Here's everything Amazon promised back when it teased the future conversational Alexa AI

Date:
Wed, 26 Feb 2025 11:07:25 +0000

Description:
More intuitive, intelligent, and useful

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Hey Alexa, how many days has it been since September 20, 2023?

Ill tell you Its been 525 days since then. Thats a fact which has been on my mind, and potentially yours and countless other Alexa users, as thats the
date of the last Amazon Devices event at which Alexa AI was unveiled. Essentially, Amazon's plan for its virtual assistant, which lives in
countless Echo devices, was to get a large language model addition to make it more intuitive, intelligent, and useful.

525 days later, though, Alexa hasnt gotten a major upgrade, and Alexa AI
still isnt here with the promised upgrades. There is a very good chance were on the cusp of Amazon debuting its next Alexa, though, and hopefully rolling out the promised enhancements. Panos Panay Amazons head of devices will
take the stage for Amazons Devices and Services February 26th event , and you can read our live blog to follow along with the news as it breaks.

For now, though, lets flip the calendar back and walk through what Amazon promised. (Image credit: Amazon)

Amazon originally teased Alexa AI as the central brain for all its Echo devices back in September of 2023, but the company did hedge a bit on the rollout, noting it would arrive first in the US at an undisclosed date with a limited feature set.

One of the leading demos, which former devices head Dave Limp showed off on stage, was a much more conversational Alexa. You could talk back and forth more informally, much like with a family member or a friend, and ultimately, much like what ChatGPTs voice mode or Gemini Live is like today. It was an actual demo as well, in that it took a few attempts before it worked and Limp was able to chat with Alexa about his presentation.

It was a much more natural Alexa that could weave in the answers with a
better cadence. Further, it could pull on the knowledge it had learned about the household, answering queries about favorite sports team, and triggering multiple automations concurrently. It was a true personalization for Alexa, and that was the main promise. Back in 2023, it was impressive, but this is closer to the AI models we see and can interact with from the likes of OpenAI and Google today.

On the smart home side, the enhanced Alexa was promised to take action based on more human requests; instead of asking for your fans and heaters to be turned on, you could simply tell Alexa that youre too cold or warm and then it would automatically start adjusting connected smart home gadgets. It could also run through multiple smart home automations with the turn of a phrase
and even generate text if you ask.

Pretty neat. It's kind of a mixture of a true smart home assistant with intelligent cues paired with a modern AI chatbot; fitting that this landmark moment should be housed in the first virtual assistant to really captivate so many households and land a spot in millions of homes. (Image credit: Amazon)

That brings us to the present day. Will Panos Panay, the current head of devices, take what was already teased and build it into an actual drop for current Echo devices around the globe? Might it start in the US only with support for select devices? Time will tell, though judging by the initial promise of Alexa AI, that could likely be the case.

My hope, and lets say prediction, is that we see pieces of Alexa AI come to fruition and that Amazon will use this opportunity to really enhance home smarts and integrate AI chat further in a uniquely helpful way.

More critically, though, as my colleague Lance Ulanoff wrote, is that Amazon may or may not retain support for even its oldest Echos. Amazon has sold countless Echo devices, and while Alexa is great for controlling music and basic requests, unleashing this next-gen version on a bounty of hardware is exciting so we hope everyone gets the chance, no matter the age of their
Echo devices.

Still, though, Id take a shiny, new Echo smart speaker with an improved AZ1 Neural Edge chip and other hardware to really let this new Alexa burn down
the highway.

Either way, my first request to this new Alexa will be to play some Bruce Springsteen some things simply never change. Stick with TechRadar for the latest as Amazon unveils it at its February 26, 2025 event. @jakekrol

vlog, chill out, calm daily life(1370843) - SUNNY HOOD STUDIO You might
also like If Alexa 2.0 doesnt fix these 5 problems, I might be done with my Amazon Echo devices I love my 10-year-old Echo and am terrified Amazon's new Alexa is gonna brick it



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Link to news story: https://www.techradar.com/home/smart-home/heres-everything-amazon-promised-bac k-when-it-teased-the-future-conversational-alexa-ai


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