First rolling out to select devices (in early access) in March 2025, before rolling out in the United States in February 2026, Alexa+ is an enhanced version of Amazon’s Alexa personal assistant. Powered by Amazon’s large-language generative AI models Nova and Anthropic, Alexa+ delivers a more personalized, conversational, and smarter overall experience than its predecessor, as well as a set of Alexa+-specific features, like the ability to order takeout or chat about the news.
However, Alexa+ isn’t perfect. Users have reported several issues with the AI personal assistant, including factual inaccuracies, becoming frustrated with its overly chatty responses and device lag, while others simply miss the functions of the old Alexa, leading some to revert to the original version of Alexa. Although some of these issues were reported during the early access period.
Although Alexa+ is included for free with the Prime membership, for everyone else it costs $19.99 per month, with non-Prime members able to try the Alexa+ chat experience on the web as part of the free tier. But given its drawbacks, is it really worth paying for Alexa+ in 2026? Below, we break down five reasons why that’s the case.
Conversations are more natural
While some Alexa+ users aren’t fans of the AI assistant’s chatter, others like how it speaks more like a human than its more robotic predecessor. You can have smooth conversations with Alexa+ about topics you find interesting, asking it to provide real-time information and news (taken from publications like Reuters and The Washington Post), with some users praising the way it can break down even complex topics and have detailed conversations about them.
Additionally, unlike normal Alexa, Alexa+ understands context and can remember previous information and conversations. This means that if, for example, you ask it to set a reminder for you for a certain time, but you get that time wrong, you can just say “change this to (time)” and it will change the time without you having to delete the previous reminder and set it again. However, some users report that the reminder feature is finicky and can get the date or time wrong. It is therefore worth checking that it is correct on the application after having defined it.
Improved smart home management
While the original Alexa lets you set up and manage custom routines, more complex routines typically require the app because only one voice command can be set at a time. Alexa+’s improved context understanding and improved smart home integration make this easier, as the AI assistant understands more complex routine voice requests.
This means you can ask it to set a routine with multiple commands in one go. For example, you can say, “Alexa, at 8 a.m., turn on the coffee maker, play my wake-up playlist, and turn on the bedroom lights” and it should understand you. Or, you can say “the living room is too dark” and he will know that you want the lighting in that room increased. Alexa+ can also set routines based on the weather, so you can ask it to turn on the heating, for example when it starts snowing.
However, some users have reported bugs with Alexa+ automations, with the AI assistant not recognizing certain compatible smart devices in their home or turning on the wrong smart device, such as bedroom lights instead of living room lights.
Understand children better
Young children often do not ask questions clearly; Instead, they stutter, mispronounce their words, and jump from topic to topic. While many voice technology services struggle to understand children – as AI devices are often designed for adults – Alexa+’s improved speech recognition means it understands children better, leading to less frustration.
To ensure their children do not access adult material, parents can create a child profile on Alexa+. The AI assistant will be able to identify your child’s voice and activate Alexa+ Kids mode when a question or command comes from that child, filtering songs with explicit lyrics, preventing voice buying and providing age-appropriate responses. However, some features, like interactive learning and games, require an Amazon Kids+ subscription, which costs $5.99 for Prime members or $7.99 without.
If you allow your child to use Alexa+, experts recommend monitoring their use, placing your Alexa device where you can hear it, making sure your child treats the device with respect as they would a person, and discussing the answers they give as a family so you don’t take their answers (which may be wrong) at face value.
Fire TV integration
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Alexa+ is now available for compatible Amazon Fire TV devices, offering a range of visual features, some of which are not available for Echo devices. The most interesting is the scene skip feature, which lets you jump to a specific scene in a Prime Video movie simply by describing the scene with details such as the actor’s name, character’s name, or a quote from the movie.
So, for example, if you say, “Switch to the “Life is a Box of Chocolates” monologue in “Forrest Gump,” your Fire TV will jump to that scene in the movie, or if you say, “What is the movie where dinosaurs escape from a park?” Skip to the scene where the glass of water ripples,” it will cut to that scene in “Jurassic Park.” This can be useful if you need to quickly jump from side to side, if you’ve lost your place in a movie, or if you’re trying to remember which movie a scene was actually in.
You can also ask Alexa+ questions about a movie or TV show while it’s streaming, like “who is this actor?” » or “what song is she playing?” offering a more conversational alternative to Prime Video’s X-Ray feature. Once you’ve finished a series or movie, you can ask Alexa+ to recommend what to watch next, like “What’s a good comedy movie?” or “What is a TV show like ‘Stranger Things’?” and your Fire TV will display personalized suggestions from a variety of streaming services.
