All kindles can now be jailbroken, thanks to new jailbreak method.
WinterBreak
WinterBreak is a jailbreak which was released on New Year’s Day 2025 by HackerDude
It is based on Mesquito
Thanks, Amazon, for motivating a bunch of people to fucking hate you.
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Wow, they decide to kill off downloading books over USB and karma immediately strikes back lol
Huh, TIL, my gf has a relatively old Kindle, are all the models affected?
She uses Calibre to get her books.
Poor wording on my part, they're removing the ability to download books directly from Amazon to your computer. You can still transfer books via USB using Calibre.
Hers's an article from The Verge with more info. My apologies.
She should be fine, but yes on newer kindles like the Scribe (came out in 2022 so not exactly brand-new now) they removed the "mass storage mode" (= what made kindles show up on a pc as a usb drive).
Calibre can work with the newer MTP mode (which is similar to what android phones have) but it's a lot less reliable and requires that no other app, including the OS, file manager, is accessing the device at the same time. It's frustrating and I'm very happy to have jailbroken it, now I can use SFTP to browse the folders much more speedily.
What are some cool things to do with a jailbroken Kindle?
Installing Koreader which can do a million things, but also playing around with terminal access, python, bash scripting, neofetch, usb-network, SSH. For older kindles: the screensaver hack was my first reason to ever jailbreak one.
According to that site you can downgrade the firmware (some people really disliked the various UI changes and the firmware is getting quite prescriptive)
You can also run your own homebrew apps so I found someone who installed KOReader which they claim is better experience than default reader especially for pdfs and also link better to personal cloud storage.
There's also ability to use locally stored Web Application Frameworks but I'm not 100% sure what the use case would be.
The main Reason I've done it is to install KOreader since it handles other formats, especially PDFs better than the stock Reader. Though you can also run your own homebrew apps as well like other people have pointed out. I personally don't bother though since Ereaders are usually best for a single purpose, reading ebooks on an eink display, and mediocre at best for other applications. The eink display tends to be its Achilles heel when it comes to anything that isn't reading ebooks, at least in my opinion.
Kobos don't need jailbreaking and have better performance
For those of us who will only buy electronics used, kindle is usually the only option. And far cheaper too. So its nice that the device can be opened up a bit.
I'd never heard of these, thanks! I been trying to find old Kindles for sale, but this looks like a much better choice.
ETA: they're also a Canadian company, win-win
My partner has a 'Boox' that runs android, complete with apk side loading its basically an android tablet! Super cool so far - there's even a model with a color screen!
I slapped the Nextcloud app on there and she has been syncing her books between her phone and the Boox!
Edit= the brand name is called Boox! Autocorrect makes a fool of me yet again
what is a good kobo to invest in on the cheaper side?
$140 – the Kobo Clara BW (black and white/e-ink) is clutch. Dark mode, plays well with calibre, a wide range of supported formats, and way more storage and battery life than you’ll ever need.
Edit: it is one of the first devices to utilize the E Ink Carta 1300 screen. It’s filled with e-books from Annas Archive loaded by Calibre on Debian and never complained about compatibility.
Oh finally! I wanted a new launcher installed and have all ads removed. Now I can finally do it! Thanks for the news!!
I have a Kobo which is already pretty open from the start and I can install Koreader, Plato and other softwares on this thing without having to jailbreak it. But this is a really cool thing, and now I may hunt the marketplace for a cheap used Kindle and install Koreader on it without having to worry about which version it has.
I have kept à disconnected kindle for a few years after I completely stopped using amazon for anything - today I wouldn't even be seen with one as carrying one is a bit like advertising for the company
These are the best ereaders period, my kobo Clara 2e is sluggish, night mode is shit, USB connection to Calibre is "when I want, if I want"... But I'm not a billboard for that business. Too bad, really good devices, and hurray for all the people who will enjoy them away from amazon
Is there a way to turn them into smart screens for home automation? I don’t want a glowing lcd on the wall…
Pocketbook uses a Linux OS
Great idea
Apparantly you can install Android on some Kindle devices. Then you'd have many possibilities.
As far as I know, it's literally just Linux, so anything is possible
I tried this on my already jailbreakable kindle and it wasn't very fruitful
Omg this is so exciting, I love jailbreaking devices and jailbreaking my mom's old ass kindle was oddly tricky.
My kindle have not been connected to the internet since 2015.
I've never had any reason to connect either. It would just try installing updates that make the UI shittier.
This seems wise, is there any perk of having wifi on if you only load books with USB?
Only if you want to synch reading progress between multiple devices.
Can it play doom now?
Any real benefits of jailbreaking a Kindle? I mean I know the "You free yourself from amazon!" elevator pitch, but what exactly does that mean?
I can already upload pretty much anything I want to it with Calibre. Can I add support for other ebook formats? Cooler utilities on my Scribe? Alternative ebook stores (yes I know where I am)? A user interface that isn't absolute garbage?
I guess if you already own a Kindle then you might be interested in jailbreaking it. But for someone choosing an ereader it seems that Kobo is just a better choice. Isn't it? Like, why pay to put yourself in a jailed system in the first place?
