Alexa will converse more naturally next year, losing its robotic tone of nearly a decade, and answer questions like the start time for football games and recipe ideas. It will also be able to compose and recite poems, Amazon showed at the company's annual product launch in Arlington, Virginia.
Amazon introduced Alexa in 2014, but has not found a consistent means to make it profitable, instead driving shoppers toward the company's website for more purchases.
The Seattle-based company has worked to pep up Alexa particularly after OpenAI's ChatGPT burst on the scene in November with longform answers to complex queries. Similar chatbots sparked an investor frenzy in generative AI startups.
At the event, Amazon also introduced refreshed versions of children's Fire tablets, the Show (an Echo with a screen), a speaker for televisions and new search capabilities on the FireTV service to find free content.
