Why it matters: Amazon’s newly announced Alexa+ represents the most significant upgrade to the voice assistant since its debut, transforming it into a powerful AI-powered personal assistant that can handle complex tasks, engage in natural conversations, and process visual information—positioning Amazon to compete directly with Apple’s Siri and Google’s Gemini in the evolving AI assistant market.
Free for Prime members, $19.99 for others
Amazon revealed Alexa+ on February 26, 2025, with early access beginning in late March for U.S. customers. The service costs $19.99 per month but comes at no additional cost for Amazon Prime members—a strategic move that adds significant value to the Prime subscription.
Most existing Alexa-enabled devices will be compatible with the new service, though Echo Show models will receive priority access to the full feature set.
Powered by multiple LLMs for more natural interactions
The upgraded assistant is built on several large language models, including Amazon’s own Nova model and partner systems from companies like Anthropic. This multi-model approach enables more natural conversations without requiring specific command phrases.
Users can engage in flowing discussions with contextual awareness, as Alexa+ remembers previous interactions and personal preferences to deliver more relevant responses.
New visual and agentic capabilities
Alexa+ introduces multimodal interactions through device cameras, allowing it to process visual information and respond to what it sees—from analyzing documents to identifying objects.
More impressively, the assistant gains agentic capabilities, enabling it to navigate websites and complete online forms on behalf of users. This means Alexa+ can now:
- Book concert tickets
- Arrange Uber rides
- Make restaurant reservations
- Create voice-activated routines
- Move music between rooms
- Provide summaries of Ring camera events
- Extract information from documents, including dense legal texts and handwritten notes
Enhanced smart home controls
Smart home integration receives significant improvements, with Alexa+ better understanding natural language commands and inferring device names and locations without requiring specific identifiers.
The assistant’s new flowing blue animation appears on device screens during responses, providing visual feedback during conversations.