Almost one year ago exactly, Amazon announced plans to integrate Microsoft's Cortana with its Alexa personal assistant. Under this integration, Alexa will be able to communicate with Cortana, and Cortana will also be able to communicate with Alexa. Today Amazon revealed the latest evolution in this plan, introducing a public preview that enables customers to experience the new functionality.
Sonos' Alexa-powered smart speakers are catching up with one of the more useful features of Amazon's Echo range, turning them into a useful home announcement system. Amazon Announcements was launched back in early April, as a way to broadcast messages across every speaker in the home.
Alexa's attempts to be your copilot in the car continue, with Amazon releasing a new toolkit for automakers to more readily bake the smart assistant into the dashboard. The Alexa Auto SDK follows a handful of car companies that have already announced - or launched - Alexa integration, allowing drivers to ask questions, play media, and remotely control their smart home, all by voice.
There is no shortage of Bluetooth headsets these days advertising active noise cancellation features. Bose’s QuietComfort line, however, remains one of the preferred brands in that market. Last year, Bose launched the QuietComfort 35 II, a.k.a. the QC35 II, with the signature feature of letting you use Google Assistant at the push of a button. Since then, Bose has also become one of Amazon’s close friends so it’s not surprising, and in fact a bit belated, that it is now announcing the addition of Amazon Alexa to its feature list.
After the failure of the Fire Phone, it was completely unexpected that the Amazon Echo would end up causing both Google and Apple to scramble to catch up. But while Amazon practically created and continue to lead the new smart speaker market, it has ironically failed at the very thing it created the Echo for: helping Amazon customer buy stuff. It turns out, only a minuscule percentage of users shop via Alexa and it’s not that hard to see why.
Ask Alexa enough questions and you'll eventually find one she can't answer. The personal assistant apologizes for its lack of a proper response, and now it has started issuing alerts when it finally learns the answer. The new ability is called "Answer Update," and it's exactly what it sounds like: a new answer to an old question. The user will need to enable the feature to use it, though.
![Just 2% of Alexa users tried to buy stuff with voice in 2018 [UPDATE: Amazon Statement]](https://c.slashgear.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/echo.jpg)
Sources this week suggested that Amazon's Alexa devices aren't working exactly the way they'd been expected to work with regard to other Amazon products. In the report, it's said that in the year 2018, (so far,) just 2% of users of Alexa products tried to purchase a product on Amazon with their voice. Of those that tried to make a purchase with Alexa, a whopping 90% never tried to buy another product with their voice through the service.
Amazon has announced that Amazon Music is getting Alexa Cast compatibility, bringing it one step closer to being a fully-fledged competitor to Spotify. Casting, of course, is not a new concept, but the Amazon Music app has been strangely missing that kind of functionality up until now. That all changes today, as you can now cast music from your phone to any Alexa device you might own.
Amazon's Echo smart speakers are gaining an equalizer, and it could well be the easiest to control ever. The new Alexa EQ feature will allow Echo owners to adjust how the treble, midrange, and bass are weighted on their speaker.
Wyze, the company that offers inexpensive home security cameras, has announced new Alexa support for its Cam and Cam Pan models. The support went live for users earlier this week, enabling them to control their Wyze security cameras via voice. As with other similarly supported security cameras, Wyze users will need to have an Alexa device featuring a screen, such as a Fire TV or Echo Show.
Kitchen appliances continue to get smarter, and now it's the microwave promising easier cooking and Amazon Alexa integration. The GE Smart Countertop Microwave debuts the company's Scan-to-Cook system, with a companion smartphone app that can identify packaged food and automatically beam the correct power and time instructions to the oven.
![Prime Day Deals 2018: The best Amazon savings today [Updated]](https://c.slashgear.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/toshiba-fire-tv-980x620.jpg)
Amazon Prime Day 2018 has begun, with 36 hours of deals for the judicious shopper wanting a July bargain. As always, there are more promotions than you could probably scroll through manually in the day and a half Amazon's annual event is going to last this year, so we've curated the best options to give your wallet a break.