On Wednesday, Amazon unveiled an ambitious vision for the future — one where its upgraded Alexa, now dubbed Alexa+, handles a multitude of everyday tasks, from booking restaurant reservations to scheduling appliance repairs.
If Amazon succeeds, it could become the first to launch a comprehensive, consumer-focused AI assistant. The company aims to combine a more expressive and natural Alexa, powered by generative AI, with the ability to seamlessly interact with both first- and third-party apps, services, and platforms in a fully autonomous and intelligent way.
“We believe that the future is full of agents — we’ve held this belief for some time,” said Daniel Rausch, VP of Alexa and Echo, during a keynote. “Many AI agents will be out there, performing tasks for customers, with specialized skills. And we’ve always believed that these agents should interact with each other and work seamlessly together for the benefit of the customer.”
This would be a major win for Amazon, which has been struggling to keep its aging Alexa assistant relevant. Despite years of investment, the company has seen little revenue return from Alexa, and its hardware division has reportedly burned billions of dollars.
The term “agents,” referring to AI models that perform tasks on behalf of users, has become a buzzword in the tech industry. Agents are seen as a way to unlock value from increasingly sophisticated AI models, helping users and businesses complete simple tasks more efficiently, thereby boosting productivity.
However, agents have largely failed to live up to their potential so far.
Although companies like Anthropic and OpenAI have released agents capable of performing browser tasks, they often make mistakes and require significant human oversight for more complex actions. Even Google’s Project Mariner, an ambitious agent project, is still in the prototype stage without a clear release date.
In contrast, Amazon’s demos of Alexa+, scheduled for a preview launch next month, showcased a more polished, agent-like experience with fewer technical hurdles. The company demonstrated Alexa+ pulling information from various sources, including emails, calendars, and preferences, to assist with everyday errands.
In one demo, Alexa+ built a grocery shopping list and placed orders through Amazon Fresh, Whole Foods, and local grocery chains. In another, Alexa+ automatically purchased discounted items from Amazon and booked spa and fitness appointments through wellness app Vagaro.
But the capabilities don’t stop there. Alexa+ can also order food via Grubhub, hail an Uber, find concert tickets on Ticketmaster, create travel itineraries using sources like Tripadvisor, and even pull key dates from event flyers to set reminders.
While all of this sounds impressive, it also raises the question: is it too good to be true?
Amazon is in a strong position to succeed, thanks to years of customer data and partnerships with major tech platforms. Alexa+ users willing to share their data will get a more personalized and tailored experience. And since Alexa+ is free for Prime members (normally priced at $19.99 per month), Amazon has an easy way to attract its most loyal user base.
The company is also banking on its massive Alexa install base, which boasts over 600 million devices, to drive adoption of Alexa+. With Alexa-compatible devices already in many homes, Amazon hopes the new assistant will be a natural fit for existing users.
But Amazon’s biggest challenge may be overcoming the current limitations of AI technology. Alexa+ has reportedly faced multiple delays due to unreliable models. Earlier versions struggled with tasks like answering questions correctly and turning smart lights on and off.
Amazon’s competitors have also encountered setbacks in their agentic efforts. For example, OpenAI’s agentic model, which compiles research reports, sometimes produces hallucinated results. Google’s Gemini chatbot has also been known to generate inaccurate summaries of emails.
During Wednesday’s event, it was hard to gauge how well Alexa+ actually performs. Many of the demos appeared highly rehearsed, and attendees weren’t given the opportunity to test the assistant for themselves.
We’ll need to wait until Alexa+ becomes available to fully assess whether it can deliver on Amazon’s agentic vision. If it does, however, it would be an impressive achievement and could give Amazon a significant edge in the race for consumer AI agents.
