The big appeal of the Amazon Echo is that you can get things done without touching your phone. So, you might’ve missed that the Alexa app you used to set up your Echo is actually really useful on its own. Here are some of the best things it can do.
Manage Your Shopping and To-Do Lists
You can use Alexa to add items to your shopping and to-do lists, read them back to you, and then mark them complete without ever touching your phone. However, you can also see and edit both lists from the Alexa app. Tap the menu button in the app to open the left-hand navigation panel. Then tap Shopping & To-do Lists
Here you’ll find a very basic set of lists. If you’re used to apps like Wunderlist or Todoist, this won’t fulfill your needs. You can mark items complete and you can add new ones, but you can’t set due dates or create multiple lists. On the upside, if you’re out of the house and need to add an item to your to-do list, you can enter it manually and Alexa will read it out to you when you get home.
Browse Your Music and Audiobook Libraries
If you know what you want to listen to, Alexa can usually pull it up with a simple voice command. If you want to browse to find something, though, you can do so in the app. Tap the menu button and press Music & Books. Here you’ll find a list of music and audiobook apps. Tap one and you can explore your library within that service without leaving Alexa.
If you have an account with a service, you can browse your library. For example, in Pandora, you can find a list of all your stations. If you have Amazon Prime, you can browse Prime Music stations and playlists. You can even tap Kindle Books to see which of your ebooks can be read aloud. Alexa reading a book isn’t quite the same as a proper audiobook, but you might be surprised at how many of your books can be read aloud.
Lookup Your Audio History and See Which Songs Are Queued Up
While Alexa keeps a record of every request you make, it can be a mess searching through timers to find that one song you played a while back. Fortunately, the Now Playing section of the Alexa app also contains a history of everything you’ve played. You can find the songs, audiobooks, and stations you’ve listened to.
The Now Playing section also has a Queue tab that can show what songs are about to play. Some services like Pandora don’t use this feature, but if you’re listening to a playlist or station from Amazon, you can glance ahead to see what’s coming and even add songs to your library.
Customize Your Flash Briefing With the News You Want
One of Alexa’s lesser-known features, the flash briefing, plays a short news snippet to get you up to speed on current events while you go about your day. By default, it plays news from NPR, but you can get news from a host of other sources as well. To customize your briefing, tap the Menu button in the app, tap Settings, and then select Flash Briefing.
Here you’ll see two sources. NPR, and the Alexa weather forecast. Tap “Get more Flash Briefing content” at the top and you can search for your favorite news outlets. From the Wall Street Journal to Fox News to the Daily Show all have packages you can add to your briefing. Enable the ones you want and tap your back button. From the Settings menu you can turn on or off the sources you want to limit your flash briefing to just the news you care about.
Get More Detailed Info After a Search
You might not think to open the Alexa app after using a voice command, but it offers a ton of helpful information that the voice commands can’t. For example, if you search for a restaurant, Alexa can read a couple results to you. In the app, though, you’ll find a list of Yelp results with ratings, address, and distance from your location.
Every request has different options on the cards. While some are useless (like “search on Bing for [your request]”), many are incredibly helpful. When you search for a musician, you can add their music to your Amazon library. When you read a Kindle book, you can search Audible for the audiobook version. Some third-party skills even add very helpful info. For example, 7-Minute Workout—one of the skills we really like—shows diagrams demonstrating how to do each workout. Of course, the whole point of having Echo is so you don’t have to pull out your phone for everything, but it’s handy to check out once in a while.