The Amazon Alexa is a powerful and intelligent personal assistant that allows you to make certain commands using the sound of your voice. Created by Amazon Lab126, it can do a number of different things like playback music, stream podcasts, create shopping lists, provide traffic and weather updates and even controls your smart home through home automation.
Top Amazon Alexa Features
There are so many voice-controlled commands you can give Alexa that make living life simpler. Some of the top features of Amazon Alexa include:
Starting Your Car
This is especially useful if you live in a colder climate. Before driving off to work, you can start and warm your car remotely. With the Blue Link skill, things like changing the interior temperature, unlocking or locking your car doors or turning on the lights without even getting into your car has never been easier.
Home Automation
Alexa can even make home automation easier. It’s compatible with smart home operations like Belkin WeMo smart switches, Lifx and Philips Hue smart bulbs, Emerson Sensi and Ecobee3 connected thermostats and SmartThings or Insteon connected home platforms. For instance, using Alexa, you can control your Nest thermostat which saves you energy by learning your habits. It helps lower your bill by changing the temperature in your home with the season. It alerts you of potential issues such as low temperatures that could burst pipes and even shows you your daily or monthly energy consumption.
Stream Your Favorite Music
You can have Alexa play your favorite artist, song or genre and she’ll pull it from the library of Amazon Prime Music and stream it for you. Alexa also works with Spotify, Pandora, TuneIn, iHeartRadio and other services.
Control Your Accounts
Using your voice, have Alexa help you conduct transactions that are tied to your credit cards, bank accounts, auto loans and mortgage payments. You can ask when your payments are due on your credit cards or even make credit card payments with the Capital One skill. Find out how much money you have in your bank account or how many payments you have left on your car before it’s paid off.
There is so much you can do with Alexa from setting alarms and timers to keeping tabs on the weather or traffic to answering your questions. Alexa’s Skills work like apps that teach her how to do things. She even works with big brands like Uber with her ride-flagging skill, Domino’s with her pizza-ordering skill and Capital One with her financial management skill. Although she can’t do everything, there is a whole range of things she can do.
