The stuff Hacker News actually recommends.

E-readers and e-ink · reMarkable

reMarkable Pro

6owners with an opinion
40%of verdicts positive
2/3positive/negative since 2024
0happy after 3+ years

Praised for display and build quality; criticized for software and performance.

What owners wrote

Neutral
Same; avid reader of printed books here. I have more pdfs I can count (most coming from Humble Bundle impulse buying), but nothing beats physical books for me. I got a remarkable pro, and it's just slightly better than screen. Being able to annotate books is actually a welcomed addition, and the screen is pretty decent. But flipping screen is slow (compared to a printed book), and going back and forth between pages is a hassle. Until we have the speed of a tablet (read: instant), with the screen quality of an e-ink, I don't think I'll voluntarily retire printed books. Now, I have an O'Reilly subscription (two actually, through school and ACM), but the app is sadly horrendous, as OP mentioned. Hard to believe this is actually their core business.
Doesn’t like it
Cool but wish it was either a phone case (draw in e-ink on back of phone) or had good sync to my macbook (my letter paper size remarkable table is absolute garbage at sync - very painful process). This isn't convenient enough to warrant existing imo. Ironically the $2 aliexpress lcd pad I bought gets more use than my remarkable these days (same as https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BBPV4491 )
Doesn’t like it
Pretty disappointing release. Over the years, I have bought 3 reMarkable 2 and 1 reMarkable Pro. That move to colors and having to charge a pen instead of more features (a Kindle integration will be sweet), faster devices, and focusing on better feedback on writing seems a bit of a fumble.
Doesn’t like it
I just returned my ReMarkable Pro. I found that split screen was something I wanted and though I had a work around with using my iPad much like Op here, it wasn't ideal. The big nail in the coffin for me was difficulty integrating into my workflow / application stack. I had to use a couple scripts I hacked together to get the data from ReMarkable into the tools I use regularly. For the cost Invested I decided it was just too much. The tech wasn't bad, I was impressed with the build quality, and I think there is a market, without a Jailbreak / easy integration it's just not for me at this time. Bummer.
Likes it
Committing to Apple’s Reminders instead of continuing to fritz with various to-do apps. Reminders was good enough and I havent thought about switching in a couple of years now. For hardware+software, the Remarkable 2 tablet changed my life. I was never a handwritten notes person and was never even an organized person. I read some book on organization and was like, “I should try being organized.” Bought the Remarkable 2 with the logic that if I spent $500 on the thing and never used it, I’d feel like a moron. I’ve been using it daily for about 3 years now and just upgraded to the Pro and love it even more.
Likes itHasn’t owned it
Writing this on an iPad - have bought like 5 RM2s for myself, employees and kids. It’s a great device. I just ordered the Pro. It comes very close to replacing a pad of paper, and has a bunch of quality of life benefits over paper. I’m not saying it’s better than a pad of paper, but it’s the first eink device I had used that offered a principled alternative. I mainly use it for my journal/planner, using like a 1200 page PDF. Could I have that PDF on my iPad? Yep. Do I? No, the experience of the ultra high quality iPad color, pixels, brightness, interface, UI, all that just puts your (my) brain in a different space. Anyway, it’s not for everyone, but I think most people who give it a try for note writing prefer it to the iPad.