The new Amazon Kindle you got over the holidays can already be jailbroken

C. Scott Brown / Android Authority

Amazon introduced a whole lineup of new Kindle e-readers last fall, and chances are that more than a few of you ended up with one as a holiday gift. After all, they’re hugely popular, pretty affordable, and who doesn’t enjoy a good book? While a Kindle is going to be quite a bit more limited with what you can do with it compared to a good Android tablet, you’ve still got some options for exploring outside Amazon’s walled garden, like support for sideloading other e-books. But if you crave even more flexibility from your new Kindle, we’ve got just what the doctor ordered, with news of a powerful new jailbreak.

Jailbreaking involves taking advantage of a software flaw in Amazon’s Kindle software that — thanks to the hard work of some dedicated community members — can be used to install unapproved, non-Amazon software. Efforts to jailbreak Kindles have been ongoing for years now, and as Amazon releases patches to close the holes that make jailbreaking possible, devs only end up finding new ones.

The latest Kindle jailbreak was released by HackerDude earlier this week, and it supports Kindles from the sixth generation forward — basically anything that came out since 2013 (via Android Police). That includes even models like our beloved Kindle Oasis.

C. Scott Brown / Android Authority

Called WinterBreak, the jailbreak requires access to a PC and Wi-Fi network, and your Kindle will have to be already registered. That’s a pretty low bar to entry, and getting started is as easy as copying some files over to the e-reader. Follow the provided guide, connecting to the Kindle Store and tapping icons when needed, and you should be less than a minute away from having a jailbroken Kindle.

What do you do once your Kindle’s been opened up? Well, you could start by improving its support for different file types by installing a document reader like KOReader. Rather than using conversion utilities to get your docs into a format the Kindle natively likes, KOReader just lets you access them directly, including stuff like compressed comic book archives.

Knowing Amazon, it might not be too long before current Kindles start getting an update that closes this jailbreak, so if you’re at all curious about seeing what else you can do with your Kindle, don’t wait any longer to give WinterBreak a try.

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