My favourite new function on the third-generation Echo Show 8 ($149.99) is the widgets. They flip the good show right into a more practical touchscreen controller, making it simpler to get to the information you need with out having to make use of your voice. It’s nearly as helpful as a pill or telephone for shortly checking my calendar, selecting a latest playlist, or turning on the kitchen lights, with the benefit of being a tool anybody in my family can use.
However this isn’t a compelling sufficient motive to improve to the brand new Echo Present 8, particularly in the event you already personal the second-gen mannequin, as widgets are additionally coming to that one (a very good transfer on Amazon’s half). The second-gen Present 8 can be getting the brand new Present’s different trick — Adaptive Content material — which adjusts the display primarily based on how shut you’re to it, making it extra helpful from throughout the room. Coupled with the truth that the second-gen is currently on sale for $60 (down from $129.99), the brand new Present is a little bit of a troublesome promote.
Except that’s, you need a good dwelling controller. The brand new Present 8 is the primary Amazon good show that’s a totally fledged good dwelling hub (at the very least till the Echo Hub will get launched). It’s now a Zigbee hub and a Thread border router, along with being a Matter controller and Sidewalk hub. This units you up so as to add and management nearly any good system to your property (sorry, Z-Wave). It’s additionally the primary Present 8 with Amazon’s AZ2 chip on board, which makes its touchscreen snappier and extra responsive and Alexa a tad speedier.
A main goal of the Echo Present’s display is to get you to spend more cash with Amazon
All of this implies in the event you’re simply beginning out with the good dwelling or trying so as to add your first good show to an present setup, the brand new Present 8 is an effective place to begin. Alongside its good dwelling chops, it does lots for a very good worth (though it’s $20 greater than the second-gen was when it launched). It’s an Alexa good speaker with a display that may do all of the hands-free belongings you’d anticipate from the voice assistant: set timers, reply questions, play music, be a house intercom. The display provides options like video calling, film watching, and visible solutions to questions. Plus, it is a first rate digital picture body.
Another excuse to decide on the brand new Present 8 over the earlier mannequin is that the sound is absolutely good. Echo Present 8s have at all times had first rate sound for good shows, however the third-gen brings a redesigned speaker system and spatial audio. This was very noticeable in testing, sounding considerably higher than the first-gen Present 8 I examined it in opposition to. I additionally in contrast it with a second-gen HomePod, and whereas the $300 Apple speaker is healthier, the Present 8 held its personal. The HomePod had higher readability, and the Echo nonetheless goes a tad too heavy on the bass, but it surely was nice to take heed to and will get loud sufficient. Plus, it’s half the value of a HomePod and has a display.
However that is nonetheless an Amazon good show. Which implies a main goal of that display is to get you to spend more cash with Amazon. Except you flip off all of the extraneous cruft immediately, you’ll get very irritated with it in a short time. There are nearly 50 totally different choices you’ll want to toggle off in the event you don’t wish to get bombarded with “product ideas’’ or recommendations of the way to have “enjoyable with Alexa” alongside along with your morning espresso. Learn my weblog on the way to arrange an Echo Present to point out you the least quantity of crap for extra on this.
With all the pieces toggled off, it’s potential to show the Echo Present into a good digital picture body (learn my weblog on the way to use the Echo Present as a photograph body). If you would like a cleaner picture body expertise, Amazon expects you to pay $10 extra for its $159.99 Echo Present 8 Photographs Version. If a digital picture body is what you’re after, there are higher choices exterior of good shows, and regardless of its different flaws, Google’s Nest Hub is great at displaying pictures.
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The primary Echo Present 8 arrived in 2019 as the center baby between the 10-inch Echo Present and the Echo Present 5. It’s lengthy been my favourite of the bunch. It has extra display actual property than the $90 Echo Show 5, which is just too small to do a lot with aside from use as an alarm clock. And at beneath $150, it’s a greater worth than the $250 Echo Present 10, whose primary trick is only a larger display that may rotate. (The wall-mountable $280 Echo Present 15 is mostly a totally different beast).
The third-gen Echo Present 8 will get the primary important redesign for the reason that authentic, including a extra shapely rear speaker however leaving the touchscreen largely unchanged aside from including edge-to-edge glass and centering the digicam. The bezel is unfortunately nonetheless tremendous thick.
Nonetheless, the touchscreen is now extra helpful, because of the widgets. The primary goal of a wise show is so as to add a visible and contact interface to a wise speaker. It reveals what album is enjoying, provides you a pause button so that you don’t should yell to show the music off, and allows you to see visible responses while you ask Alexa a query.
