Huion Ink (EB1011) review: a feature-rich and fuss-free e-ink tablet

Most people strictly associate the entire e-ink tablet genre with just the Amazon Kindle e-book readers. This is because these are the most widely sold and affordable e-ink devices in the Indian market. It surely helps that these e-ink tablets let you read books and documents on a paper-like display with minimal eye strain.

However, even the top-of-the-line Kindle devices are quite limiting. For example, while these tablets let you read documents, you can’t annotate or create a document in your own handwriting. On the other hand, despite offering these facilities, traditional Android/iOS tablets can be too distracting and strain the eyes.

To offer you the best of both worlds, there is a third category of e-ink tablets that not only provide the amazing paper-like display of Kindle but also offer stylus/pen support to let you sketch, annotate, digitally sign documents, and even go through your emails. The most popular brand name in this category right now is reMarkable, but given its steep price tag of around Rs 55,000, there is another option you should consider: the Huion Ink (EB1011).

At the time of writing this review, I’ve spent around a month using the Huion Ink (EB1011). Before I dive into the detailed review, I just want to share that this e-ink tablet has already become my go-to device for taking notes, list-making, and reading books. Now that you know this, let me tell you how it reached this point.

Table of Contents

Initial impressions and the design

When I first received the review unit of the new Huion Ink, I admittedly had some doubts. I was not sure whether I would be able to include it in my daily routine or would have to force it. I was not even sure whether I would prefer it to my iPad or to take notes on my laptop (where I do most of my work) instead of the Ink. All these doubts went away swiftly. This shows that, regardless of how familiar you are with the tech world, some products must be used to understand their actual benefits.

Despite its relatively large size, the Huion Ink is quite sleek (5.5mm thick) and lightweight (440g), making it easy to carry around.

The tablet features a power-on/off button on the top, toward the right, and a USB Type-C charging slot at the bottom, sandwiched between the speaker grille. The SD card slot lets you expand local storage up to 2TB, in addition to the 64GB built-in storage.

Although the tablet’s build quality is solid, it ships with a PU leather book-style case in the retail box (no additional charge), which provides additional protection. Personally, I preferred using the tablet with the case as it felt natural (like a notebook).

Display and Pen (stylus) experience

The Huion Ink features a 10.3-inch e-ink display with a resolution of 1,872×1,404 pixels and a pixel density of 227 ppi. Like most e-ink panels, this display handles ambient light reflections well and offers a glare-free viewing experience. I found the text on the display to be quite crisp, and the panel perfectly legible in all sorts of lighting conditions. The key factor that makes the Huion Ink stand out from the competition is its built-in front light, which lets you see its content even in a pitch-dark room. Notably, this feature is missing from the reMarkable 2 (review), making it dependent on ambient light for use.

Since I’ve been using an old, non-backlit Kindle, I’ve found this to be a game-changer. I ended up using the Huion Ink to read books far more than my Kindle, as I could simply carry it to my bed like a regular book, but still be able to read it without a lamp that might disturb others sleeping in the room. That said, the latest 12th Gen Kindle Paperwhite comes with adjustable brightness and costs around Rs 17,000 for those interested.

Another quality-of-life feature of the front light is that you can adjust the colour temperature and brightness. With a warm colour tone, you can avoid blue light, ensuring your sleep quality isn’t affected, even if you use the Huion Ink at the end of the day.

The bundled EMR (Electro Magnetic Resonance) Pen thankfully doesn’t need to be charged and has a dedicated slot in the PU leather case. These small inclusions add up to improve the overall user experience. The Pen supports 8,192 levels of pressure sensitivity and tilt recognition, allowing you to use it comfortably like a regular pen.

As for writing and sketching, the EMR Pen was a seamless and satisfying experience, but I still feel the latency could be improved further. At times when I was writing a bit fast, it felt like the ink trail was falling behind ever so slightly; however, never by a frustrating margin.