My kindle could already handle everything the Kobo I was looking at could do, but was far cheaper than the Kobo due to a sale (and Amazon thinking I'm dumb enough to be locked into their system)
Literally using Calibre is enough to turn your Kindle into a piracy machine, so if you can get one cheap it's long been my recommendation for people
Kindles are easy to come across 2nd hand for free or a few bucks
Haven’t done a thorough research so take this with a grain of salt, but it seems in my country kindles are significantly cheaper than kobos.
hell yes i will be doing this right away so i can continue To not use my kindle or read books because im FUCKED
mood
Behind me I have physical copies of books I want to read SO BADLY and they’re all like 40-69 pages in and haven’t been touched in months
Why are we like this
the internet
After the feature of being able to send EPUB files to Kindle through email and them being automatically converted... I have not felt I was missing anything by using standard Kindle software.
So I'd suggest, unless you really really need some obscure feature, Calibre+Kindle is nowadays perfectly fine, and maybe you shouldn't risk bricking your device.
So I'd suggest, unless you really really need some obscure feature, Calibre+Kindle is nowadays perfectly fine, and maybe you shouldn't risk bricking your device.
Uhm... Well about that... You will not be able to transfer books onto you kindle via USB in about a week. Amazon is going to remove that feature from all Kindles next week. The only way to do that may be through the method you described. But how long will they offer that, if they say they are removing the USB feature because of piracy? You cannot pirate books onto your kindle, when you cannot transfer books from outside of Amazon onto it. (Also this is a nice reason for them to block you from buying books anywhere else than on Amazon, of course)
https://www.theverge.com/news/612898/amazon-removing-kindle-book-download-transfer-usb
I think you fundamentally misunderstand what Amazon is removing. From your linked article:
Once this feature goes away, you’ll still be able to manually copy ebook files and other documents to Kindles over USB using Amazon’s apps or third-party solutions like Calibre. You just won’t be able to download copies of your purchased books to a computer.
The only thing Amazon is removing is the ability to save books that you purchased from them. No more personal backups of legally purchased material, but piracy is still fair game.
Okay, yeah, that is definitely concerning.
Can this make Overdrive/Libby integration easier? Thats really the main thing pissing me off about Kindles.
That's cool. I may keep an eye out for old Kindles in thrift stores and whatnot. With the advent of android tablets that just have e paper displays, I probably will try those before buying another kindle.
Anyone know how to set custom screen idle images after doing this? I've been wanting to put 'Don't Panic' on my 6th gen paperwhite since I got it but it's so locked down that wasn't possible.
Custom sleep picture is one of the features of KOReader. Pretty easy to spot it in the settings.
I decided to go ahead and install KOReader and check it out. It's pretty neat although I can't find what you're describing in the settings.
In any case I was hoping to find a way to do this without having to switch to a separate user interface.
🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳
Is there a way to change the Library to be able to see epub files? I have KOReader installed now, but I have to go through the directory to find my epub files.
You can set a specific folder as the "home" folder on koreader by long pressing the folder where your files are located. I put all my epubs in there with moisaic viewing style.
Cool!
What for? Cuz loading pirated books is trivial?
Well for one, koreader is awesome.
It has preferences I like, syncs reading position to anything else running koreader, and syncs my current reading queue from Dropbox.
Kill ads on the cheaper one would be my main if not only use case.
Installing an alternative reader that can read other formats is mentioned a few times, but honestly, with Calibre that became a non-issue decades ago. Need to transfer them via cable anyway, converting in the process takes a few seconds at most.
Isn't a cracked (old, I think?) Kindle the only way to pirate KU/DRM titles? At least, that's what I recall from the last time I looked into it. There's a book I really wanted to format shift from KU since Google TTS was fucking up all the proper nouns, but I gave up. (It was an obscure book that isn't available anywhere pirated.)
Ah I wouldn't know about THAT. I just download and convert epubs from the likes of z-library/libgen, and have done so since getting my first Kindle circa 2012
What does it do?
What this make? I have my kindle in planemode because I don't want to get updated and loss my USB connection capabilities
edit: I jailbreaked it, now it can't get amazon updates anymore!
Sick luckily mines already jail broken but will keep this saved for future. I would love to see a bigger modding scene like custom os akin to android
im glad i got a normal tablet over an ereader, s9fe surprisingly is fire (i read comic books mostly), relatively cheap tablets are solid now, too big at 11 inches to one hand comfortably but better for video so ill make the sacrifice. Expected cheaper tablets to be garbage since my only experience was like a decade ago, now they're all pretty good, the lenovo ones are better/cheaper off aliexpress and have usable nits (brightness) compared to the us models.
If just for reading ereader is much easier on the eyes and amazing battery life. Completely different products I think.
E-reader is a much better experience for reading text but tablets are better for comics. There’s very limited color e-ink options and they’re very expensive with pretty washed out colors.
You know what's easy on the eyes? Dark mode.
Is comic rack still the standard software for comics?
It is, and it's been revived! https://github.com/maforget/ComicRackCE
I use a tachiyomi fork yokai
Giving me something to do with my current kindle. I wasn't sure how to load to it my downloaded books, so I've been suffering on my phone, but hopefully this helps me out a bunch. Thanks. This is a rabbit hole I never knew existed.
That title was extremely disappointing to read. Initially read it as, "All kinds can now be jailbroken, thanks to new jailbreak method." and was like, "What?! Yeahhhh we're gonna jailbreak all the things!!!"
Then I saw what it really said. Cool, but meh. Happy for all the Kindle owners but I already solved that problem by just not buying a Kindle. Such disappoint. (눈_눈)