onn. 8-Inch Tablet Review (2024)

When it comes to affordable tablets, Amazon's Fire lineup has long been our primary recommendation. Walmart's 8-inch onn. tablet ($64), however, is a surprisingly compelling alternative to the $49.99 Fire 7 and the $79.99 Fire HD 8. Amazon's tablets remain better for beginners, but they're also geared toward consuming Amazon content. If you want more freedom, the onn. tablet offers a relatively stock version of Android 9 and unfettered access to the Google Play store.

Design and Display

The onn. tablet is a plastic slab that measures in around 8.3 by 5.0 by 0.3 inches (HWD) and weighs 12 ounces. The front houses an 8-inch display surrounded by large black bezels, while the back is made of textured navy blue plastic.

The top of the tablet is home to a headphone jack and microSD slot, which you'll probably need since there's only 11GB of available storage out of the box. A volume rocker and power button are on the right side of the tablet, the left is bare, and the bottom holds the micro USB charging port.

Resolution comes in at 1,200 by 800 pixels, the same as the Fire HD 8 and slightly higher than the Fire 7 (1,020 by 600 pixels). The screen itself is an IPS LCD that's constructed of plastic. Although polycarbonate is more durable than glass, it scratches more easily and makes for more resistance when you're tapping around or scrolling through a webpage. In this regard, we prefer the glass displays on the Fire tablets, which also look brighter and more vivid in general.

Hardware and Performance

The onn. tablet is powered by a MediaTek MT8163 chipset along with 2GB of RAM, which is more RAM than you get in the Fire 7 (1GB) and the Fire HD 8 (1.5GB).

See How We Test Tablets

Performance is what you'd expect for the price. The onn. is fine for basic tasks like streaming video, scrolling through social media, and reading ebooks, but struggles with anything more substantial. We tried playing PUBG Mobile, and not only did it take a considerable amount of time to load, there were so many skipped frames that we quickly gave up. There's also a noticeable delay when loading other apps and swiping between screens, but it's still faster than what we experienced on the Fire 7.

In our battery drain test, in which we stream HD video over Wi-Fi at full brightness, the tablet's 3,500mAh cell lasted just 3 hours and 58 minutes before dying. That's a little worse than the Fire 7 (4 hours, 11 minutes) and the Fire HD 8 (4 hours, 50 minutes), but your mileage may vary with more conservative use. When you find yourself running low on juice, a micro USB cable and adapter are included in the box, but be prepared to wait, as there's no option for fast charging.

Audio and Cameras

The onn. has a single rear-firing speaker with a peak volume of 92dB. Audio sounds okay at lower volumes, but becomes tinny and flat once you begin to turn it up. It's fine for listening to Instagram stories, but you're probably not going to want to use it for streaming multimedia. Luckily there's a headphone jack as well as Bluetooth for connecting headphones and speakers.

Unsurprisingly, the camera experience here is poor. The 2MP rear camera struggles in bright light, but is fine if you need to scan a document. The front camera comes in at just 0.3MP and isn't good for selfies or video chat.

Software

This is where the onn. excels. While most affordable tablets run old versions of Android with lots of bloatware, the onn. 8-inch runs a nearly stock version of Android 9.0 Pie. Aside from a handful of Walmart shopping apps and odd Walmart icon in the navigation bar, what you see here looks similar to what you get on any other Android 9 phone or tablet.

For comparison, Fire tablets run a heavily modified version of Android called Fire OS. It's focused on putting Amazon products and services front and center, replacing all of Google's apps and services with custom Amazon alternatives. It's easier to use than stock Android, which can feel a little alienating to newbies, and if you use a lot of Amazon services, a Fire tablet is probably the way to go. But if you're fond of Google's apps, or simply want the freedom to download whatever you want from Google Play, the onn. is a better fit for you.

That said, the buck probably stops here when it comes to software updates. It's also likely that security patches and any other updates will be few and far between.

Conclusions

For $64, the 8-inch onn. tablet is a suprisingly good value for people who want an inexpensive, no-frills Android slate. It's a capable multimedia device, with full access to Google apps and services. Beginners, however, will likely be better served by the Fire HD 8, which has a nicer display, longer battery life, and an easier-to-use interface. Ultimately, given the relatively similar hardware, your choice should come down to software.