Amazon’s Alexa Gets Major AI Upgrade and Subscription Model
By Lisa Eadicicco, CNN – February 27, 2025
Amazon is revamping its Alexa voice assistant with generative AI and launching it as a premium subscription service, signaling a shift for the company in the competitive landscape of AI-powered virtual assistants.
Amazon unveiled Alexa+ Wednesday, an upgraded version of its popular voice assistant designed to compete with the rise of advanced AI chatbots. The new Alexa is more conversational, personalizes responses based on user preferences, and can handle tasks like booking concert tickets, according to Amazon. The service costs $19.99 per month but will be free for Amazon Prime members, with early access starting next month.
This move is Amazon’s response to the growing popularity of AI-infused virtual assistants, such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini, which have gained prominence since 2022.
Amazon, along with its tech industry rivals, is striving to develop what is believed to be the next generation of AI chatbots: AI agents. Unlike simple chatbots, these agents are designed to perform actions on a user’s behalf, encompassing tasks such as shopping or managing real-world activities, like returning online orders or scheduling appliance repairs.
Alexa+ represents a key component of Amazon’s strategy to advance in this field, alongside enhancing Alexa to meet the requirements of the current chatbot era.
What Alexa+ Can Do
Amazon is highlighting Alexa’s new capacity to incorporate a user’s personal context, including the apps and services they use, as a key differentiator compared to chatbots like ChatGPT. Nevertheless, Apple and Google are taking a similar approach with their respective virtual assistants.
In a preview video, the company demonstrated Alexa+ performing tasks such as informing a user of the number of books they’ve read this year, reserving their usual Friday night dinner spot, or alerting them when concert tickets for their favorite artist become available.
This is achieved through analyzing a user’s personal history and data across apps, devices, and services, which allows it to remember user preferences, the company explains. Alexa+ will also be capable of answering questions about a user’s surroundings.
Using an Echo Show device, which is the tablet-like version of the Echo with a camera, Panos Panay, Amazon’s head of devices, asked Alexa whether the crowd at the event “looked pumped” after pointing the camera at the audience. “From what I can see, those 250 folks look pretty fired up,” it replied.
According to Panay, Alexa+ should also be better at understanding context and more natural language. For example, instead of asking Alexa to lower the music volume, you could say something like “play music but don’t wake the baby.” Panay attributed Alexa’s revamp to generative AI and large language models, which are the foundation for popular AI apps like ChatGPT.
“While the vision of Alexa has been ambitious and remains incredibly compelling, until right this moment, we have been limited by the technology,” Panay said.
This approach mirrors the strategies of Apple and Google with their respective virtual assistants. Apple is updating Siri to answer questions based on personal data, and Google is aiming for its Gemini assistant to function as an agent that can handle tasks. Amazon’s approach, while not unique, is a much-needed upgrade that could bring its decade-old assistant up to date with its competitors.
Panay also mentioned that Alexa+ is designed to understand a user’s tone and environment to adjust its responses accordingly.
Boosting Amazon’s Struggling Echo Business
Amazon’s original Echo was a surprising success when it launched in 2014. However, throughout the decade since Alexa entered our homes, Amazon has struggled to generate substantial profits from its hardware division, despite the widespread adoption of Alexa due to its affordability.
Additionally, Amazon’s business model for the Echo faltered, as the company had hoped users would increase their Amazon purchases through the device. Instead, consumers primarily used the Echo for functions such as setting alarms and listening to music, rather than for Amazon shopping. The Wall Street Journal has reported that Amazon has incurred billions of dollars in losses on its Echo business. With Alexa+, Amazon is hoping to change that.
In addition, generative AI-powered chatbots such as ChatGPT gained prominence in late 2022, posing a threat to older voice assistants like Alexa and the Google Assistant.
One potential advantage for Alexa is its existing integration with Amazon’s devices and services, such as Fire TVs and Ring cameras. Users will be able to ask Alexa about what happened around the house while they were away, or if someone took the dog out. Plus, if successful, Alexa+ could also encourage more consumers to subscribe to Amazon’s lucrative $15-per-month Prime service.
Amazon, which previewed the long-awaited update in 2023, announced the changes during an event in New York City.
