The hockey-puck-shaped speaker has a more refined look thanks to the fabric finish - far better than the older all-plastic version. It comes with a mounting bracket so you can quickly and easily position it on your wall in landscape or portrait orientation. Among its robust lineup of smart speakers, the Echo (Fourth Generation) and Echo Dot (Fifth Generation) are eerily similar, despite the former being almost twice as big as the latter. Then again, it's subjective if this new placement is actually better for you than the previous generation or not. This is a good Echo smart display for the kitchen or for use in the living room, where the family usually gather.

Sadly, the UK version of the speaker misses out on the Eero mesh, which turns the Echo Pop into a wifi hub, as well as the accelerometer for snoozing alarms with a tap. That’s not a swap I’d have made personally as it’s far more flexible for most people than a temperature sensor.When side by side, I found the Echo Dot was more enjoyable with music than both the Nest Mini and the Echo Pop. I’ve reviewed more than a thousand different consumer electronics products including headphones, speakers, TVs, and every major game system and VR headset of the last decade. Four rubber buttons (action, mic mute, and volume up and down) protrude from the fabric along the top of the sphere. The speakers are housed on its base on the rear and deliver surprisingly clear and vibrant sound, with a good, rich sense of bass.

But we’re going to start counting exactly how many times you have to hit “agree” to use devices when we review them since these are agreements most people don’t read and definitely can’t negotiate.

I set it to turn up the AC when it gets too warm in the kitchen, and it worked reliably without me having to ask Alexa to adjust the Ecobee thermostat while I toiled over a hot stove. Any kind of audio content is great for the Dot, but music especially shines with its clear and loud sound on it. In the meantime, if you want the fun and somewhat helpful features of the LED display, the fifth-gen Echo Dot with Clock is the Alexa smart speaker to get.

It’s more elegant than the Echo Show 8 because the screen will always be facing you when you’re watching a film, and a 10in display is just comfortable enough for viewing in the kitchen.mm input that allows you to connect to larger speakers, and we're glad that it's still around as it's always nice to have multiple connectivity options.

They take voice-recognition technology to the next level by playing music, finding binge-watch-worthy flicks, reading news, and adjusting room settings. The Verge asks each company whose smart home products we review about safeguards it has in place for your data. Volume, too, is always going to be a drawback of a speaker that’s not much bigger than a standard hockey ball. It is occasionally overpowering when it comes to less bass-heavy tracks, so that’s something to be aware of, but with seven microphones, the Echo Studio always heard us, wherever we were in the room.

No, we haven’t quite arrived at the point at which all aspects of our domestic existence can be governed by a series of brusque commands to Alexa or Siri like something from 2001: A Space Odyssey, but voice-controlled speakers hooked up to the wi-fi aren’t going anywhere any time soon.