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Amazon reportedly making a tablet that costs just $50

Amazon reportedly making a tablet that costs just $50

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That's less than the cheapest Kindle

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Amazon hasn't had great success trying to sell its own high-end electronics, but maybe it will continue to find more success at the low end. According to The Wall Street Journal, Amazon is preparing to aggressively attack the super cheap tablet market this holiday season with a $50 device that has a 6-inch screen. That's half the price of the company's current 6-inch Fire HD tablet, and even less expensive than the company's Kindle reader, which starts at $79.

The low-end tablet market is a strange place with lots of garbage, but Amazon has actually made some decent inexpensive devices. The current 6-inch Fire HD tablet is one of the cheapest tablets worth buying, and while the idea of an even cheaper tablet sounds wild, anything that performs less capably than Amazon's current low-end tablet could be too compromised to be usable. There are no specs yet, but WSJ suggests the new $50 device will test the limits of cost savings — even a stereo speaker is reportedly too rich for this tablet.

Amazon could also be exploring other ways to make the $50 target price possible. The company's current Fire HD tablets may be as cheap as they are because of lock screen ads, and Amazon could expand ads like those to reach the $50 mark.

WSJ reports that Amazon will also release new 8-inch and 10-inch tablets later this year. There are no details about those yet, but if they're anything like the company's HDX tablets they could be among the best cheap tablets you can buy. As for the $50 device? That's a big "we'll see."