NEW YORK — Amazon’s Fire tablets are getting the Alexa voice assistant.
The previously announced feature will start rolling out to customers Wednesday. It’s meant to complement what users get on other Alexa devices, such as the Echo speaker. Through voice commands, users can get the news read out to them or listen to music from services such as Amazon Music or Pandora.
The Fire tablets will go beyond Echo by offering full-screen cards with additional details. For instance, when you ask for the weather, Alexa will speak out the current temperature and offer the day’s forecast, just as she does on Echo. But the visual card will also display the week’s forecast. For news and music, the card offers playback control such as pausing and skipping.
For those with both Fire and Echo, making a request on Echo will trigger the Fire’s screen to turn on and present the detailed cards, as long as a Voicecast feature is enabled through the Alexa app.
Amazon said Alexa differs from Apple’s Siri and Google’s Assistant in that it was designed for tablets first, rather than phones. That means it focuses on tasks typically done at home, such as entertainment, recipes and timers.
