Amazon has long worked with other brands like Toshiba and Insignia to produce Fire TV Edition sets equipped with its own smart TV system. Now the giant online retailer is getting into the TV hardware game itself. The Amazon Fire TV Omni and Fire TV 4-Series are the first Amazon-built TVs, according to the company. Preorders start today; they’re slated to arrive in October.
The Fire TV Omni’s claim to fame is a built-in far-field mic array that responds to the “Alexa” wake word, much like an Echo Speaker. That feature allows you to talk to the TV hands-free — no remote required — to search for TV shows and movies, navigate menus and have a conversation with Alexa to help you figure out what to watch.
If you don’t want the TV’s mic active, a physical switch on the front lets you turn it off. As with other Fire TVs, you can also use the included voice remote, with its push-to-talk mic button, to talk to Alexa. By default the TV won’t respond to “Alexa” commands hands-free when turned off, including a command like “Alexa, turn on the TV,” unless the user activates the Alexa Always feature in the settings menu.
The ability to speak directly into thin air to control a TV isn’t new. Alexa always-listening voice functionality is available in myriad devices such as Echo Speaker and the Fire TV Cube, many of which can control TVs. Alexa hands-free is already built into a handful of other TVs, including models from Samsung and LG, while the competing Google Assistant is available hands-free on TVs like the Sony X90J, Hisense H9G, and TCL 6 Series. The idea in every case is to make voice commands for TV, in particular smart TV functions like streaming, easier to use than a traditional remote control.
To that end, Amazon touts a few new Alexa features. Asking, “Alexa, what should I watch?” launches a voice-powered recommendation engine where Alexa tailors suggestions across apps, asks questions, and helps you narrow down choices by actor, genre, and more (the feature arrives in beta this year). Exclusive to Fire TV, saying “Alexa, play something from Netflix” will work the same as hitting the Play something button on the Netflix app, essentially picking a show for you. Fire TV will also play TikTok videos if you say — wait for it — “Alexa, play TikTok.”
