E-book or Physical Copy?
An unbiased opinion on what you should go for.
I’ve been reading for quite some time, I’ve tried both formats, e-books and their physical versions. I’ve often been asked which one’s better, a physical copy or get the Kindle edition. Truth be told, there’s no winner here. It simply comes down to one’s preferences. So to help you decide which format to go for, here’s my run down on the advantages and disadvantages of both e-books and paperbacks/hardcovers.
Physical copies : Paperbacks & Hardcovers
The Good :
If you’re really into the feel of holding a book in your hand, if you yearn for the smell of books, physical copies are a no-brainer! You won’t get any of those with a Kindle edition or some e-book.
The physical nature of books also appeals to the motivation of completing a book. You can actually see how much you’ve read, unlike an e-book, where you see is a percentage or number of pages.
If you’re one whose trying to build your own library, then, again, physical copies are the ones to go for.
No eye strain! We’re already ruining our vision and sleep cycles with our phone’s displays, add hours of reading a book to that, and I wish you the best of luck with your eyes. (This isn’t that big of a deal if you’re on a Kindle, or any e-ink display.)
Oh, if you want to be featured on Instagram pages like hotdudesreading, holding a physical copy would be more appealing than a Kindle.
The Bad:
They degrade. As all biological products, books too will degrade, slowly, but eventually. And by degradation I don’t mean complete biological degradation, where your books disappear, but foxing. Foxing are small yellowish-brown spots or blotches that appear on paper due to mold and iron contaminants in the paper. So you’ll have to take really good care if you want your books to look fresh for years.
If you read a lot of technical books or self-help books where you’re going to highlight lines and make notes, you’ll probably need to carry a highlighter and/or a pen/pencil. Oh, and a bookmark, if dog-eared pages trigger you.
There’s no in-built dictionary : If you are reading a book with a lot of new words that you need a look up, be prepared to pop out your phone and google the meaning. This then makes way to you forgetting about reading the book and taking care of all the notifications on your phone.
Large and heavy books can be a real pain to carry around. If you tend to carry around a book everywhere you go, a heavy book is definitely going to be painful. But this applies only to a few books.
E-books & Kindle editions
The Good :
Carry hundreds of books on your vacation in a tiny tablet. A typical book is hardly over 2MB and a Kindle has at least 8GB of storage (that’s 250 times more!). And if you’re reading on your phone or tablet, it’s got even more storage.
That highlighting and note-taking problem of physical copies, not here! Best part is, you can export your notes to a note taking app and then you can edit/format it as you want.
In-built dictionary means that jargon and sophisticated language doesn’t make you look up the meaning on your distraction filled phone.
You don’t need to carry anything, at all. Maybe the Kindle, if you own one, but if you’re reading on your phone, you can just open the app and get started. No physical book, no highlighters/pens, no bookmarks, just the one device.
If you own a Kindle, your reading experience is going to be distraction-free. The thing can do only one thing, and that’s let you read books, no notification, no messaging, nothing. Just you and the book. (Not applicable to mobile phones and tablets, obviously.)
Lastly, Kindle editions tend to be cheaper than the physical copies.
The Bad:
The page number indication can be annoying, especially in Kindle. Google Play Books app does a good job of that. But it’s just a cold number on your screen. You don’t actually see the progress. (Probably just me)
No book smell, unfortunately. That beautiful ‘book smell’ that you enjoy when you enter a book store or library, that smell that makes you take a deep breath to embrace the warm welcome of books. Sadly it’s not there here. I wish technology could simulate that every time I opened my Kindle.
Lastly, you can never see your entire book collection in one go. It’s just a bunch of files or cover images. If you have a shelf at home you could see rows of books and be proud of your collection and yourself for reading so much, something a book reading app or the Kindle can’t do well.
The Conclusion
By now you’ve probably got an idea of what you want. You’re probably one of two, a sucker for physical experience of holding a book and taking in the sight and smell of it. Or you are willing to sacrifice that for practicality. There are trade-offs with both.
One way to deal with this is buying both, but not of the same book (obviously). If your current book is a physical copy, maybe buy a Kindle edition of the next, or vice versa. Maybe there are books you want to own physically. Others can sit nicely in your Kindle. Or, buy physical copies of fiction, and e-books for technical and self-help books, for notes and lightning, because you probably don't have much to highlight in a fictional book.
At the end of the day, what matters is the fact that you’re reading. E-books or physical copies, they’re just mediums. It’s the content that matters. Choose what makes you read more, makes your reading experience better, not because someone said one is better than the other.
If you’ve decided that the Kindle is the way to go, I highly recommend my Kindle Paperwhite review. Something you should read before you buy one.
If you have any questions, feel free to comment down below, or DM me on Instagram or Twitter.
Happy Reading! :D
