Kindle: Scroll or Page Turn?

[The Masked Scrivener]

When Kindle introduced scroll reading I jumped on board and never looked back. I found it easier to read, which I do primary on my phone, when the text was at or near the top of the screen. Also, not have to turn a page to read the next word in a sentence was nice.

Recently I got a book, first in a series, that does not have the ability to read in scroll mode, so I am forced to use page turn. It reminded me how much I enjoyed the scroll reading feature.

Is there someone that prefers page turn over scroll that can make a good case? Is there a reason I should go with page turn that I'm missing?

[sliderule]

Is there someone that prefers page turn over scroll that can make a good case?

Not me. I just happen to like page turn and prefer it.

All about preferences.

[Thorvald Meyers]

I started out page-turning but eventually switched to scrolling. The shift happened after mobile browsers got much better at rendering text (and probably blog hosts & other websites got better at optimizing content for phone screens!).  I don't remember exactly when, but I was trying to read a Kindle book that hadn't been formatted very well—odd line breaks and such—and in exasperation I toggled to scrolling instead.

It worked fine. I never switched back.

Although I think if I owned a tablet, and used it to read books and magazines, I would probably switch back to page-turns. Reading a long article, and definitely any book, on a phone is like driving with a viewslit instead of a windshield. It's better than not making the drive at all! But if my screen were the size of a comic book or a magazine, I would want to swipe through the pages.

Scrolling works best for me right now, with the screen I have.

[Luke Everhart]

I use page turning on my Kindle. Just personal preference but anything that preserves something of the real book experience is 👍

[elleoco]

I think scrolling cheats us KU people out of page reads. Maybe not on the phone app, but on an actual Kindle it does.

[Gerri Attrick]

I have a mobile (cell) phone which I barely use for anything, including making phone calls.

I also have an old Kindle with page turn buttons which I love - I can hold it and turn pages one handed - and I loathe touching screens in order to read. Heaven knows what I'm going to do when it gives up the ghost. I had my eye on a Kindle Voyage, which also had page turn buttons, though it was vastly more expensive than the one I own, but they seemed to have stopped making the Voyage for some reason. *Grump*

[sliderule]

I think scrolling cheats us KU people out of page reads. Maybe not on the phone app, but on an actual Kindle it does.

Do you have any data on that?

I'm not asking because I'm a jerk but because I was concerned about the same thing on my Kindle.

[Lynn]

I think scrolling cheats us KU people out of page reads. Maybe not on the phone app, but on an actual Kindle it does.

Do you have any data on that?

I'm not asking because I'm a jerk but because I was concerned about the same thing on my Kindle.

I don't see how it's possible since it's my understanding that "pages" are just kindle locations. Kindle locations go flying by in page turn or scroll. You can test it just by making the font bigger on the device. Suddenly what was a page isn't a page. That's why it depends on kindle locations.

[elleoco]

I think scrolling cheats us KU people out of page reads. Maybe not on the phone app, but on an actual Kindle it does.

Do you have any data on that?

No, I'm just remembering posts on the Other Place from people who said they tested on some of their own books. It was back when there was a lot of discussion about bots set up to zoom through books to get page reads and Amazon's attempts to stop it. That was at least a couple of years ago, and I'm sure there have been changes in both the way people try to cheat and the way Amazon tries to address it since then, and if there's been more discussion like that I missed it. I think a lot of people who were really concerned just quit KU.