Amazon Echo Spot Review

My Amazon Echo Dot (2^nd generation) was purchased in July 2018, primarily as an alarm clock for my wife to use. In September 2019, it was replaced under warranty for a new one by Amazon.

For comparison, I also have an Amazon Echo, Echo Dot and an Echo Show 8.

Warning: The Echo Spot has a design flaw that eventually means the display will start flickering. My device original device was replaced under warranty by Amazon but this replacement device has started doing the same thing. All the other Echo Spot devices I've seen at friends houses have the same issue.

I'm not really interested in the smart home features of the Amazon Echo Spot, as it was bought primarily to be an alarm clock.

Features

Microphone array to detect voice requests from distance.
In-built speaker.
A small round screen with a representation of the traditional Echo 'ring'.
Bluetooth connectivity for Smartphones and other devices to push music to it.
In-built camera for video chat.

Limitations

It obviously needs an Internet connection (via Wi-Fi to work, though the reliability of the connection has been excellent in my home as I'm using a mesh Wi-Fi solution.
It requires and Amazon account and is obviously tied into the wider Amazon eco-system.
The quality of the audio output via the in-built speaker is not brilliant. You really wouldn't want to use it for music.
The Spot comes with an in-built camera, something I don't think is a good idea in a bedroom. You can disable it in the settings though. For added security, I've also stuck a shaped piece of black tape over the camera and this is practically invisible.
The screen is always on and whilst you can set the brightness down really low, it still puts out some light at night time.
These are always on devices, always using power and as such are phantom loads.

In Use

One of the more annoying things with all Amazon Echo devices is that they will occasionally and randomly active even though you didn't specifically direct a request to Alexa. This happens more often in rooms where you tend to talk more, e.g. the lounge.

Use Cases

The Echo Spot can do all the things that an Amazon Echo can do but, I only bought this device to do one thing and that is to be a good alarm clock. If you want a bigger view of what can be done, then have a look at my Amazon Show 8 review.

Voice Announcements

One of the unsupported features I like is the ability to push voice announcements to one or more Amazon Echo devices. This means I can basically make them say anything I want and so my contextual smart home can do the same.

Summary

Our Amazon Echo Spot works really well as an alarm clock but the screen is too limited in space to do the kind of things the Echo Show 8 can do. I would not buy another one as the Echo Show 8 would work equally as well as an alarm clock and also has many more useful features. This is even more true given the design flaw in the Spot, which results in a flickering screen.