Walmart is now taking pre-orders for the XO Tablet. The 7 inch tablet comes from the folks behind the One Laptop per Child project, and it’s an inexpensive tablet aimed at kids and featuring an emphasis on educational software.

The tablet’s available for pre-order for $149, and the tablet is expected to ship August 1st.

XO Tablet

The XO Tablet has a 7 inch screen, WiFi, and a removable rubberized case which helps protect the device from scuffs and falls.

It runs Google Android, and you can download and run apps from the Google Play Store. But what makes the XO Tablet different from most Android tablets is the custom user interface and software designed for kids and parents.

The default software offers access to videos, games, books, and other software, and includes a Journal app which lets parents see how much time their kids are spending on different activities.

There are also parental controls which let you limit the apps and content your kids can access, and support for up to 3 user profiles per device which you can use to customize apps and parental controls on a per-user basis.

When I got a chance to look at a prototype earlier this year, the XO Tablet was powered by a 1 GHz Marvell Armada processor and had 512MB of RAM, 4GB of storage, and a 7 inch, 1024 x 600 pixel display.

I can’t tell if those specs have changed in the past half year, because the website and Walmart item listing don’t really dwell on the tablet’s hardware. Instead the emphasis is on the software.

The XO Tablet is hardly the first tablet designed for kids. Fuhu, Ematic, and Archos all make Android tablets aimed at children and teens. But the XO is a bit unusual thanks to the OLPC Foundation’s pedigree in developing low-cost devices and software for students in developing (and developed) nations.

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5 replies on “XO Kid’s Tablet goes on sale at Walmart for $149”

  1. This seems to be a dual core. So that have changed the SoC.

    Maybe based on RK3066, which is 1.6Ghz?

  2. I’ve been wanting this for my kids forever — it looks like there is a ton of content already sorted and ready to go right when you turn it on?! No more sifting through the Google play store trying to find apps for my kids for my nexus, only to spend a bunch of money and have the kids not like them… plus it can be hard and time consuming to make sure that they’re quality apps that don’t have ads and the ability to buy more “coins” (learned that mistake the hard way). I was going to buy a Nabi, but I looked up Fuhu on the Better Business Bureau and quickly changed my mind… plus they don’t have the Google play store, so I wouldn’t be able to download any additional content if I wanted to. I’m definitely going to give this one a try. Love that they’re giving back to the community! And the Spanish interface for my older son who is learning Spanish in school!

  3. Got the Fuhu Nabi XD tablet for my son. It did NOT have the promised parental software as promised, so could not limit my son’s use based on the time of day. That being said, he had the OLPC XO-1 to use before and it does not compare to his XD. Reading the specs before, I would stick with the 10″ XD tablet and not get the OLPC model.

  4. Not a good deal considering the harware specs. I am also not sure a custom UI is needed for kids. Anyone who has seen a 3 – 5 year old use their parents cell phone or ipad can tell you they figure them out amazingly fast. Parental controls on the otherhand are a great idea.

    1. I’m not going to get hung up on specs until I can test drive one. If they’ve done the software right it could outperform tablets that look much better on paper.

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