Amazon Echo Show

Alexa, show me the news

Imagine the conversation at Amazon HQ: – “The Echo is selling well, but we’ve found two things are putting people off: it’s expensive and having it listening to them feels creepy”. – “OK – we’ll give them the same thing, but at twice the price and with a camera on it, so it can also watch them!”

Dubious it may be, but the Echo Show is an interesting development. Its touchscreen enables video chat, which works over the internet with another Show or a phone or tablet running the Alexa app. You’ll also need a device to set up the Alexa Calling and Messaging services ( www.snipca.com/26549), which can’t be done entirely from the Echo Show itself. Part of the process involves importing your contacts. After that’s done, you can just say ‘Alexa, call…’ followed by the person’s name, and they can answer on their own Echo or using the app on their phone or tablet. You can also say ‘Drop in on…’ to hear, or even see, a feed from someone’s Echo (though only close friends and family will want to activate this). Call quality is very good, although not immune to the odd glitch.

The 5- megapixel webcam works well, and the Show’s microphones are good at picking up your voice over background noise, while the speakers are better than on the original Echo. The touchscreen is a bit smaller than we’d have liked, and the software is not as impressive as that on a a tablet: you can shop on Amazon.co.uk, for example, but instead of the full website you get a simplified list of products.

You can also bring up things like news and recipes on the screen, and it can help to control compatible ‘smart home’ devices – for example, to show the feed from a Nest Cam or Netgear Arlo security camera. This kind of feature depends on apps or ‘skills’ (Amazon’s term) which are gradually being added by other developers. Originally you could watch Youtube, but Google, which owns Youtube and is Amazon’s rival in both smart speakers and video services, has blocked this.

It’s the Echo smart speaker with a screen – it now listens to and watches you

VERDICT: With a great screen, good performance, top-end cameras and long battery life, the 5T is a superb buy

★★★★☆

ALTERNATIVE: Huawei Honor 7X £269 Also an 18:9 phone, this new model is somewhat less impressivee in each feature, but it is much cheaperap