After you buy your first Amazon Echo you will want to know some cool Alexa tricks. This helper is full of functions that can be funny if you want to do more than a to-do list. Many of the things that Alexa can do are hidden features so even after years of having Amazon Echo, you can discover new things.
Amazon expended hundreds on this AI and the internet has gone wild over all of the things she can learn. This being said, we don’t exactly know the number of things that it can do. However thanks to the internet we discover funny functions you can exploit.
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Rap with Alexa
We start with a fun feature that you shouldn’t miss. You can always ask Alexa to play something from Spotify or Amazon Music by saying “Alexa Play” followed by the song, but you can make Alexa sing. If you know how to ask, she will sing you a song the best way she can.
Whenever you say “Alexa, sing me a song”, she will be shy at first but she will deliver a killer tune about the life of an AI. If you want something deeper and more complex, Alexa can rap. Say to her “Alexa, rap for me” and she will try to deliver something.
Change the Echo wake word
Alexa will always wake up whenever you say Alexa and she is always listening. As a feature, this is useful until someone close to you is called Alexa, or Alex, or something similar. You can mute Alexa so whenever you say the name she won’t respond but this isn’t the most practical idea.
The best solution for this is changing the wake word directly to something else and you can do this from the app. There are available the word Echo, Amazon, Dot, and Computer, and all that you need to do are go to the Alexa app. Hit settings, select your Echo Wake Word, and it’s done.
Set room music
Is possible to personalize your rooms – if you have multiples Echos –for free. For this trick, first, you need to group your devices in the Alexa app. Once there hit Settings, and then Multi-Room Music. From here you can set one playlist or a radio station.
You can have as many groups as devices; each one will be in one group and can be called by the group name. You can say “Room 2 group” and Alexa will play what you set.
Announce everything
You can avoid talking to people for whatever reasons you have and just use Alexa to broadcast everything. Say “Alexa, announce” or “Alexa broadcast” followed by the thing you want everybody to listen to and she will reproduce it on the speakers.
Play some of the available hidden games
In case you are bored and want to play something, this is the Alexa trick you are asking for. There are a lot of options, most of them involve guessing, but there are escape rooms and trivias. Say “Alexa, play” or “Alexa, start” followed by some of these games:
- Tic Tac Toe
- Memory Match
- Song quiz
- Twenty Questions
- Trivial Pursuit
- True or False
- Escape the Room
Select the news you want
Whenever you ask Alexa “What’s new” she will tell you the news suggested in the app, but you can change this information. In settings, go to Flash Briefing, which is the same as flash news, here you can pick what you want to know. If you want the weather reports or something else, you can pick it. You can also change the order the news are delivered and add more content.
Get your personal Master Yoda
Alexa has a lot of Easter Eggs from many movies, like the name computer we mentioned before. This is more of a funny trick that can be done talking to Alexa, for this to work out, say “Alexa, speak like Yoda”. Most likely she will reply “Speak like Yoda I cannot. Master he is, while merely apprentice I am”.
You can also ask her to use the force, but we must point out that droids can’t use the force and Alexa will tell you the same. She can also point out some fun facts from Star Wars and even translate some of the lines from Chewbacca.
Cook with Alexa
In case you are a cooking enthusiast, Alexa is perfect because she can look for recipes and send the ingredients and the step by step to your phone. If this isn’t enough there are tons of thinking Alexa can help you with. You can set timers, ask the time for any specific preparation, like hard-boiled eggs, or ask her to convert measures.
This function is very straightforward, you only need to say “Alexa give me … recipe”. She will look at every recipe online but she uses her Allrecipes skill. In case you don’t have a certain ingredient you can put it on a to-do list.
Program a Do Not Disturb schedule
Echo speakers can be programmed and you can ask Alexa to do the trick. Do Not Disturb mode is very common in cellphones and many gadgets. This mode prevents that Alexa makes any noise during specific times you can schedule. You just need to go to the app, tap devices, the Echo, and Alexa, select the device and select Do not Disturb.
Pick skills for Alexa
Some functions of Alexa need a skill to work better. You can enable multiple features to make your echo devices more suited to your lifestyle. And we must say this is the best Alexa trick on the list, for us. To access these skills you need to go to the Alexa app and tap more, here you will tap Skills and Games in the sidebar.
The range of features you can add is incredible, this way you can personalize your echo the way you want. In case you don’t know what to add, you can just ask Alexa what you want to do and she suggests what skill is necessary.
Discover the meaning of life
IA’s now know everything, this means you can ask Alexa the meaning of life and she will answer “42”. This is a reference to The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, a famous novel by Douglas Adams. Also, this is a funny answer to all of the sci-fi fans who own an Echo.
Besides this reference, you can ask Alexa for random facts about movies or about Chuck Norris. This is a fun way to pass the time asking Alexa to enlighten you with random things.
Set Routines for you
This might take a while but you can set routines or a sequence of actions that Alexa will do after one special word or word. So, if you say “I’m leaving” Alexa will turn off the lights and turn on the security cameras for example. You can program these routines in the app, with a list of features that are included.
You can’t personalize this to an extent and some routines can be complex, to the point Alexa could read you a book. This Alexa trick is amazing if you have that, routine, and you want to save yourself some time.
Check some of your bills
Thanks to its popularity, Alexa can check your bills in many countries. With EDF energy, a skill you can get, you can say “Alexa, ask EDF Energy” followed by “for my account balance”, “when my next payment date is” or another question related to your bills. After the full command, Alexa will answer any of your questions.
Order food
Another useful skill is the Just Eat skill that can be adapted to your Alexa. You are on your lazy Sunday and you don’t want to cook? You can ask Alexa to re-order your favourites. This skill isn’t perfect still and you can’t order anything new but just by saying “Alexa ask Just food to re-order” she will send the order to some of your favourite dishes.
Play a song by somebody
For now this only works with Amazon music, you can try it with Spotify but it won’t work as well. If you are having struggles to remember the name of that good song you listened to last week but you don’t remember the name, you can say “Alexa play that song by Conan Gray I listened to last week”.
The request works in many different ways, you can ask for songs from any time, anybody. Say “Alexa, play that song I haven’t heard in a while” and it would do the trick. Alexa will try to guess the best, but remember this works only for amazon music.
Hook the Echo through Alexa
Now, every Echo device has Bluetooth and you can hook it up to everything. This Alexa trick is very easy to do; you just need to put the device near any smart TV or another audio device that can be paired. You just need to go to the Alexa app, choose Stereo Pair, and that’s it.
After buying the Amazon Echo you should get more useful gadgets, like the ones on this list.
