It is capable of natural language processing for tasks such as voice interaction, music playback, creating to-do lists, setting alarms, streaming podcasts, playing audiobooks, providing weather, traffic, sports, other real-time information and news.

Alexa capabilities may be extended by installing "skills" (additional functionality developed by third-party vendors, in other settings more commonly called apps) such as weather programs and audio features.

Alexa was developed out of a predecessor named Ivona which was invented in Poland, inspired by the film 2001: A Space Odyssey and bought by Amazon in 2013.

[13][14][15] In June 2015, Amazon announced the Alexa Fund, a program that would invest in companies making voice control skills and technologies.

The US$200 million fund has invested in companies including Jargon, Ecobee, Orange Chef, Scout Alarm, Garageio, Toymail, MARA, and Mojio.

[17][18][19] Follow up conferences went under the name Project Voice and featured keynote speakers such as Amazon's Head of Education for Alexa, Paul Cutsinger.

[28] Hoped-for revenue never materialized from people using voice ordering for Amazon products or services from partners such as Domino's Pizza and Uber.

In 2022, with the division losing several billion dollars per quarter, the company started laying off Alexa employees en masse.

The app can be used by owners of Alexa-enabled devices to install skills, control music, manage alarms, and view shopping lists.

[30] It also allows users to review the recognized text on the app screen and to send feedback to Amazon concerning whether the recognition was good or bad.

Alexa can perform a number of preset functions out-of-the-box such as set timers, share the current weather, create lists, access Wikipedia articles, and many more things.

[31] Users say a designated "wake word" (the default is simply "Alexa") to alert an Alexa-enabled device of an ensuing function command.

Behind the scenes, the data gathered is then sometimes passed to a variety of suppliers including WolframAlpha, iMDB, AccuWeather, Yelp, Wikipedia, and others[32] to generate suitable and accurate answers.

[35] Some of the most popular Alexa skills in 2018 included "Question of the Day" and "National Geographic Geo Quiz" for trivia; "TuneIn Live" to listen to live sporting events and news stations; "Big Sky" for hyper-local weather updates; "Sleep and Relaxation Sounds" for listening to calming sounds; "Sesame Street" for children's entertainment; and "Fitbit" for Fitbit users who want to check in on their health stats.

[36] In 2019, Apple, Google, Amazon, and Zigbee Alliance announced a partnership to make their smart home products work together.

Alexa can interact with devices from several manufacturers including SNAS, Fibaro, Belkin, ecobee, Geeni, IFTTT,[45] Insteon, LIFX, LightwaveRF, Nest, Philips Hue, SmartThings, Wink,[46][47] and Yonomi.

Amazon Prime members have an additional ability to access stations, playlists, and over two million songs free of charge.

[66] Nowadays, Alexa Smart Properties is used for some purposes, one of them being healthcare, hospitality, senior living, success stories, and solution providers.

[citation needed][67] This feature was included in February 2020, in which the digital assistant can notify the user when a severe weather warning is issued in that area.

[89] In 2018, Too Many T's, a hip hop group from London, received international media attention by being the first artists to feature Amazon Alexa as a rapper and singer.

[95][96][97] In early 2018, security researchers at Checkmarx managed to turn an Echo into a spy device[98] by creating a malicious Alexa Skill that could record unsuspecting users and send the transcription of their conversations to an attacker.

[100] Although the man who received the recordings reported the anomaly to Amazon, the company did not notify the victim until German magazine c't also contacted them and published a story about the incident.

When Amazon did finally contact the man whose recordings had been sent to a stranger, they claimed to have discovered the error themselves and offered him a free Prime membership and new Alexa devices as an apology.

Although Amazon has announced that this was a rare occurrence, Alexa shows the dangers of using technology and sharing private information[103] with robotics.

[104][better source needed] Privacy experts have expressed real concern about how marketing is getting involved in every stage of people's lives without users noticing.

A New Hampshire judge ruled in November 2018 that authorities could examine recordings from an Amazon Echo device recovered from the home of murder victim Christine Sullivan for use as evidence against defendant Timothy Verrill.

Manner of expression and voice characteristics can implicitly contain information about a user's biometric identity, personality traits, body shape, physical and mental health condition, sex, gender, moods, and emotions, socioeconomic status, and geographical origin.

[108] At the Amazon Re:MARS conference In June 2022 the company demonstrated a feature in development that would let Alexa mimic a specific person's voice.

By specifically targeting developers, device-makers, and innovative companies of all sizes, Amazon aims at making digital voice assistants more powerful for its users.

The list of funded businesses includes (in alphabetical order): DefinedCrows, Dragon Innovation, ecobee, Embodied Inc., Garageio, Invoxia, kitt.ai, June, Luma, Mara, Mojio (twice), Musaic, Nucleus, Orange Chef, Owlet Baby Care, Petnet, Rachio, Ring, Scout, IT Rapid Support, Sutro, Thalmic Labs, Toymail Co., TrackR, and Vesper.