Amazon’s Echo Show 15 is touted as the biggest and best of the Alexa devices. With a bigger screen for more information, plus the ability to handle lots of daily tasks, Echo Show 15 is meant to become a family home center. One of the things Echo Show 15 lets you do is set up Visual ID, which is Amazon’s facial recognition service. By seeing and recognizing your face using the built-in camera, the Show 15 can personalize results and responses just for you — or for members of the family. If you need a quick primer on that, read how to set up Visual ID here.
One of the personalization options in the Echo Show 15 is the ability to send a note to a family member. It's worth pointing out there are two options here: Sending a Note and sending a Sticky. Here’s what to know about each and send them.
Notes and Stickys: What's the difference?
Notes are wrapped in little digital envelopes and are a cute communication tool. They’re not terribly proactive, in that you need to see them on the screen or ask if you have any. There’s no verbal alert from Alexa informing you that you’ve got mail. The Note notification appears and disappears from the screen seemingly at will.
Sticky notes are just like they sound; they stay stuck to the screen in the widget gallery and look like a digital Post-it note on the screen.
How to get Alexa to send a Note
To write a Note, just say, “Alexa, send a Note to Erin.” Alexa will take the dictation via your voice and deliver it to that person the next time they pass by the screen and the camera recognizes them.
To send a Note to a specific person, the sender and recipient both need to have Visual ID and Voice ID enabled. If your recipient doesn’t have these features set up, you can still leave something for them — you’ll just do it as a Sticky instead.
How to get Alexa to send a Sticky
Step 1: If your person is not part of Visual ID, you can simply say, “Alexa, write a Sticky.”
Step 2: You’ll dictate the contents of the note by voice, or you can type it in.
Step 3: The note will stay stuck to the screen as part of the widget grid until you tap and hold to remove it or ask Alexa to delete it.
Notes and Stickies make it easy to pass messages between family or household members on the go, whether they use Visual ID or not.
