Amazon’s Alexa can now act on her own intuitions to turn off lights and more

Amazon is today activating a new feature that allows Alexa to proactively perform tasks around the house, such as turning off the lights, based on your habits and frequent requests.

Alexa has been able to sense these habits and ask questions about them since 2018 – the company calls them “hunches” – but before this update, Alexa was asking permission before acting on something like lowering the thermostat before turning down. go to bed. If the new proactive hunches are enabled, Alexa won’t ask for permission for a task and just will.

While proactive hunches seem to be able to make Alexa much more useful, it will be important to have granular controls over what Alexa can act on automatically. An Amazon Support article seems to suggest that you can select the types of hunches Alexa can perform on her own, but we reached out to Amazon for more information on the ability to customize proactive hunches.

In addition to Alexa’s new capabilities, Amazon is also rolling out its Guard Plus security subscription service. The service can alert you if Alexa picks up certain types of sounds in your home and provides access to human agents who can call emergency services on your behalf, such as ADT. You’ll be able to sign up for Guard Plus in the Alexa app, and it’ll cost $ 4.99 per month.

Amazon is also deploying an energy dashboard on the Alexa app which can monitor and estimate the amount of energy used by compatible devices connected to Alexa if their manufacturers support it. This can include anything from TVs to water heaters, and Amazon has a whole list of compatible products on their site regarding the new dashboard.

Image: Amazon

Amazon says all three features are expected to start rolling out in the United States today.