What to expect from Amazon’s Alexa event on Wednesday

Amazon is hosting an Alexa-focused press event in NYC on Wednesday. Considering the company hasn’t held a major device presser in nearly two years — the last one was September 2023 — we’re expecting some splashy announcements.

The event will not be live streamed. However, TechCrunch will be reporting on the ground. The festivities, emceed by Amazon’s new devices and services chief Panos Panay, formerly of Microsoft Surface fame, are scheduled to start at 10 a.m. Eastern.

The stakes are high for Amazon, which has reportedly lost billions of dollars on its Alexa business despite selling hundreds of millions of devices. Amazon CEO Andy Jassy is said to have pushed the company’s hardware team to find ways to boost profits through monetized subscriptions, fees, and other add-on services.

We may hear about one of those subscriptions on Wednesday.

Amazon reportedly plans to introduce an upgraded Alexa experience, code-named Remarkable Alexa, designed to make interactions with the assistant feel more natural and intuitive, along the lines of ChatGPT. Priced between $5 and $10 a month, the enhanced Alexa is said to be able to respond to multiple requests in a single command and even take actions autonomously.

Amazon teased some of this functionality way back in 2023 during its last tentpole devices event. The company promised the upcoming Alexa experience would be compatible with existing devices and draw on generative AI technologies to take into account the context of requests and personalize its responses.

Improved smart home capabilities could be in tow with the new Alexa, as well. The Verge reports that multiple companies are working on integrations with the new Alexa using developer tools that Amazon announced in 2023. Back then, Amazon said it was collaborating with brands including iRobot and Philips on features to simplify scene controls and allow Alexa to better understand what users might want their devices to do.

A big question is whether the new, generative AI-infused Alexa will be able to overcome some of the underlying tech’s more glaring flaws. According to reporting late last year, the new Alexa at one point struggled with basic commands like switching smart lights off and on.

Thanks to its tendency to get things wrong on occasion and hallucinate, today’s generative AI is typically less reliable than the more rigid systems that make up Alexa’s current technical scaffolding. The upgraded Alexa’s many delays have given Amazon ample time to address the worst potential blunders, but there’s always an element of unpredictability.

Fortunately, the new Alexa won’t be a mandatory upgrade. Reports suggest that Amazon will allow device owners to stick with the “Classic Alexa” experience if they choose.

As for when they’ll be presented with that choice, it may be a little while. According to The Washington Post, the launch of the upgraded Alexa was delayed earlier this month after the assistant gave incorrect answers to several test questions. Sources told the publication that it may not roll out until the end of March or later.