Amazon’s AI-powered Alexa is on its way to more homes soon. The upgraded assistant will be available straight out of the box with new hardware announced today. New Echo devices will come with Alexa Plus straight out of the box; it’ll also be available to those who buy one of the new FireTV. Alexa Plus is still an early access program and only available in the US, but including it on the new hardware marks an important step forward for Amazon’s overdue assistant overhaul.

Alexa Plus hasn’t had an easy journey to get here. Amazon initially announced an LLM-embued Alexa update two years ago under former hardware exec Dave Limp. The project was delayed and eventually relaunched under a new boss, ex-Microsoft Surface head Panos Panay. From there, it rolled out in a limited release, eventually

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