Image credit: Philip Sowels/Saga Magazine
Alexa is Amazon’s personal digital assistant. And a personal digital assistant is a very handy thing to have in your home and on the go: you can use it to control your smart speaker, to answer questions and even control smart-home devices.
You’ll find Alexa in every model of Amazon Echo smart speaker – the Echo, Echo Pop, EchoDot and Echo Studio – as well as in the Fire TV Stick and many third-party speakers. Getting started couldn’t be simpler.
Find the Alexa app in the Apple and Google stores
The Alexa app is available from the Apple App Store and the Google Play Store. Simply install the app on your phone, plug in your Alexa-powered smart speaker (in this case, we’re using the Echo Studio, but the process is the same for all Echo models) and open the app.
In the Alexa app, tap on Devices at the bottom of the screen. Now tap on the big plus sign at the top right and follow the on-screen instructions.
For more information, read our how to set up a smart speaker guide.
Once you’ve set up your smart speaker, Alexa is ready to use.
You can command Alexa in three ways: via the Alexa app using your voice or the keyboard; by saying “Alexa” and following it with a command or question; or by tapping the action button on your Echo speaker – it’s the one with a circle on it – and speaking your command then.
“Alexa” is what’s known as a wake word: your speaker listens for it and when it hears it, activates and waits for a question or command.
You can change the Alexa wake word to “computer”, “Amazon”, “Echo” or “Ziggy” in the app by going into Devices, selecting your smart speaker, then scrolling down to Wake Word. You can also change Alexa’s accent and gender in that section.
Alexa can respond to commands and to questions. You can also use Alexa to add items to your shopping lists, set reminders, add calendar events and do other handy tasks.
To set an alarm or timer say, “Alexa, wake me up at 8am” or “Alexa, set a timer for 20 minutes”.
And you can ask all kinds of things: “Alexa, what’s 1 cup in millilitres?”; “Alexa, what’s the tallest mountain in the world?”; “Alexa, what’s the weather forecast?”
One of the most useful things Alexa can do is control your entertainment. You can say, “Alexa, play Rumours by Fleetwood Mac” and it’ll play the music; “Alexa, skip this” to move to the next track, and “Alexa, turn the volume up” to make it louder.
If you have a Fire TV Stick you can use similar commands to control your TV, such as “Alexa, open Netflix”.
There’s so much more too, with many things you didn’t know you could ask Alexa. And as we’re about to discover, you can make Alexa’s impressive features even more powerful with a couple of clicks.
There’s a wealth of options to choose from
Tap on the home icon in the Alexa app and you can now scroll down through some introductory help, such as this option to see what Alexa can do. You’ll also see an option to change Alexa’s voice and other settings.
If you tap on Browse Things to Try, you’ll be taken to the Alexa skills page, and that’s where things get really interesting.
This is how you link to other services
In addition to Alexa’s built-in commands, you can add new skills. These are downloads that expand what Alexa can do, for example by adding a specific radio station to your smart speaker.
The Alexa app will recommend some popular ones and there’s a search facility to help you find the best Alexa skills too.
Some skills enable you to link accounts from other services. For example, you can link your Spotify or Apple Music account to play music if you’re not an Amazon Music user. Those skills will ask you for your login details when you install them.
When you tap on the Launch button next to a skill, it’s installed to Alexa on all your devices: the phone app and any Alexa-powered smart speakers.
Control your heating, lighting and security in an instant
You can also add skills for specific smart-home devices, so for example if you have Philips Hue smart bulbs, you can install a skill so that Alexa can control them too.
You can even set up routines in the app to make things happen at certain times, or in response to certain events – such as turning on the lights when you say, “Alexa, I’m home!”
As you can see, it’s easy to set up and use Alexa on smart speakers – and we’ve just scratched the surface of what it can do. It’s a good idea to spend some time exploring the Alexa app and the available skills to see how Alexa can make your life easier and more entertaining too.
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