Review: Ozeri Kandle

Do you live with someone who likes to read in bed? I do. LincsGeek often wants to read a chapter or two on his Kindle when I’m already well on the way to sleep. But of course this means that a light must be left on.

There are a number of solutions. Obviously the latest Kindles and other e-readers have backlit displays, but LincsGeek has one without, so it is down to the bedside lamp to provide the light he needs to read by. Our lamps have a few dimness settings so it’s not too bad, but it does light up quite a large part of the room. Another option is to invest in a lamp specifically designed for e-readers.

This is the Ozeri Kandle, an LED lamp designed to fit most e-readers including Kindle. The premise is very simple; it slots on the top of the Kindle and provides localised lighting that allows someone to read without lighting a whole room.

The Kandle fits easily on the top of a Kindle (we don’t have any other e-readers to test it on) and seems sturdy. We wondered whether it would fall off because there is no clip fastening or anything to keep it in place, but the foam padding does the job of keeping it in place without any wobble.

The three LEDs, which are arranged in a line, are on the end of a goose-neck stalk so you can bend the light to where you want it. Being an LED light it is very efficient and does not get hot, and offers a bright white light superior to the dim yellow light of our bedside lamps. But being three LEDs worth of bright light, even with the dimmer of the two settings, it was very very bright, maybe a bit too bright. When we tested it in daylight (I know…) it seemed to glare a lot on the screen, which worried us, but actually once the room was dark and we tried it again it didn’t seem so bad on the screen and with the goose-neck stalk it was easy to get it into a position where there was no glare at all. LincsGeek always uses the softer of the two settings and says that offers plenty of light to read by, and commented that it could do with being more focussed in the shape of the screen rather than a wide spread of light.

Something to note is that LincsGeek keeps his Kindle in a rather nice protective leather case; an official Kindle one. But the light won’t slot on the top of the e-reader if it is in a case because the fitting is not adjustable, so he had to take it out to use it. That’s a shame really, a bit of a pain.

Oh and for the record, in a world where “does not contain batteries” is an all too common sight on packaging, it was a welcome change to find the Kandle came with a set of batteries installed into the light ready, and a spare set for when those go. Good show. It’ll be interesting to see how many hours reading one set of batteries offers.