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So far, good shows have been good on the visible bit however unhealthy on the contact half. Easy duties like controlling a lightweight or altering an alarm take longer with contact than voice, and the brand new widgets go some solution to addressing that. A sensible dwelling widget lets me entry a lightweight with two fast faucets now, in comparison with swiping, tapping, swiping, and tapping. A music widget provides fast entry to play a latest album, and the purchasing checklist and calendar widgets are equally helpful.
The draw back is you possibly can solely have 4 widgets, they usually’re restricted in each measurement (when opened, they solely use about half the display) and customizability (the music widget opens on Advisable from Amazon Music, and you’ll’t change it). Nevertheless it’s a begin and does make the Present 8 extra helpful on a desk or bedside desk.
The opposite new function is Adaptive Content material. This modifications what’s on the display primarily based on how shut you’re. Information headlines and album titles are massive while you look from the opposite facet of the room; as you get nearer, the textual content turns into smaller, and the show provides extra particulars. It is a neat trick, however because the Echo Present not often shows a lot I wish to see past pictures, I discovered it of restricted use. However if in case you have different use instances for the Present, it’s now simpler to see data from additional away.
I examined the Echo Present for 2 weeks, switching it between the kitchen, my workplace, and my bedside desk. I did discover myself reaching for it incessantly within the kitchen and workplace, tapping the display to pause music within the kitchen once I wished to shout at my child to get off the bed within the morning, and utilizing the good dwelling shortcut widget to shortly flip the lights on and off in my workplace when beginning / stopping video calls. I discovered it too massive for a bedside clock, although. There’s a motive the Echo Present 5 exists, and that’s it.
I used to be impressed with the Echo Present’s velocity as a wise dwelling controller. My Zigbee-connected lightbulb turned off nearly immediately once I tapped the widget display. (The brand new onboard radios imply all the pieces can work regionally and minimize out the cloud.) Nevertheless it nonetheless took two faucets, which is one faucet too many. And I couldn’t management teams of lights, solely particular person ones. I additionally couldn’t alter the brightness of the bulb. For that, I wanted to enter the principle good dwelling management display, which is clunkier to navigate.
Pulling up a dwell feed from a Ring video doorbell or safety digicam was considerably sooner than on the first-gen Present, taking beneath three seconds in comparison with eight to 10. However this gained’t change a Nest Hub as my desktop good show for one massive motive: video. The Echo Present 8 would make an excellent little workplace TV, but it surely solely gives Netflix, Hulu, and Prime Video. There’s no YouTube app or YouTube TV, and the place the Echo Present 15 is now a fully-fledged Hearth TV, the Present 8 remains to be restricted.
Amazon has added its new FAST Hearth TV Channels to the Present 8, supplying you with someplace round 400 dwell TV channels to peruse. Say “Alexa Watch TV,” and it begins enjoying one, with the choice to faucet by means of others sorted by class. Nonetheless, there’s no information that I may discover, so it’s actually solely helpful if you already know there’s something you wish to watch on a particular channel — or in the event you’re bored and wish to watch random stuff like somebody whipping up a frittata on Tastemade or cats knocking espresso cups onto their proprietor’s laptops on the very enjoyable Pet Collective channel, I stumbled throughout. (Who wants YouTube?)
The opposite video disappointment is video calling. The Present 8 solely helps Alexa calling, so you possibly can solely do video calls with individuals who have Echo gadgets or the Alexa app on a telephone or pill. I truly like utilizing the Echo Present second gen for Zoom calls, however Zoom isn’t supported on the third-gen.
If you happen to’re within the Amazon ecosystem, the Echo Present 8 is a superb good show. It’s simply the correct measurement, it sounds good, and it’s sooner than earlier variations. Its Visual ID feature makes it helpful as a communal system, as it might adapt the content material primarily based on who’s taking a look at it (my husband can see his calendar, and my youngsters can see their playlists). The draw back is that this solely works in the event you hold the digicam on (there is a bodily privateness shutter). That digicam additionally permits the Present to double as a house safety digicam (though it gained’t report), and it might pay attention out for appears like smoke alarms or glass breaking while you’re not dwelling (though that’s now a paid function; it was free).
However there isn’t a killer function to justify an improve from a second-gen mannequin — and even choose it over that model if yow will discover it for beneath $100. Whereas the third-gen is a correct good dwelling hub (because of new radios), if that’s your primary want, I’m inclined to say look ahead to the Echo Hub. At $179.99, it’s dearer, however its options are extra tailor-made to a wise dwelling controller, and it has waaay extra widgets.
If touchscreen good dwelling management is secondary to you, nevertheless, and also you need good sound plus higher responsiveness out of your good show, you’ll be proud of the third-gen Present 8.
Photographs by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge
