Amazon is moving Alexa+ from beta into broad U.S. availability, giving all U.S. customers access to its upgraded generative AI assistant as of Wednesday. The rollout marks a major step for Alexa, shifting it from a voice assistant built around commands into a more conversational AI service that can respond to follow-up questions, maintain back-and-forth chat, and handle a wider range of tasks.
For Prime members, Alexa+ will be free across devices with unlimited access. Non-Prime customers can still use Alexa+ through the Alexa website or mobile app for free, though Amazon says that version includes some limits.
What Amazon is making available
Alexa+ is Amazon’s generative AI-powered version of Alexa. The company announced it last year and has been testing it with Alexa customers during a year-long beta period.
According to Amazon, the assistant is model agnostic. That means it can run on a mix of Amazon’s own foundation models and models from other companies, depending on what is best suited to the task. The practical goal is to let Alexa+ do more than the original assistant without being tied to one single AI system.
Daniel Rausch, VP of Alexa and Echo at Amazon, told TechCrunch that Amazon already has “tens of millions of customers using Alexa+ now” and that the company is expanding it to Prime members with what he described as “basically a paid-tier level of access” included in Prime.
The assistant will be available in the U.S. across Alexa devices, including Echo products, Fire TV, Alexa.com, the Alexa mobile app, and Alexa-enabled devices from partners including Samsung, Bose, and others. Amazon said more devices are still to come.
How Alexa+ changes the assistant experience
The original Alexa was best known for direct voice commands: timers, weather, news, music, smart home controls, and similar everyday tasks. Alexa+ keeps those uses, but Amazon is positioning it as a broader AI assistant that can hold more natural conversations.
That matters because users no longer have to frame every request as a single command. Alexa+ can handle follow-up questions and back-and-forth exchanges, which makes it closer to the AI chatbot experience people now expect from generative AI tools.
Amazon says Alexa+ can help with a broader set of tasks, including:
- Planning an itinerary for a trip
- Updating a shared calendar
- Finding and saving recipes to a library
- Making movie recommendations
- Helping with homework
- Exploring a topic
- Handling smart home tasks, timers, news, and weather
The assistant also connects with services including Ticketmaster, Thumbtack, Uber, Angi, Expedia, Square, Yelp, Fodor’s, OpenTable, and Suno. Those integrations are meant to support more complex actions, such as scheduling a dinner reservation or requesting an Uber ride.
Amazon has not shared user adoption numbers for this more “agentic” use case, where the AI acts more autonomously to complete a task. That leaves an important question open: users may be talking to Alexa+ more, but it is not yet clear how often they are letting it take action through outside services.
What beta feedback changed
During the beta period, customers could try Alexa+ or roll back to the prior version. Amazon told TechCrunch that the rollback option will remain available, though the company could not say for how long.
That continued option suggests Amazon is still tuning the experience before making Alexa+ the only version users encounter. Rausch said the percentage of users opting out is in the low single digits, which indicates that most beta users did not abandon the new assistant.
Still, the beta exposed problems Amazon had to address. Some testers said Alexa+ was too chatty. Others said it interrupted at the wrong times, or did not like the new voice.
Amazon responded by revising onboarding so Alexa explains how users can change the voice. The “OG” voice remains available as Alexa+ voice No. 2, but Amazon says it now uses AI to add more inflection. Rausch said the team eventually had Alexa use the new version of the old voice and then switch back again to show customers the difference.
The company also changed how Alexa+ handles uncertain moments in conversation. When the assistant is not sure whether someone is speaking to it, Alexa can now ask, “Is that for me?”
Users can also configure parts of the experience. For example, if customers do not want follow-on mode, which lets Alexa continue listening after responding, they can turn it off.
Pricing, limits, and early signals
Alexa+ is free for U.S. Prime members. For non-Prime customers who want standalone access, Amazon says they could pay $19.99/month, a price TechCrunch notes is comparable to something like ChatGPT Plus.
There is also a free web and mobile experience for anyone, though Amazon says it comes with limits. Rausch said those limits are mainly meant to protect against abuse, adding, “I think we’ve got some great, generous limits. We’re not talking about exactly what they are today, but…there are some [limits].”
Amazon reported several positive adoption signals during the beta. Music streams increased by 25% after customers upgraded to Alexa+. Recipes saw 5x growth. Overall, customers are having two to three times more conversations with Alexa+ compared with the original Alexa.
Those numbers point to a central reason Amazon is pushing the upgrade: a more conversational assistant may create more frequent use. The company’s next challenge is making sure that use feels helpful rather than intrusive, especially as Alexa+ becomes available to everyone in the U.S.
When asked whether users will eventually be able to change the AI assistant’s personality, as they can with some other AI chatbots, Rausch offered only: “Stay tuned.”