Setting up Talebrix: power, wi-fi, profiles
Setting up is a grown-up's job and happens once. Put the machine somewhere near a socket and in reach of the wi-fi, plug it in, join the wi-fi on the 7-inch colour touch panel, add a profile for each child with a name for the cover and a reading level, and load the first blank book. No app is needed, and the child never has an account.
Last checked 5 November 2026 by Tom McDonough, Co-Founder and CTO
Talebrix is not on sale yet, and production is targeted for June 2027. This page describes the design, and it will change if the design does.
The five steps
Step 1
Find it a place
A shelf or a table in the child's bedroom works, at a height a child can reach the screen and the red button. It needs a socket nearby and the wi-fi in range.
Step 2
Plug it in
It runs from an external 24 V supply. There is no battery, so there is nothing to charge and nothing to run down, and the machine stays where it is put.
Step 3
Join the wi-fi on the screen
Choose your network from the list and type the password on the touchscreen. The password is kept on the machine and is not sent anywhere.
It needs the wi-fi to make a book, because the story is written and drawn on Talebrix's own servers rather than on the machine.
Step 4
Add a profile for each child
A profile is a name and a reading level. The name is what is printed on the cover as the author, so a nickname is fine. The reading level can be set from an age. No birthday is asked for.
Step 5
Load the first blank book
Put a blank book in through the slot at the bottom of the front. The finished book comes back out of the same slot.
The grown-ups' app, which is optional
An app for grown-ups is planned, to look after the profiles, see the books that have been made and order Story Packs. It is optional. A household that never installs it can set up and use the machine from its own screen.
The app is for grown-ups only. There is nothing for a child to log into, anywhere.
Changing a reading level later
Children grow, and so does the writing. A grown-up can change a profile's reading level at any time, and the next book is written for the new one. Books already made are not changed.
Questions families ask
- Does my child need an app or an account?
- No app or account is needed for the child. A parent sets up the device and its reading profiles. Children speak their ideas and choose between options on the touchscreen; the finished story is read as a printed book.
- Does Talebrix itself ask for anything about my child?
- When a grown-up sets it up, it asks for a nickname and an age or reading level, never a birthday. To make a book, what your child says, the story and the pictures are worked out on computers over the internet rather than on the machine. We plan for recordings to be deleted, and for the companies we use to be barred from learning from them, and we will hold them to that before launch. This website collects nothing about your child.
How this page is kept true
Every number on this page is read from the same facts the rest of the site uses, so when a fact changes the page changes with it. The date at the top changes only when a person has read the page against the product.
- First published.