Amazon Fire 7 (2017)

Crazily cheap price ; Decent media performance ; Strong battery life

Screen extremely dull and low-res ; Amazon Appstore still thin on the ground ; Camera verges on useless

Amazon is still in a $50/£50 tablet league of its own with the Fire 7 (2017), but the low-res display is now arguably a cut too far for a modern media-focused device.

Fantastic price. Large content ecosystem. Good parental controls.

Slow performance. Poor camera. Weak speaker.

Yes, there are other cheap tablets out there. You can find them on the shelves at your local drug store, or in the depths of Amazon.com. Many of their specs are similar to the Fire's; some even have more storage. Still, though, they give me the willies...

Warm colour palette ; Price ; Good battery life ; Tonally balanced through headphones ; Alexa integration

Unsophisticated picture ; Tinny built-in speakers ; Poor camera

A cheap and cheerful tablet that's good value for money

Great value for money ; Solid build ; Seamless integration with your Amazon account ; MicroSD card slot for storage expansion on a budget

Tech spec isn't great ; Could do with faster charging ; Limited resolution ; Mono speaker is lacklustre

The Fire 7 has won itself a lot of fans based on its happy-go-lucky positioning at the bottom of the tablet pile. It's one of those devices that you'd probably dismiss based on the spec sheet, if it wasn't for its ridiculously affordable price point....

price ; IPS panel ; decent battery life ; solid build quality

poor CPU & GPU ; slow storage ; poor cameras ; speaker

Considering its low price of only $49, the Fire 7 (2017) is a nice and well-rounded offer. We would have preferred to see a more significant upgrade but unfortunately, the slow SoC and internal storage, the low-resolution display, and only 1 GB of RAM...

That price ; Solid build ; Loads of content for Amazon users ; Great for kids

That screen ; Prone to crashes ; Lacks some big apps

The Fire 7’s far from the best tablet but it’s easily the best ultra-cheap tablet

The Amazon Fire 7 is inexpensive, runs Amazon's user-friendly operating system and houses a microSD card slot expandable up to 256GB. This 2017 edition is slightly lighter and battery life has been improved. Amazon Prime members can access the bevy of...

1,024x600 display is sub-HD quality and not as sharp as the display on the step-up Fire HD 8, which doesn't cost much more. To truly take advantage of what the tablet has to offer, you need an Amazon Prime membership and there's no access to Google...

Despite its performance limitations, you'll be hard-pressed to find a better entry-level tablet than the 2017 Amazon Fire 7.

It's certainly not perfect, and the lack of Google apps will still put some people off, but the Fire is excellent value at under £50. The latest Fire OS is so Android-like that it's easy to use, and the Fire for Kids app makes it possible to limit what...