Everything Amazon has announced so far in October 2026
Amazon is abandoning Fire tablets to move towards a new line of more high-end devices. Alexa tablets will be available in the United States, Mexico and Canada on October 14 and five days later in the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy and Spain. They come in three sizes, the smallest two of which are primarily for entertainment purposes.
The Alexa Tablet 8 (which starts at $230) has an 8.7-inch display, an 8-core CPU, a 2-core GPU, 4GB of RAM, and 64GB or 128GB of storage. It measures 0.3 inches thick and weighs 16.4 ounces, so it’s the most portable of the bunch. Amazon claims to offer up to 14 hours of video playback and 19 hours of Kindle reading (more on that soon) for an additional fee.
Next, we have the Alexa 11 tablet, featuring an 11-inch 2.5K display with a 90Hz refresh rate and a cinematic 16:10 aspect ratio. Along with an 8-core CPU and a 2-core CPU, it has a fifth-generation MDLA NPU to support on-device AI processing. The tablet also has 8 GB of RAM, the same storage options as its little brother and two Dolby Atmos speakers. The battery will provide up to 15 hours of video playback, Amazon claims. This tablet starts at $330.
Then there’s the flagship model, the Alexa Tablet 12 Pro, which costs $500. Amazon claims it’s the most powerful model yet, with “three times faster processing and nine times faster graphics” than any of its previous tablets. The 12-inch, 280 PPI display has a 120Hz refresh rate and a 3:2 aspect ratio. The tablet has an 8-core CPU, 7-core GPU, 8th generation MDLA NPU, 8GB of RAM, and 128GB of storage. Battery life reaches 16 hours for video playback and 20 hours for Kindle use, according to Amazon. As with the Alexa Tablet 11, the Alexa Tablet 12 Pro has a fingerprint sensor.
There is an anti-glare option that is supposed to preserve detail and color accuracy. It’s called Nanomatte and if you want this on your tablet, it’ll cost you $50 more.
The Alexa Tablet 12 Pro is designed more for productivity. To that end, there are accessories like the $90 Alexa Tablet Pro Stylus and the $150 Alexa Tablet Pro Keyboard, which connect magnetically to the device.
Of course, all tablets have Alexa+ integration. You can enable a feature that lets you ask Assistant for anything displayed on your screen. Amazon designed the Kindle experience (the Kindle app is installed by default) to be distraction-free with reduced blue light. The Nanomatte screen is said to give ebooks a paper-like feel, and you can add notes to books using the Pro Pen.
Amazon
There are also kids’ versions of the Alexa Tablet 8 and Alexa Tablet 11. Like other Alexa tablets, these have an aluminum design but come with a “child-proof case” to help protect them. These versions also come with one year of access to Amazon Kids+.
As expected, Amazon bid farewell to Fire OS. Alexa tablets run Android 16 with a custom layer on top. As such, they offer direct access to the Google Play Store. As someone who has had to jump through hoops to access apps outside of the limited selection that Amazon itself offers on Fire tablets, this is a very welcome change. Unfortunately, it looks like the Alexa tablets don’t have a microSD card slot that you can use to expand the storage.
