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Kindle desktop app: the apps Amazon ships, and Kindle for Web

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Amazon still offers a Kindle app for Windows 11 and for Mac, and the old Kindle for PC is unsupported as of June 30, 2026. Kindle Cloud Reader is now Kindle for Web at read.amazon.com, a reader in the browser, while the desktop apps are where Amazon says a purchased book can be downloaded. A Pake window around read.amazon.com is that same web reader with its own icon, which also gives Linux, absent from Amazon's supported list, a Kindle on the desktop.

What Amazon offers on a computer

Amazon's install page for the desktop app lists Windows 11 and Mac OS X 10.14 or higher. It says the legacy Kindle app, previously called Kindle for PC, isn't supported as of June 30, 2026, and that any other operating system should use Kindle for Web.

On a Mac, the install steps are to open the App Store, search for Kindle, and choose Get or Update. The setup page for the new Kindle for Mac says it needs macOS 11 or higher, that support for the old app, now called Kindle Classic, was ending by October 31, 2023, that purchased books appear once you sign in, and that personal documents have to be imported with Send to Kindle. If the App Store will not install it on macOS 10.14 or 10.15, Amazon's answer for unsupported systems is Kindle for Web.

The download page says a purchased book can be downloaded on the Kindle apps for PC, Mac, iOS and Android, and that Kindle for Web is for reading online. The personal documents page puts PDFs and Word documents in Kindle for Windows, under the left navigation menu, or on other Kindle apps and devices. A book you need offline, a personal document, or a title the web reader will not open belongs in the Kindle app; the rest of this page puts the web reader in a window.

What Kindle for Web can do

read.amazon.com says Kindle Cloud Reader is now known as Kindle for Web. It lists browsing and sampling books, magazines and comics, reading on any device after sign-in, notes and highlights, searching a book for words, phrases or names, and a dictionary lookup by pressing and holding a word, then releasing.

The customize page puts the controls behind the Aa icon at the top of an open book; if the bar is hidden, move to the top to reveal it. The choices are Bookerly, Amazon Ember or OpenDyslexic, 14 font sizes, four page colors, one or two columns, a narrow, medium or wide margin, and reading progress as time left in the chapter, page in the book, time left in the book, or a mix. These settings synchronize to other Kindle for Web sessions in desktop and mobile browsers, and the page does not say they reach an e-reader. Notes go further: on the edit-notes page, you open a note from the Note icon, or from the Notebook icon and its pencil, click Save, and the change reaches all your Kindle apps and devices.

What is Kindle for Web lists the minimum desktop browsers as Chrome 87, Firefox 78, Safari 11 and Edge 87, and says not all titles can be read there; those need the Kindle app or a Kindle e-reader.

Personal documents stay out of this reader. The notes table marks Kindle for Web "N/A (personal documents aren't supported yet)", while Kindle for Mac and Kindle for PC get text notes and highlights. Send to Kindle accepts HTML, RTF, text, common images, PDF and EPUB; its web upload takes files of 200 MB or smaller, and Add to your library lets any device linked to the account download them. That page names devices and the Kindle app as destinations, not Kindle for Web. Mac and Windows also have a separate Send to Kindle app for uploads.

When a separate window helps

A browser tab is enough for one chapter. A window helps when the reader stays beside notes or a draft, or when you want Kindle in the Dock, the Start menu or an app launcher.

Pake's install page covers macOS 14 or later, including Intel, Windows 10 version 2004 or later, and Arch-based Linux such as Omarchy. Other Linux distributions use the CLI, which needs Node.js 20.9 or later and Rust 1.85 or later.

Kindle is in the gallery under Reading. On the Create tab, type Kindle into Paste a web address or search the apps below to start, or paste https://read.amazon.com/ if the tile is missing. The entry carries the address, name, icon and the line "Read your Kindle books", with no tuned size, CSS or JavaScript, so every option starts at its default (Create an app). Leave Incognito off to keep the sign-in, then click Create App.

