Which Tablet is Better, the Kindle Fire HD 6 Kids Edition or the Orbo Jr?

The Orbo Jr is a child-friendly 7″ Android tablet whilst the Kindle Fire HD 6 Kids Edition is a 6″ tablet based on Amazon’s popular Kindle Fire range. Although the Orbo Jr has a larger screen, the one on the HD 6 has better resolution, 1280×800 pixels compared to 1024×600. The Kids Edition is also available in a 7″ form, the HD 7 Kids Edition, which is slightly more expensive.

The Orbo Jr is an Android tablet running, currently, 4.1.2 Jelly Bean out of the box. The Kids Edition’s system, whilst based on Android, is Amazon’s own Fire OS, currently version 4, Sangria. This can mean that some Android content won’t work on the Kids Edition, but very few Android apps run on every Android device.

The Kids Edition has 8GB, compared to the Orbo’s 4; however, the Orbo Jr has a Micro SD Card port which allows the memory to be expanded by another 32GB. The Kids Edition lacks a port, but does have unlimited Amazon Cloud Storage, allowing files to be stored online using WiFi.

The Kids Edition has a speaker, whilst the Orbo has stereo speakers. Both have a 3.5mm headphone jack.

Both have two cameras. The rear facing one on both devices is 2.0 megapixel (MP), whilst the front facing one on the Kids edition is only 0.3 MP compared to the Orbo Jr’s 1.3 MP camera.

The Orbo Jr comes with a number of pre-installed apps and Google Play. The HD 6 comes with one year’s subscription to Amazon FreeTime Unlimited, which has over 5,000 hand-curated games, books, apps, films and television programmes that can be watched, read and used as much as wanted without any extra cost. Further content can be added to the HD 6 from Amazon using a parental account.

Both tablets have built-in WiFi, but the HD 6 also has Bluetooth, and both have a micro-USB port for connecting to other devices and charging.

The Kids Edition is more child safe with better parental controls, as children’s accounts are unable to access the browser, appstores, email or social media. None of the FreeTime content has either ads or in-app purchases.

The Kids Edition also comes with a “worry-Free” two year guarantee against breakage.