The e-reader battlefield features relatively few combatants, but there’s a new challenger on the horizon. The DuRoBo Krono is the latest device to emerge in the quest to replace dead-tree books with something more technological.
Revealed at IFA 2025 in Berlin and currently being crowdfunded on Kickstarter, the e-reader seems to have loads going for it. Literally, if we’re talking about storage. 128GB of space is packed into its frame, more than enough to carry every book you’ll ever read (possibly — some readers are truly voracious). There’s another reason for all that space, however.
Defeating Kronos
The Krono isn’t just any old lightweight e-reader. Kindle and Kobo lean heavily on their displays to provide long-lived performance, but DuRoBo’s slate isn’t really keen on doing that. There’s still an E Ink Carta 300 HD display, a 6.13in 300PPI effort that wouldn’t look out of place in one of its competitors, but the company behind this one has also gone all-in on other specs.
There’s no camera, because that would be silly, but you’ll have almost everything else that a modern smartphone offers. An octa-core processor with 6GB of RAM joins the bonkers storage allocation, which is required as a result of its Android 13 operating system. So yes, app downloads are a thing here, though how your WhatsApp and TikTok will look on the Krono is anyone’s guess.
That’s why DuRoBo isn’t pitching this as an e-reader, even though the display makes it perfect for the task. Instead, it’s an “AI-powered ePaper Focus Hub,” meaning that you’ll be using it for note-taking and voice notes — which are then transcribed into text using the dubious power of ‘artificial intelligence’ — as well as reading those Susanne Collins novels you promised your high-school self that you’d always get to. An app called Spark facilitates vocal and typed note-taking, after which “you can transcribe them into text and use the AI Summary to distil key points.”
A physical key that looks, to us at least, like the Digital Crown™ found on Apple’s Watch lineup is used to access voice mode. Give the Smart Dial a poke, and you can dictate your thoughts as they happen before handing it all over to the Spark app and the onboard Libby AI.
A 3,950mAh battery keeps the whole thing alive between charges via USB-C, a must given the beefier hardware. The Krono supports ePub, MOBI, AZW3 (Amazon may not appreciate that), and PDF file formats. It also plays MP3 and WAV files, which you can listen to via connected Bluetooth headphones. Play Store support means users can download the appropriate app for their preferred e-book outlet instead of being forced into one or the other by hardware limitations.
The company behind this one is using Kickstarter for pre-orders, while looking to raise $23,342. If you want one, and a case to go with it, it’ll set you back some R5,200 (€250) if you’re an early-enough bird. Final shipping countries aren’t yet confirmed, but the African continent is on the list. The DuRoBo Krono is expected to depart from warehouses in November this year.
