Tiny e-readers are everywhere these days. Popularized by the Xteink 4 last year, this category is now booming, with several companies seeing the appeal behind having the tiniest tiny Kindle-like experience in your pocket anywhere you go, without added bulk or weight.
Flowtica, for example, has made the Verso that also doubles as a note-taker, but everyone has their eyes on another name: Boox. The company, which has popularized portable e-ink readers with its Palma series, has been teasing its own tiny e-reader too: the Picco.
At IFA 2026, Boox let me have some hands-on time with an early unit of the Picco to get a better understanding of the product. I spent half an hour swiping, reading, and checking settings, and I’m honestly impressed.
The Boox Picco is so, so, so tiny
Did I mention it’s tiny?
It’s tough to explain in words and even in photos how small the Picco is. It is minuscule. The whole device is basically the size of the 3.97-inch touchscreen display with some bezels all around. A stack of credit cards would be the same size basically.
When I first held it, I was amazed by the size, how easily it fit in my hands and pockets, and how thin it is. Boox hasn’t announced exact dimensions, but this couldn’t have been thicker than 5mm. Unlike Xteink, Boox has skipped the built-in magnets, which helps keep the weight and thickness down.
Although I like the idea of a device that magnetically attaches to my phone and that I carry all the time without thinking, I have to admit that I always get annoyed when there’s something permanently stuck to my phone. So I don’t mind the fact that Boox has skipped it here.
Hardware wise, you’re looking at a microSD card slot on one side for storing books, flanked by an up/down rocker that lets you flip through pages, and a power button. On the other side, you have the front light switch which can control the night mode or the entire display light.
And on the bottom, the Boox Picco has a USB-C port for charging — a welcome feature considering the Xteink X4 Pro skips it for the proprietary and finicky magnetic charging system.
No Android, but the software looks good
Boox has thought of all the features
Moving from hardware to software, Boox has skipped Android for this reader — understandably. Running Android would require much more powerful hardware, which can get bulkier, heavier, and more expensive. That’s not the purpose of the Picco.
These tiny e-ink readers are made for reading first and foremost; they don’t need access to the Play Store. Just put your books on a microSD card and start gobbling down words. Done. No need for third-party apps, Google accounts, and other shenanigans.
Obviously, there’s more to it, though. Boox has a few preinstalled apps of its own, like a Pomodoro timer, a countdown, a todo list, an image viewer, and a Reading Stats page that shows you how long you’ve been read, how many pages, the number of days, and more. It’s a cool addition.
What I like, though, is that Boox is offering several ways to transfer books to the Picco. You can use the microSD card as mentioned, but also USB, the cloud, and even your phone over a local LAN network.
When I went digging in settings, I found options for almost everything I could think of. The side buttons can be customized for short and long presses. The side button can control the night mode or the entire front light. There’s also a way to change the sleep screen.
When you’re reading, you can trigger two overlays, too, full of extra controls: The top one brings up brightness and warmth, whereas the bottom one lets you customize the book’s font, size, height, alignment, spacing, and more.
Reading is cool and practical again
Boox has yet to announce the Picco, so we don’t know much about pricing, battery life, processors, exact dimensions and weight, connectivity (though there’s Wi-Fi and Bluetooth clearly), book formats supported, built-in storage, and more.
What we do know is that the Picco should be coming around November, and more details will appear then, including pricing. I’m holding out hope that Boox will manage to remain within the same range as the Xteink X4 Pro: a $100 or so Picco would be excellent.
My hands-on time with it has me very excited for this product category — much more than the Boox Palma 2 Pro I’ve been using. I can easily imagine keeping a Picco in my backpack or my pocket to read on the metro, without having to worry about larger e-readers that add bulk and weight to my daily carry.
