What's the average age of Kindle owners?

Amazon's marketing to a more youthful audience but the Kindle is proving appealing to seniors.

(Credit: Amazon)

In April of last year, a user on Amazon.com's forums opened a discussion thread entitled, Average Kindle Owner's Age.

Amazon, of course, doesn't provide any sales numbers or data detailing who's buying Kindles, but it's an interesting question to ask on the day of the Kindle 2's launch (according to reports, the device has already started shipping).

Apparently, a lot of senior folks bought the Kindle--and now the Kindle 2--partially because the digital reader is easier to handle than regular books for arthritis sufferers. It also helps that you can increase the font size, if you have trouble viewing small print in books.

When more textbooks arrive in Kindle format, and colleges require students to buy a Kindle 2 (at a discounted rate, hopefully), we might start seeing the age of owners skew younger. But combine the benefits for seniors with the device's relatively high price tag of close to $400 bucks (with cover), and I'm guessing that the average age for owners comes in around 45--even if Amazon is trying to reach a younger demographic with its new marketing campaign (see picture).

Anybody else care to guess? Or reveal your age, if you are a Kindle owner.

Editor's note: The link to the Amazon thread was initially broken. It's now fixed.

[Kev50027]

I dunno David, that's a pretty high average age. I would guess it's more like 30 or younger. If only because of the 45+ year olds I know, none of them even know what a Kindle is, let alone e-ink. True, once I described it to my mom (55), she was interested, but she wouldn't have found out on her own unless it was in the paper or something. Maybe I'm hanging with the wrong crowd, but the Kindle's target demographic seems like an interesting question. Old enough to have the money for it, and young enough to know about it, while old enough to love reading books.

[bitoflaurie]

The Kindle definitely has a lot of potential, and I wish Amazon would stop extending the 'early adopter' pricing strategy to the second gen too. Make it affordable already! I would have to read a book a week for this to be affordable, and since I maintain other interests such as seeing sunshine or talking to friends, I refuse to give my life away just to make this gadget a worthwhile purchase. Can't a girl have a light, portable reading experience even if she reads a book a month?
Oh and PS. the Amazon "Average Kindle Owner's Age" link is broken. Might be the extra 'http' in the link.

[steve5200]

I am 37, my wife is 48, and we bought our Kindle last fall. I did not realize that we were seniors already! We will have to start asking for our senior discount when we wheel our jazzys down to the blue hair cafeteria next Friday night.

[arshield]

I am 35 but the message boards that focus on Kindles do seem to be much older than any other message board that I participate in.

[margyh]

I don't know. kev50027, I think you're hanging out with the wrong "seniors". I'm 68, am about to receive my 2nd Kindle, and at least a dozen of my similarly-aged friends have Kindles. And, we are web-savvy and know when new gadgets come out!

[mattcolver]

I'm 53 and bought mine after an author I sat next to on a flight showed me hers. I ordered mine the next day. The convenience of ordering and having the books downloaded in seconds was great. Also adjustable font size sure helped too. I await the arrival of my kindle 2.

[KindleKat]

65 next month and this is my third ebook reader.

[casseo]

I am 55 and have been waiting for the Kindle to upgrade for about two years. Received an e-mail Saturday that mine has been shipped. I've been doing my web research and checked out e-ink at my neighborhood Border's store on their e-book brand. Most of the people that I know that have Kindles are over 50. You are hanging out w/the wrong "older" crowd.....all of my age group still work and enjoy the ease of technology as we remember when we had to "do it by hard copy."

[chowza]

I'm 58 and a co. executive who regularly travels on long international trips. I've had a Kindle 1 since they launched and couldn't be happier -- sure beats lugging around several paperbacks, and even outside the US, downloading books to my laptop and transferring via USB to my Kindle is fast and easy. To kev50027, the so-called "seniors" you know may not be tech-savvy, but please be reminded it was "our" generation that created personal computer and the internet, and it is "our" generation who own many of the co's that design and manufacture most of the electronics and related software in this world today. There are plenty of us "seniors" around who are extremely tech-savvy and far from being ready to be "put out to pasture".....:-)

[Kev50027]

Sorry, I never said people over 45 were "seniors". My father works for a well known printer company, and still knows little to nothing about the Amazon Kindle, other than what I've told him. I thought the Kindle was mostly a 'net' phenomenon, with early adopters jumping on board. Perhaps I'm wrong, but I'm still entitled to my opinion, and heck.. I might as well stick to it.

