7 Best Uses For Amazon Echo

The world we live is becoming “smarter and smarter” thanks to the technological advances that are being made pretty much every day, including when it comes to the Internet of things, so we wanted to take a look at the 7 best uses for Amazon Echo.

So, what is Amazon Echo, right? Well, this is the voice-enabled speaker the American retailer launched back in 2014, continuing to update it over time. More specifically, after the November 2014 release, Amazon introduced Echo Dot back in April 2015, a smaller version, and then an updated version of the regular Dot in September.

Selling for $179.99, Amazon Echo can be used to play music, relay various information via voice control, answer questions, read audiobooks and news, control other Internet of things “members” across your house.

The speaker comes with seven microphones and advanced noise-cancelling technology, a powerful speech processor with high speech recognition accuracy that’s always ready for your commands. Of course, unless we’re talking about Echo Tap which has a button you have to press rather than expect it to be on at any time. You can also read up about the 10 things you can do with Amazon Echo, if you so desire.

What makes the Amazon Echo cool is Alexa – the voice-activated assistant that helps you navigate everything you want by using voice commands, whether that’s to play music or to turn the lights off in the kitchen, although that’s only possible if you have smart home devices.

Well, without further ado, here are the 7 best uses for Amazon Echo.

7. Get traffic alerts

You know what’s one cool thing you can do with the help of your Amazon Echo? Get traffic info. That’s right. As you’re prepping to go to work, or go out downtown or wherever else you may need, Alexa can update you on the situation of the traffic. Are the streets blocked? Is there a better route you can take towards your destination? No wonder this one is on our list, right?

Ask “Alexa how’s my commute?” after you’ve told her your home and work address and you’ll get info about what the traffic is like and even how it will take. If you’re more used to using the likes of Waze to get around, you should know that Alexa gets the info from HERE, a Nokia company. You’ll have to use the Alexa app to input all the data, but it will make your life so much easier in the end.

6. Get updates on sports scores, info on the weather and more

We are continuing our list of best uses for Amazon Echo with the number 6 – picture this – you fall asleep before the big game you meant to watch and wake up bewildered after the teams are already in the locker rooms. What’s the first thing you do? Well, you check for the score, of course. With the Amazon Echo this is easier since it doesn’t involve fumbling with your smartphone or computer. “Alexa, give me my sports update!” is all you have to say before the app replies with the scores of the latest games, upcoming schedules and more.

You’ll have to add your favorite teams to the app beforehand, but that’s not much of a hassle.

Alexa can also tell you what the weather is like, not only at your current location, but in any other place around the globe if you’re curious. This is particularly useful to ask Alexa while you’re looking for what to wear before leaving the house so you know to be prepared if there’s a chance it’s going to rain and more. The highs and lows are also on the list of information given when it comes to weather.

You can also ask it what the time is, not only for the location you’re in, but also for other locations around the world which is particularly useful if you’re planning to have a video call with someone.

5. Order pizza

Yes, yes, there could have been other things mentioned on this list of best uses for Amazon Echo, instead of being able to order pizza, but come on! That’s one of the best features by far because who doesn’t love pizza, right? Well, it’s not just any pizza that you can order, but more specifically Domino’s since the folks over at the pizza chain have made it possible to order your favorite combination by sending out a tweet.

What you need to do is go over to Dominos and sign into your profile, sign up for order pizza via tweets and connect your account. You’ll then have to save easy orders by looking at previous orders you’ve made so your life becomes a lot easier in just a few clicks. You can then just ask Alexa to order a pizza by tweeting your order. “Alexa, trigger order pizza,” is all you have to say to have it send a tweet that includes the famous hashtag #easyorder.

4. Create shopping lists, set timers, and alarms

We are continuing our list of best uses for Amazon Echo with the use number 4 – before you even think about cooking anything you have to make sure you actually have everything you need. How do you do that? Well, a shopping list of course. Pen and paper and classics, but if you’re anything like me you’ll leave the house in a hurry and forget that piece of paper on the counter. So how about a list inside an app? Well, that works since forgetting your smartphone is slightly more unlikely.

What do you need to do when it comes to Amazon Echo? It’s really simple. You can just say “Alexa, add eggs, cheese, and chocolate” and you’ll get distinct entries on your shopping list which you can later check off as you put them in your basket. You don’t have to order the items off of Amazon, but it’s an option if you want to do that. Using your 1-click settings and the preferred shipping address on your Amazon account you can get Alexa to add all the items to an order and have them delivered as soon as possible.

3. Control smart devices

If you have an Amazon Echo, it’s quite likely you also have other smart devices around the house. Alexa can talk to Philips Hue light bulbs, for instance, or anything that’s plugged into a WeMo outlet, to be honest. It’s also possible to control your Nest thermostat via voice control too, so that’s particularly great. Sure, using the dedicated Nest app is great when you’re away from home, but telling your thermostat to go up a couple of degrees without turning to your phone or getting up from the couch can be quite useful. It also works with other brands of thermostats, such as Lyric T5, ecobee3 or Sensi.

There’s a lot more you can do with the Amazon Echo on this front, and there’s more that can be added in the future.

2. Listen to books or articles

It shouldn’t really be a surprise to find out that Amazon Echo and Alexa are integrated with another Amazon service – Audible. Basically, if you have audiobooks from Audible, you can have Echo read them to you while you do your chores around the house.

So, tell Alexa to play a certain audiobook on your list, or tell it to resume playing from wherever you left off. You can also tell the app to go back and forward if you feel like you’ve missed something. If you want, you can even tell the app to stop reading after a certain amount of time has passed so you can even go to sleep while listening to your favorite books.

Additionally, it’s also possible to have Alexa read your favorite Kindle books. Just say “Alexa, read my Kindle book”, and the words will start streaming through the Amazon Echo, which is really cool.

The tool can also be used to read various Wikipedia articles, or news articles that the app updates you on. And now, let’s see the number one in our list of best uses for Amazon Echo.

1. Play music

Last, but not least on our list of best uses for Amazon Echo, we have the ability to play music. After all, the Amazon Echo is, for all intents and purposes, a speaker, even if a smart one at that. This is the simple explanation, anyway, since the Amazon Echo does so much more than that.

When the device was first launched, it could play music from your smartphone, which is pretty much something any Bluetooth speaker can do. It did this by getting music available via Amazon Prime Music or getting songs you had uploaded to the Amazon Cloud Drive.

Echo is so much more nowadays. Not only can it play for specific songs, playlists or artists, but it can also offer a playlist to suit your mood or for a specific holiday, say Christmas. What’s more, you can also connect the speaker to Spotify and access everything it has to offer you. Pandora, iHeartRadio, and TuneIn are also among the services you can access via Amazon Echo.

The Apple Music service isn’t available for users in the same way, but you can still use the app on your smartphone and have the Amazon Echo act as a simple Bluetooth speaker, so there’s that. Not only can you tell Alexa to move on to the next track or repeat the one you’ve just listened to, but you can also ask it what song was playing in case you’re unfamiliar with it, turn up or down the volume or set a timer for when the playback should stop.

All in all, this is a great device and there are a lot of things you can do with it and many more that will be added to the list as the years go by, on top of the 7 best uses for Amazon Echo.