Amazon has launched four new calling features for Amazon Echo users. The new calling features of Alexa will bring the family to the living room, no matter how far they are. Amazon Echo is already packed with a lot of useful features, but these new calling features are pretty interesting and worth trying. Using these calling features will provide the friends and family with a virtual happy hour. So these are the new calling features of Alexa on Amazon Echo.
Make Group Calls on Amazon Echo
The feature for calling an individual user was available for a long time. Now with the newly arrived feature, users can call seven people together. People who have Echo speakers and Echo dots can also work with audio calls, and Echo Show is available for video calls.
To start this, users will need to make a group in the Alexa app first.
- First tap on Communicate.
- Click on the Profile icon.
- Choose the Add New option.
- Click Add Group.
- Now press Enable to start the Group Calling feature.
- Find and choose the person to add to the group and press Continue.
- Set a name for the group (e.g. Family).
- Now users can command “Alexa, call Family” to start the group call.
Use Amazon Chime or Zoom on Echo Show 8
If anyone has a large group of people for the video call, they can rely on Amazon Chime or Zoom on their Echo Show 8. To start with Zoom, users will need to log in to Zoom for the Home app on Echo Show 8. After setting up, join the Zoom call by saying “Alexa, join my Zoom meeting” and type the meeting ID.
To organize the Amazon Chime, connect the calendar to Echo Show 8 through the Alexa app. Now say, “Alexa, join the Amazon Chime meeting.” However, if anyone doesn’t like to connect their calendar, they can directly type the meeting ID to join the meeting.
Echo Show Can Caption What People Are Saying
Using the Call Captioning feature, users can see what others are saying while being busy on a call. The good thing about Echo Show is that it will display real-time captions on the screen about what others are saying. The call captioning feature can be used during a video, audio or a drop-in call. However, this feature will work only on individual calling.
This feature will be in use mainly for the people who are deaf, and face hearing problems or can’t take loud noises. To activate the feature, slide down on Echo Show and open Settings on the upper-right corner. Slide down in the Accessibility section and turn on the Call Captioning feature.
Kids Can Now Make Calls on Their Amazon Fire Tablets
With the new feature, now kids can call their family and friends using Fire-tablets. Using the Amazon Kids app, kids can start Alexa to Alexa outgoing audio and video calls to those who have an Alexa app and Echo device.
Conclusion
These all four features are currently live, and users can activate them on their Amazon devices. The most useful feature among all these is group calls and call captioning. Both of these features will be helpful for the users in several ways, and hopefully more useful features will arrive in the future.
