and listening: does what it’s supposed to

Reading mode is any e-reader’s key feature, and this one didn’t disappoint. Even in HD, the slowest mode, the Onyx Boox Note Air 3C responds quickly, displaying the font legibly and in high contrast. Sometimes, the refresh rate is too slow for me and I see some faint ghosting. Mind you, I can quickly fix that with a manual refresh. Reading on the device is enjoyable.

The colour display can be used for reading comics. They show up well overall – after a few manual tweaks to the brightness and contrast. That being said, the ghosting bothers me and the font appears slightly blurry from time to time. All in all, there are too many drawbacks compared to paper comics. Personally, I wouldn’t read a colour comic on the Onyx Boox Note Air 3C.

As the device is fine for mangas with only a few colour images, I could take my entire One Piece collection with me to the beach.

Since it has speakers, I can also listen to audio books or watch YouTube videos. To get audiobooks, I put the Audible app on the device. Given the fact I can listen to the audio for several hours, it’s safe to say the speakers do their job. When it comes to music, however, the sound is too muffled. I generally wear headphones or use external speakers when playing music on a mobile device. As for videos, I definitely don’t recommend watching them on the e-reader. Although I’m surprised at how smoothly the images move, the ghosting and matt display mean the device is only suitable for videos as a last resort.

Sketching and note-taking features are a pleasant surprise

A stylus for drawing and taking notes comes included with the device. It’s comfortable to hold, and recognises pressure and tilt. Just like a conventional pen, it’s protected by a lid. I don’t think the magnetic holder for the pen on the left edge of the tablet has been well implemented. It’s too weak to hold the pen firmly. Still, at least it doesn’t roll away as soon as I stick it down. What’s more, the stylus doesn’t require a battery, so I never need to think about charging it.

The Onyx Boox Note Air 3C boasts built-in technology made by Wacom, a manufacturer of professional graphics tablets. This is apparent as soon as my stylus touches the display – the screen responds without latency, even with quick pen strokes. Writing feels very natural overall, and the matt surface makes drawing even more pleasant.

The pre-installed notebook app is perfectly equipped. I can create books and select backgrounds such as dot- and line grids for them. I’m able to draw colourful pictures as well as write in these notebooks. There’s also a layer feature and various drawing tools.

But here comes the big but. As time goes on, the e-reader has trouble calculating sketches. The image will briefly fail to display or it’ll freeze for a few seconds, momentarily stopping me from continuing my drawing. When it comes to bigger art projects, I prefer working on my iPad or PC. But I definitely enjoy doing quick sketches with simple colouration on the e-reader. If I want to capture an idea or a reference from my surroundings, the Note Air 3C is ideal. For an E Ink display, I think the performance is good. An even more practical plus point is that the notebooks – including individual pages – can be exported as a PDF or in e-book format.

Casual games work on the device too

I can also install games via the Google Play store. However, because of the e-reader’s display technology, they have to be slow. Like Sudoku, for instance. The store’s apps are optimised for smartphones, so I can’t write the numbers into the grid with the stylus like I would with a pen-and-paper puzzle. Even so, the app, with its typing feature for entering the numbers, works well enough on the Note Air 3C. As long as I activate ultra-fast mode, anyway. It consumes slightly more battery than the HD mode for reading alone, but the experience is better.

The same goes for the second game I picked out: a search-and-find puzzle. It runs really well and despite the matt colour display, I’m able to spot the characters and objects I’m supposed to find. What’s more, I can zoom right into the picture. The mediocre response time doesn’t bother me, as this game’s meant to be played at a leisurely pace anyway. All this to say, the device can handle relaxed games.