If Amazon’s CEO does take over the world, the Amazon Echo Dot may be to blame. As Amazon strives to penetrate every possible product market, home, and room, the new Echo Dot 3rd generation is perhaps the most enticing way to bring Amazon’s Alexa voice assistant into your home. However, if you like the idea of a smart assistant combined with a simple music speaker, the Echo Dot is difficult to dismiss.
Amazon appears to take a sluggish approach to product design. The original Echo, Echo Dot, and Echo Show were at best utilitarian, with hard plastic shells and a generic, factory-factory finish. It took the pressure of Google’s much more appealing Home and Home Mini to make Amazon reconsider the design of its flagship Alexa devices.
[content-egg-block template=offers_logo hide=price]As a result, the third-generation Echo Dot ditches its predecessors’ all-plastic sides in favour of a cloth-covered finish. The new Dot looks less like a hockey puck and more like something you’d want in your living room, thanks to softer, more-rounded edges. The top of the Dot, as before, is ringed with LEDs that glow blue when Alexa is listening; there are also two volume buttons, a button to turn the microphone on and off, and a button to activate Alexa.
The third-generation Dot is slightly larger than the second-generation Dot, which is only 3.3 inches wide and 1.3 inches tall and measures 3.9 inches in diameter and 1.7 inches in height. While the third-generation Dot is available in three colours (charcoal, heather grey, and sandstone white), its new design means that many of the third-party skins, cases, and accessories designed for the second-generation Dot are no longer compatible.
The speaker in the third-generation Dot is a full half-inch larger than its predecessor, measuring 1.1 inches. Playing songs on the second-generation Dot was like listening to music on a third-rate transistor radio. It was clear from the first bars of Bruce Springsteen’s “Thunder Road” that the new Dot is far superior. On the gen-2 Dot, the opening drumroll sounded like static, but on the gen-3 Dot, Max Weinberg’s sticks finally got their due.
The previous generation Echo Dot had seven microphones to pick up your voice, and it did a good job; the third generation was equally sensitive and responsive, and it heard me just as well. Because Alexa’s abilities are constantly evolving, it’s difficult to keep this section of these reviews up to date. To summarise, there are now over 50,000 skills available, ranging from playing Jeopardy to turning on your lights, ordering pizza, and getting a ride to the airport. Here are some of our favourite Alexa skills.
In the Alexa app, create groups to group lights together, allowing you to control lights by room or all of your home lights with a single voice command or app. When it’s time to sleep, simply say “Alexa, turn off the bedroom” OR use the Alexa app to turn off all the lights in the room at once.
Control your Amazon Basics smart light bulbs with your voice or via the Alexa app, eliminating the need to turn on/off each individual light switch. Create custom routines to automatically schedule your lights at sunset and sunrise OR change the colours of your lights for a movie night with family or a party with friends. It only works with Alexa. Google Assistant, Apple HomeKit, and Smart Things are not supported.