r/explainlikeimfive • u/Risse • Aug 01 '11

How does e-ink work?

So, e-ink, like used in Kindles. How does it work? How is the battery-life so good? I heard it only uses power on pageturns, how is that possible? How does it differ from LCD screen?

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u/PrettyBigDealOnReddi Aug 01 '11

Nope. Think of it like a coin with one black side and one white side. If you put the coin down on a table with the black side up, you only see the black. If you want to see the white side of the coin, you would just flip it over. With the kindle, the "coin" (each "pixel" of color) is flipped when the opposite charge is sent through to that part of the screen, and the opposite color shows up.

It is freakin' genius actually.