You might have heard often that voice is the future. That the Voice assistants are the future of how we are going to consume digital content, make orders online, and receive the services we need.

Following this trend and the mention of Amazon Alexa as one of the best voice assistants available, you have found yourself searching to buy an Alexa device. But all you find it’s an Amazon Echo. It might sound a bit confusing initially, but the fact is in the difference between Alexa and Echo.

What is the difference between Alexa and Echo?

The difference between them is the fact that Alexa is the software, located in Amazon Servers, and the Echo devices are the hardware, which allows you to access Alexa.

Put in more simple words, Alexa is the virtual assistant that answers any questions you have. Then it makes your requests happen. On the other side, the Echo devices, are the official devices Amazon launched. They come as ‘Alexa enabled devices’, to allow every user free access to Alexa.

As seen in the explanation above it makes it clear what is Amazon Alexa and what are Amazon Echo devices.

Every time you need to make a request, you speak to the Echo device and wake it with the word “Alexa”.

Using only that word to access the service, makes people use the name Alexa. In reality they are speaking about Amazon Echo devices.

What are Echo devices?

When wanting to know about ‘what are Echo devices’, normally we refer to the Amazon Echo lineup. Echo lineup includes several devices.
Amazon Echo is the name of one of the devices Amazon first launched in 2014. Amazon Alexa is the artificial intelligence that makes it special.

The entire lineup of Amazon Echo devices is smart speakers that stay always on and require an internet connection to work properly. They are mainly voice-controlled and only a few selected actions you can do manually. You need an internet connection to access the Alexa services located in the Amazon Servers, which is entirely cloud-based. Every request or question you make comes from the servers since Amazon Echo devices don’t have built-in memory and neither can be added.

This extra description makes it clearer what Amazon Alexa is.

How many Amazon Echo devices are there?

The Amazon Echo lineup includes many similar yet different devices, where Amazon Echo is the “big brother” of them all.

• Amazon Echo Dot is a smaller version of the initial one. It also costs less but has a smaller speaker.
• Echo Plus has a slightly better sound output and better hardware to connect with different Smart Home appliances.
• The Echo Show devices come equipped with a display, which allows you to view videos and make video calls.
• Echo Studio is the king of sound output both in quality and volume.

There are also many other Amazon Echo products, each one with specific use cases.