[strandcos--2008]

My wife and I both bought Kindles when they first came out. I am 74, and a gentleman, so my wife"s age will remain undisclosed. I really dislike the above young snots who think we are too far gone to form sensible opinions. I own a Linux netbook, 2 Macs, a Google G1. I program in C, HTML. CSS,.and shell script. I am an early adopter over the last 30 years: S100 CPM, UNIX, Next, (never Micro$oft), Handspings and at least 3 crappy ereaders. I think the Kindle is the best realized first generation device i have ever bought. It has paid for itself twice over in the number of books I have read. I bought it mostly because I travel a lot and used to have to carry several books with me. I still buy books I want to show off in my library ; e,g. the new Herodotus, but the mysteries and other books are fine on Kindle. I use it all the time now even when I am home. The font changes are good not because I am old and blind, but because it ti nice to enlarge the font when reading in bed or on a plane. I do wish it had more travel guides (how great would it be to go into a smaller town in Italy and be able to pull up a travel guide to find a good restaurant or hotel). Of course, it would be better if one could download directly outside of the U.S. At 230,000 books it is still short of many of books I look for and its foreign dictionaries and verb books do not include the best available. Nonetheless, I it is a very solid device. I wish the above know-it-all younger responders who continue to consider us ignorant and computer illiterate would remember: Age discrimination is as offensive and any other kind of discrimination.

P.S. to the younger generations: I do not do facebook or twitter. Having lived through the '50s, I know that keeping your anonymity is the best defense against Government oppression. Like tattoos, there may come a time when you wished you had realized how long you would live.

[CliffK2]

Not to hijack this thread, but you bring up an excellent point - privacy. It is my contention that the older generations, say 40 and older (I am 45), are more protective of their privacy. The younger generations, especially mid-20s and younger have only known a time when privacy was not a huge concern for them - re facebook and other software that tracks all you do. They have voluntarily given up their privacy for the advantages they perceive in twitter, etc..

I am not saying one way is better than the other, and obviously there will be exceptions to the above. I know many people who are my age and older who are totally into social-networking.

[mkinyon]

When I see Kindle owners on the bus to or from work, they are invariable in the well over 40 crowd. I would say 45 is a safe guess for average age.

[hugh5700]

Think about it. What demographic actually reads enough books regularly to need a device that can store dozens! So, yeah, I certainly expect the average age to be above 40. But not because of physical frailty, but because of mental agility.

[bankron]

65 book lover who reads less in book form and more items on the Internet. I hope to enjoy the ease of Kindle 2 book reading.

[filrite2u]

Re Kindle, I am 2 1/2 months short of 92. I read the WSJ on it @ 0500 AM and wonder why I still subscribe to the paper. I consider 60 an entry to adulthood and 80 to be the end of the apprenticeship. Kindle could be an enormous boost to the nation if the illiterati could only learn to read.

[HeinrichSS]

I am several months older than 70 and started using a computer in my pharmacy around 1975. Since I bought a Beta Max and 3 movies in the fall of 1978 for about $885 as I remembgeer as you could not rent VCR movies at that time I really would like a Kindle 2; however, after being burned on the price of the original Sony Beta Max I will definitely wait until the price comes down to a reasonale level, i.e. around $200

[Vactor413]

26, I was 25 when I got the first Kindle and the Kindle 2 is in the mail

[Ryansway]

106.. and like everyone else who bought the Edsel, I didn't know netbooks had been invented, which cost less, and have color .. and an operating system, and a bunch of other charming applications!

[AJBieber]

54 - Purchased Kindle I in November 2007 - awaiting arrival of Kindle II. I have never met another Kindle owner. I love gadgets and love to read. As a traveler this tool can't be beat.

[pmurph5]

I bought the Kindle 1.0 the first hour it was available, for my then-10 year old son. He uses it often, as do I (50). So I guess the average age in this household is 30 years old <grin>.

[lebonroute]

Can't let this question pass by -- (average age of Kindle users).

I am 66. Spouse is 77. I want the Kindle, which is "in the mail" primarily for reading the text of dense technical .pdf files. Spouse will read fiction, photography-related material, higher-level gardening and landscaping info.

We are definitely 'older' but not complete idiots. Three computers, two printers, digital cameras, wireless headphones, streaming movie(s) from Netflix. Yes, we can still figure out how to use all of our remote controls.

Age range may be skewed upward considerably in the current financial times in favor of those who still have some money left.