With the CLI, after the setup guide:

pake https://read.amazon.com --name Kindle --width 900 --height 1000

On a Mac, --install copies the built app into /Applications; the CLI options list the rest.

A window shaped for a page

The default window is 1200 × 780, wide and short for a page of text. Size on Mac and Linux, Window size on Windows, sets the starting width and height, each between 200 and 10000. Try 900 × 1000 and see how Kindle lays out the page. A size you set by dragging is remembered until you change the size from My Apps with Edit and Save Changes (Manage your apps).

Page zoom is separate from Kindle's 14 font sizes: Cmd = and Cmd - on Mac, Ctrl = and Ctrl - on Windows and Linux, Cmd 0 or Ctrl 0 to reset (Keyboard shortcuts). Dark window darkens only the title bar and frame; the page keeps the color you chose under Aa (FAQ).

Find in page adds Cmd F or Ctrl F to search the page in the window. Kindle's own search covers the whole book, so turn it on only if you also want the page-level one.

Always on top keeps a narrow reader above a notes app, and on a Mac Hide title bar lets the page run to the top edge. WeRead on the desktop uses the same pair.

pake https://read.amazon.com --name Kindle --width 900 --height 1000 --always-on-top

Sign in and keep your place

A browser session does not carry over, so sign in inside the window, then quit and reopen once. With Incognito off the app keeps cookies and site data; with it on, every launch starts signed out. For a second Amazon account, Add Another Account in the ⋯ menu of My Apps copies the settings and icon under a new name, such as Kindle 2, signed out (Two accounts on one website).

The window reopens on the last page. --no-restore-last-url opens the packaged address every time and keeps the sign-in, and changing the address in My Apps clears the remembered page.

How the window works

Pake has no Kindle reader of its own; it opens read.amazon.com in the system web view. That is WKWebView on macOS, as the CLI FAQ notes, the Microsoft Edge WebView2 Runtime on Windows, which Windows 11 already includes, and WebKitGTK on Linux, which pacman installs with the package (install page). WKWebView is WebKit, the engine behind Safari, and WebView2 is Edge's, two families Amazon's browser list names; WebKitGTK is not on it. WKWebView explained covers how that view differs from Safari: no Safari extensions, and a data store of its own.

On Windows the app keeps logins, cookies and storage in its own WebView2 profile under %APPDATA%\<identifier>, and passwords saved in a CLI build are not shared with Chrome or Edge. On a Mac, the last page and window frame are files in ~/Library/Application Support/<identifier>. An empty User agent under Advanced uses Safari on Mac and Chrome on Windows; the CLI default is a Safari string on macOS and Linux and a Chrome string on Windows. Either way the engine stays the same (User agents in web apps).

When something goes wrong

  • The book is missing or will not open. Not every title is on Kindle for Web. Try the same account in Chrome, Firefox, Safari or Edge: missing there too means the Kindle app or an e-reader; opening there but not in the window means the Kindle app on Windows 11 or Mac.
  • A Send to Kindle PDF or EPUB is not there. Kindle for Web does not support personal documents yet. Use Kindle for Windows, the new Kindle for Mac after a Send to Kindle import, or another Kindle app or device.
  • The chapter will not open offline. Downloads are a Kindle app feature, not part of Kindle for Web.
  • Sign-in is asked on every launch. If Incognito is on, choose Edit, turn it off and Save Changes; the app stays in place. If it is off, Amazon may have expired the session.
  • The page is blank or the login loops. Reload with Cmd R or Ctrl R, then try a browser from Amazon's list.
  • You cannot see the address. On a Mac, Cmd L copies the current URL; Windows and Linux have no such shortcut, so compare with a browser.
  • On a pure Wayland compositor, especially niri, an AppImage opens but clicks and keys miss the page. The CLI FAQ says to launch it with PAKE_LINUX_WEBKIT_SAFE_MODE=0, and with PAKE_LINUX_WEBKIT_SAFE_MODE=1 if the window then goes blank.