One thing I noticed right away was that writing on this textured display felt closer to writing on paper, especially compared to writing on a smooth display like a regular tablet, like an iPad. Again, a very minor detail that might not matter to many, but those who are particular about their writing/sketching experience will really appreciate it.

While the OCR function allows you to convert handwriting into text for copying and exporting, I found that my words were often not properly recognised. Now, this could partly be due to my poor handwriting, but ideally, recognition should not be limited to ideal scenarios. Another small issue I faced was that the tablet occasionally detected mistouches and would take me out of the app. While the EB1011 usually rejected mistouches efficiently, these occasional issues were slightly jarring.

Features, battery life, and user interface

Huion Ink (EB1011) runs Android 11 out of the box and comes with 4GB of RAM and 64GB of built-in storage. This storage can be expanded by up to 2TB via a microSD card. The tablet offers a plethora of features such as Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Screenshot, Screen Cast, Auto-rotate, Airplane mode, and more. With Google Play Store support, you can install any app the tablet supports. However, I found out that the unit I received could not access the Google Play Store as the device did not have a locked bootloader. You don’t need to worry about this issue, as retail units sold on Amazon don’t have it. But I will not be able to share how Google apps fare on this tablet, which is a bit of a shame, as I really wanted to access Gmail and try YouTube on this e-ink display.

The local app market let me install some of the most popular apps for e-ink tablets, including Kindle, Skoobe, AIReaderX Pro, Moon+ Reader, NOOK, Audible, Sketchbook, and more. Some of these apps worked just fine, while others, like BBC News, were not supported because of an outdated Android version.

One of the tablet’s interesting features is Pen Tablet mode, which lets you connect it to a PC and write/sketch directly on it. For artists and creators, this is a must-have tool.

On a single charge, the tablet lasted around 10 days for me without battery saver mode, and Wi-Fi was enabled most of the time. The company claims a battery life of around 12 days in regular use, and if you do not push the tablet (like I did), you can easily get that much out of it.

The user interface and gesture support of the tablet are fairly easy to understand and get used to. If you swipe up from the bottom centre of the display within any app, you get to the home screen. If you swipe right, you go to the previous screen. If you swipe up or down from the left or the right side of the display, you can adjust the colour temperature. To access task management, you can swipe up from the bottom left and swiping up from the bottom right will refresh the page (to get rid of any residual ink from previous pages). Finally, if you swipe down from the top right, you can access most of the tablet settings from the drop-down panel.

Why go for an e-ink tablet? Should you buy Huion Ink EB1011?

One of the key points Huion highlights when pitching the EB1011 to users is that it is a distraction-free device that lets you focus on the tasks at hand. This is the key here. You should go for an e-ink tablet if you have a short attention span and are constantly distracted by notifications on other devices. But it doesn’t stop there; there is something lucrative about taking notes in your own handwriting that writing text via keyboard simply can’t match. Whether it’s nuanced symbols or sketches, using a stylus/pen rather than an on-screen keyboard with your fingers is a more satisfying experience, especially when you’re trying to move away from distracting devices.

This tablet also does a wonderful job as an e-book reader. Its front light and amazing display encourage you to read more. Unlike me, with Huion Ink you can even access emails when you want to work in a less distracting environment. All these aspects do make it a compelling package.

While the asking price of around Rs 40,000 feels steep, when you look at the other options, you will soon realise that the Huion Ink EB1011 is probably the best value-for-money option you can buy in this category. As I mentioned earlier, the reMarkable 2 costs around Rs 55,000 and doesn’t even feature a front light, which I described as a game-changer for the Huion tablet.

Having said this, I want to point out that e-ink tablets are not for the masses; these are productivity-centric devices that will make most sense to creators and professionals only. If you’re simply looking for an e-reader to read books, the 12th Gen Kindle Paperwhite (review) at Rs 16,999 will do the trick. But if you’re looking for an e-ink tablet that can do more, the Huion Ink EB1011 is worth considering.

Editor’s rating: 8.4 / 10

Pros:

Cons:

Home Reviews
Related Articles
© 91digital Web Private Limited. All Rights Reserved.