- Amazon touts Alexa+ as its voice assistant’s “biggest leap forward”
- Aussies can now request early access to Alexa+, but it’s also available with the purchase of a new eligible Echo or Fire TV device
- Prime members get Alexa+ for free after early access ends in November; non-members pay AU$29.99p/m
Alexa+, the conversational AI upgrade of Amazon’s long-time voice assistant, has officially launched in Australia, over a year after rolling out in the US.
This “smarter, more conversational and more capable” voice assistant promises a more transactional experience that recognises natural language, can remember user preferences and automatically adjust your smart home tech, like turning on your air conditioning when it starts to get warm or turning on lights when it starts getting dark.
For its local debut, Amazon has added Aussie touches, so Alexa can now understand colloquialisms like ‘arvo’, ‘snags’ and ‘servo’, as well as being “tuned into Australian culture”, like not mixing up footy codes or understanding expressions like ‘fair dinkum’ or ‘passing the pub test’.
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You can sign up for an early access invite now if you already own a compatible device, or get automatically signed up when you buy an eligible Echo or Fire TV device. After early access ends on November 30, 2026, Alexa+ will remain a free Prime benefit for subscribers, while non-members will have to pay AU$29.99 per month to retain access.
Most of the current Echo devices are compatible with Alexa+, with only the now-discontinued first- and second-generation models unable to support the new voice assistant. Fire TV devices, meanwhile, will have limited compatibility with Alexa+, with support available only on the following:
- Fire TV Stick 4K Select
- Fire TV Stick 4K Max (2nd Gen)
- Fire TV Stick 4K Plus (2nd Gen)
- Fire TV Cube (3rd Gen)
Alexa+ isn’t the only ‘smart’ voice assistant available in Australia, with Google Home Premium (formerly Nest Aware) being its main competitor. The latter costs AU$15 per month or AU$150 per year for its Standard tier, or AU$30 or AU$300 per year for the Advanced tier, scoring Alexa+ points on pricing — provided you’re a Prime member or course.
It remains to be seen whether this would trigger a Prime membership price hike in the days to come.
Do we really need an Amazon-powered LLM in our lives?
Amazon claims that Aussies interact with Alexa “more than two billion times each year”, with 77 million questions asked and more than 600 million smart home actions in 2025 alone. While that suggests there’s a large customer base in Australia, it begs the question of whether we’re willing to bring another AI assistant into our homes and, importantly, pay extra for it.
As my colleague Graham Barlow rightly pointed out, Alexa+ may be an improvement by being more conversational and context aware, but it doesn’t really do enough to warrant the consistent use of the assistant.
Lots of Redditors have also expressed their displeasure with Alexa+, with some choosing to revert back to the old Alexa for the many ads, the style of the new voices, or just preferring not to opt into the upgrade.
Sure, being a free add-on to Amazon Prime will see plenty of early adopters, but it remains to be seen if Aussies will jump ship from ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude or whatever LLM they’re already using and move to Alexa+. (Incidentally, a web version is also slated to come soon.)
Then again, AI is evolving and Alexa+ seems like the next step in the voice assistant’s development, although it will need to do more than just speak fluent ‘Strayan if it wants to reign supreme Down Under.
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nico.arboleda@futurenet.com (Nico Arboleda)
