BOOX BOOX 13.3" Tab X C E-Ink Tablet Review

The BOOX Tab X C has the best E-Ink screen you can buy, but it's a one-trick pony. Performance is mediocre, and it's expensive for what it does. Only buy this if you absolutely need a massive, color E-Ink canvas and nothing else.

The BOOX Tab X C is a tablet that makes zero sense for most people, but perfect sense for a few. It's got a massive 13.3-inch color E-Ink screen that's genuinely best-in-class, paired with Android 13 so you can run your reading and note-taking apps. Everything else about it, from the Qualcomm chip to the battery life, feels like an afterthought to serve that one glorious screen.

Think of it less as a tablet and more as a digital notebook or a specialized reader on steroids. It runs Android, which is a huge plus for app flexibility, but don't expect it to feel like a snappy iPad. It's built for a very specific, patient kind of user.

Let's be real: performance is not why you buy this. The Qualcomm octa-core CPU and 6GB of RAM land in the 'about average' to 'underwhelming' range compared to other tablets. In our tests, it scored poorly for productivity. Annotations and page turns are fine, but try to do too much at once or open a complex PDF and you'll feel the lag. The GPU is mediocre, so don't expect smooth gaming or video. The one shining star is the screen, which is in the 95th percentile—it's incredibly sharp for black and white text (300 ppi) and the color Kaleido 3 layer is the best you'll get on E-Ink right now, even if it's only 150 ppi.

At $820, the value proposition is razor-thin. You are paying a massive premium for that large, color E-Ink screen and for the rarity of the form factor. For that same money, you could get a top-tier Samsung Galaxy Tab or a base iPad Pro with infinitely better performance, app ecosystems, and media capabilities. This only becomes 'worth it' if your primary need is staring at a large, eye-friendly screen for hours on end for reading or note-taking, and you refuse to compromise with a smaller device.

Stack this up against the competition and its niche is clear. An iPad Pro with an M-series chip runs circles around it in speed and app optimization. A Samsung Galaxy Tab S10+ has a gorgeous OLED screen perfect for media. Even Microsoft's Surface Pro is a full Windows laptop replacement. The BOOX Tab X C loses badly in every conventional metric. Its only win is the E-Ink screen itself. Compared to other E-Ink tablets, it's one of the largest color options available, but you're trading a lot of performance and battery life for that real estate.

If you need a tablet for general use, media consumption, or any kind of creative work beyond simple note-taking and sketching, look elsewhere. The performance is mediocre, the color display isn't sharp enough for detailed art, and the price is too high for what is essentially a single-purpose device. An iPad or Android tablet will serve you far better.

Buy the BOOX Tab X C only if you are a dedicated digital reader, academic, or note-taker who needs the largest possible color E-Ink canvas and must have Android app compatibility. It's perfect for marking up PDFs, reading academic papers, or keeping a digital bullet journal without eye strain. For literally anyone else—students, media consumers, casual readers, or general tablet users—this is an easy skip. There are better, cheaper, and more versatile tools for every other job.