The company, better known for its Kindle e-reader and its online shopping site, has stated that its Fire smartphone contains features to address vision, hearing and motor-related impairments.
For vision-related impairments the phone features:
- A screen reader incorporating Ivona text-to-speech technology, adjustable to five different speeds.
- Navigation using accessibility gestures (including a tutorial on gestures) or through dragging a finger over items on the screen.
- A screen magnifier activated by a triple tap on the screen. Users can pinch to adjust the zoom level on the phone and swipe with two fingers to pan around a page.
- Options for high-contrast colour combinations.
For hearing-related impairments the phone features:
- Closed Captioning for Amazon Instant Videos (though captions not available for all titles).
- Adjustable captions (including text colour, size, opacity, font style, edge style, background colour).
- Hearing aid compatibility (Rated of T4/M4 and compliant with the US FCC Hearing Aid Compatibility requirements).
- TTY mode (text telephone/telecommunication device for the Deaf) offers Full, HCO (Hearing Carry Over), and VCO (Voice Carry Over) options.
- Stereo to mono audio — users can direct all audio through a single channel (left or right).
For mobility-related impairments the phone features:
- Amazon voice assist (voice dictation).
- One-handed navigation and shortcuts — tilt, auto-scroll, swivel and peek to access menus.
- Low motion mode — turns off tilt, auto-scroll, swivel, peek, and Dynamic Perspective features to avoid automatically launching any actions or panels.
The Fire is currently only available in the US and prices for the device start at US$199. Further details are available on Amazon’s Fire page.
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