Kindle Paperwhite (11th Gen) not loading thumbnails from Amazon books

johnnyb · 10-06-2025, 05:58 PM

So I have recently found a Paperwhite in the back of my drawer and actually enjoy it as a on the go reader. I have completely factory reset it but it refuses to download the thumbnails for many of the books I have bought on Amazon. I know there is a workaround for Calibre books but none that I know of for books tethered to Amazon. I have checked the hidden thumbnails folder and cleared all all the “no cover available” 1kb jpegs but this did not lead to the Kindle attempting to reload the thumbnails.
A second factory reset didn’t do anything either. The Kindle has no issues extracting the covers from the book for the sleep screen.

I know there used to be some command to clear the cache but I forgot what is was and don’t even know if it still works.

Does anyone here have any idea what I can do to fix this?
I did move my account from the US to the UK a while ago. Could this have anything to do with it?

tomsem · 10-06-2025, 09:09 PM

This sounds like the same thing that can happen when publisher decides to re-list a title and it gets issued a new, different ASIN. This appears to 'orphan' the previously listed book and its ASIN, and the ASIN is what informs the download service which thumbnail image to download to the Kindle.

[I'm guessing that when this happens, the book also lacks Xray and popular highlights (if it had any in the first place).]

If you go to Content page for your account and locate one of the affected books, click on the title and see what product page it comes up with. It may display a 'SORRY we couldn't find that page' image and (in the one I tried) a picture of a dog named Rocco Deluca, "meet the dogs of Amazon". I purchased the book in 2009, but pretty sure I've seen it in more recent books. The book is still listed, but with a different ASIN.

You will probably find (as I did with above book) that these books do have cover thumbnails when downloaded with one of the Kindle apps. The apps are able to generate thumbnail from the Cover image in the book. Kindles will only do this for Personal Documents (send via Send To Kindle or side-loaded).

Quoth · Yesterday, 07:07 AM

It used to work on Kindles to generate a thumbnail. No doubt Amazon thinks the stupid change to use the shop web page is an improvement. It's just stupid.

johnnyb · Yesterday, 10:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tomsem

This sounds like the same thing that can happen when publisher decides to re-list a title and it gets issued a new, different ASIN. This appears to 'orphan' the previously listed book and its ASIN, and the ASIN is what informs the download service which thumbnail image to download to the Kindle.

[I'm guessing that when this happens, the book also lacks Xray and popular highlights (if it had any in the first place).]

If you go to Content page for your account and locate one of the affected books, click on the title and see what product page it comes up with. It may display a 'SORRY we couldn't find that page' image and (in the one I tried) a picture of a dog named Rocco Deluca, "meet the dogs of Amazon". I purchased the book in 2009, but pretty sure I've seen it in more recent books. The book is still listed, but with a different ASIN.

You will probably find (as I did with above book) that these books do have cover thumbnails when downloaded with one of the Kindle apps. The apps are able to generate thumbnail from the Cover image in the book. Kindles will only do this for Personal Documents (send via Send To Kindle or side-loaded).

Thank you I will give this a try later.
If that is indeed the case with my books, I am definitely not buying any more books from Amazon. What a way to devalue these purchases.

JSWolf · Yesterday, 11:02 AM

Are your eBooks from the US and you are not registered with a UK account?

johnnyb · Yesterday, 05:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Are your eBooks from the US and you are not registered with a UK account?

My ebooks are from a US account and I have used the “move account” feature to move my books to a UK account. All within Amazon.

Oh and btw I can now confirm that this is indeed the reason. The books affected are not listed in the UK account (but are still sold in the US).
This basically means that the book download just grabs covers from the shop it’s in, not from a general repository of asin-tagged books.
This must be the dumbest thing anyone has ever programmed. I guess that settles it then and I am moving my stuff over to Kobo where displaying book covers doesn’t seem to have been turned into a problem of rocket science.

JSWolf · Yesterday, 09:00 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by johnnyb

My ebooks are from a US account and I have used the “move account” feature to move my books to a UK account. All within Amazon.

Oh and btw I can now confirm that this is indeed the reason. The books affected are not listed in the UK account (but are still sold in the US).
This basically means that the book download just grabs covers from the shop it’s in, not from a general repository of asin-tagged books.
This must be the dumbest thing anyone has ever programmed. I guess that settles it then and I am moving my stuff over to Kobo where displaying book covers doesn’t seem to have been turned into a problem of rocket science.

Since you have a PW5, calibre has a work around for it.

johnnyb · Today, 12:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Since you have a PW5, calibre has a work around for it.

What do you mean?

10-06-2025, 05:58 PM	#1
johnnyb Cloud Reader Posts: 1,132 Karma: 4000066 Join Date: Aug 2010 Device: Kindle Paperwhite, Boox Note Air 4C, Remarkable PP Move, iPad Pro 11	Kindle Paperwhite (11th Gen) not loading thumbnails from Amazon books So I have recently found a Paperwhite in the back of my drawer and actually enjoy it as a on the go reader. I have completely factory reset it but it refuses to download the thumbnails for many of the books I have bought on Amazon. I know there is a workaround for Calibre books but none that I know of for books tethered to Amazon. I have checked the hidden thumbnails folder and cleared all all the “no cover available” 1kb jpegs but this did not lead to the Kindle attempting to reload the thumbnails. A second factory reset didn’t do anything either. The Kindle has no issues extracting the covers from the book for the sleep screen. I know there used to be some command to clear the cache but I forgot what is was and don’t even know if it still works. Does anyone here have any idea what I can do to fix this? I did move my account from the US to the UK a while ago. Could this have anything to do with it?

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10-06-2025, 09:09 PM	#2
tomsem Grand Sorcerer Posts: 6,993 Karma: 27060353 Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: USA Device: iPhone 15PM, Kindle Scribe, iPad mini 6, PocketBook InkPad Color 3	This sounds like the same thing that can happen when publisher decides to re-list a title and it gets issued a new, different ASIN. This appears to 'orphan' the previously listed book and its ASIN, and the ASIN is what informs the download service which thumbnail image to download to the Kindle. [I'm guessing that when this happens, the book also lacks Xray and popular highlights (if it had any in the first place).] If you go to Content page for your account and locate one of the affected books, click on the title and see what product page it comes up with. It may display a 'SORRY we couldn't find that page' image and (in the one I tried) a picture of a dog named Rocco Deluca, "meet the dogs of Amazon". I purchased the book in 2009, but pretty sure I've seen it in more recent books. The book is still listed, but with a different ASIN. You will probably find (as I did with above book) that these books do have cover thumbnails when downloaded with one of the Kindle apps. The apps are able to generate thumbnail from the Cover image in the book. Kindles will only do this for Personal Documents (send via Send To Kindle or side-loaded).

Yesterday, 07:07 AM	#3
Quoth Still reading Posts: 14,799 Karma: 110486575 Join Date: Jun 2017 Location: Ireland Device: All 4 Kinds: epub eink, Kindle, android eink, NxtPaper	It used to work on Kindles to generate a thumbnail. No doubt Amazon thinks the stupid change to use the shop web page is an improvement. It's just stupid.

Yesterday, 11:02 AM	#5
JSWolf Resident Curmudgeon Posts: 80,468 Karma: 150249619 Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Roslindale, Massachusetts Device: Kobo Libra 2, Kobo Aura H2O, PRS-650, PRS-T1, nook STR, PW3	Are your eBooks from the US and you are not registered with a UK account?