If I had to do it all over again, I'd probably go with the Kobo Clara BW. My tiny ass Kindle does just fine though. Just don't like being tied to Amazon because of it. I basically pirate all my stuff so I can't comment on the storefront of each.
The HD was what I was looking at when I ended up with my Kindle. I fell victim to the sunk cost fallacy since I had a few books on Kindle already and didn't know how easy getting books actually was. I went with the new 2022 model Kindle I think. It still does what I need it for and it does it well. I think I've had like 3 reboot relaled issues in the 2 years that I've had it. Open box or refurbished Clara sounds like a great deal though.