Amazon’s Alexa lets you control a Lamborghini’s air conditioning with just your voice

Amazon is taking a bigger step in cars today by integrating Alexa into Lamborghini’s Huracán EVO, and not just for asking questions or remotely controlling your home – it gives the assistant the ability to control settings at home. inside the car, hands free. The partnership was originally announced last year as part of Amazon’s push into cars, but the integration goes beyond Alexa’s usual bag of tricks.

Alexa integration allows users to control “air conditioning and comfort settings, including air conditioning, heating, fan speed, temperature, heated seats, defroster and airflow direction. , as well as the lighting, ”says Lamborghini. (It can also display a screen showing you the torque vectoring and traction control of the car.) Of course, Alexa also has her own suite of skills for interacting with your smart home devices, playing music and podcasts, and basic navigation.

Image: Lamborghini

The Huracán EVO has physical controls on the steering wheel and driver’s side door, but the majority of the car’s features are adjusted via a display in the center console. Giving Alexa more control over the car itself means less time searching and pecking through menus – “Alexa, I’m hot” is apparently enough to run the air conditioning – and more time with your eyes on. the road, which could be a victory for safety and convenience.

It’s not like Alexa will be conduct your car, but give it time.

The auto industry’s shift from controls like buttons and dials to full touch screens is underway, and we even launched a series of reviews looking at in-car displays as gadgets a few years ago. Amazon has tried to help ease the transition with Alexa-enabled Echo Auto in the past, but we found the accessory to perform best as a simple Bluetooth speaker and adapter in our review – the tasks that required knowledge of the location or a consistent cellular connection was malfunctioning. Huracán EVO’s implementation of Alexa, with all the benefits of real control over a connected car, might be a better version of the idea.

Amazon and Lamborghini aren’t the only automaker / tech company team tackling the problem of embedded car software. Volvo’s Polestar 2 launched in 2020 with Android Automotive built in and Google Assistant integration for similar control of settings like air conditioning, something that wasn’t part of the old Android Auto. We liked Polestar’s Google software, although just like Lamborghini, it comes at a steep price.

The new Huracán EVOs should have the functionality out of the box, but Lamborghini says all existing Huracán EVO customers can be upgraded with support for Alexa, for free.