Skip to main content

Alexa can now show more emotion when your sports team loses

Folks who converse with Alexa on a regular basis may be interested to know that Amazon’s voice-activated digital assistant will soon be putting a lot more feeling into her responses.

The team behind the smart technology has been making gradual adjustments to Alexa since its launch in 2014, and these latest changes continue that work.

Recommended Videos

In a post on the Alexa Skills Blog this week, Amazon’s Catherine Gao says the latest update introduces two new capabilities — emotions and speaking styles — designed to create “a more natural and intuitive voice experience” for people that use the digital assistant.

It means that, when appropriate, Alexa should soon be responding to your inquiries with a more realistic happy or excited tone, or one that conveys disappointment or empathy. The new capabilities have just landed for U.S. developers, with more countries expected to gain the functionality soon.

Gao notes that emotional responses are particularly relevant for games and sports activities using Alexa. You can check out some examples below:

Alexa Emotions: High Excited
Alexa Emotions: Disappointed Low

So, in the case where someone answers a trivia question correctly or wins a game, Alexa can now respond in a happy or excited manner. In a similar way, Amazon’s digital assistant can now use a disappointed or empathetic tone if someone asks for their favorite team’s sports score and Alexa has to deliver the devastating news that they lost.

“Early customer feedback indicates that overall satisfaction with the voice experience increased by 30% when Alexa responded with emotions,” Gao said.

The company has also launched new speaking styles that match with a specific type of content, starting with news and music.

“The news and music speaking styles tailor Alexa’s voice to the respective content being delivered by changing aspects of speech such as intonation, which words are emphasized, and the timing of pauses,” Gao said, adding that listening tests revealed that the music style was perceived to be 84% more natural than Alexa’s standard voice, while the news style was considered as 31% more natural.

Anything that makes Alexa sound more natural has to be a good thing, and should pave the way for more realistic and meaningful exchanges with the digital assistant. Just don’t start believing it’s a real person you’re talking to (although a real person may be listening).

Trevor Mogg
Contributing Editor
Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…
5 reasons I still use the Echo Show 15 everyday
Amazon Echo Show 15 hanging horizontally on the wall in a kitchen.

The Echo Show 15 first released in December 2021. Much of the initial conversation around the smart display was that it was a large novelty -- a huge display that didn't have the same functionality as the Echo Show 10. It released in the midst of the work-from-home surge, and without video conferencing capabilities, the Echo Show 15 just didn't seem like it offered much.

That couldn't have been further from the truth. The large amount of screen real estate introduced a lot of utility that previous models didn't have. Widgets make it one of the most useful smart displays I've ever used, and that's saying a lot for someone who routinely works with these devices.

Read more
Can your smart home save you money on homeowners insurance?
Nest devices grouped together on a counter.

Smart home devices provide more than just convenient assistance -- they also help us complete tasks more efficiently and protect our homes. And now, they may actually be able to save you money on your homeowner's insurance.

Homeowners insurance protects or aids you if an incident happens. Yet the best days are when nothing goes wrong, and life is easy for everyone. Smart home devices can be your first line of defense against things that could cause your home harm.

Read more
Alexa, May the Fourth be with you
Kylo and Rey fighting in Rise of the Skywalker

Star Wars is among the most popular multimedia franchises in the galaxy, so it should come as no surprise that it's been given its own annual holiday. Celebrated on May 4 (for obvious reasons), most fans will dedicate Star Wars Day 2022 to rewatching their favorite movies, running through their favorite games, or picking up some discounted merch. But there's another way to celebrate Star Wars Day that's a bit more obscure -- having a quick chat with Amazon Alexa.

Whether you own a smart home device like the Echo Dot or just want to run the app through your smartphone, Alexa has a surprisingly robust knowledge of all things Star Wars. To access that knowledge, however, you need to know the right prompts. From chatting with Chewbacca to taking a Star Wars Trivia quiz, here are some fun Alexa commands to get you in the Star Wars spirit.

Read more