Having to say “Alexa” before every command is fine if you only occasionally use your Echo speaker to check the news headlines or set a timer, but if you use Alexa a lot throughout the day, having to repeat the wake word every time can become annoying. Thankfully, there is a way to reduce how many times you need to with Alexa Follow-Up Mode.
Enable Alexa Follow-Up Mode
Open the Alexa app on your mobile device and tap the Devices tab at the bottom. Select your Echo device from the list of devices and scroll down the list of settings until you see “Follow-Up Mode”.
Tap this, and use the slider to turn it on.
When you activate Alexa with a command, you will now notice that the blue indicator light remains lit for a few extra seconds. This is your follow-up time, allowing you to make an additional request without saying the wake word.
You could, for example, say:
Alexa, what is the weather like?
And after being told (while the follow-up indicator is lit), say:
And tell me the news
There are situations when Alexa doesn’t remain active. These include:
– When audio is playing. For example, the device is playing music.
– If you end the conversation with Alexa by saying, “Stop,” “Cancel,” “Go to sleep,” or “Thank you.”
– When Alexa is not confident you’re speaking to her. For example, if she detects that speech was background noise or that the intent of the speech was not clear.
Change the Wake Word
Your Echo speaker and Alexa app allow you to change the wake word to any one of four options (with more possibly coming soon). The choices of wake words are Alexa, Amazon, Computer, and Echo. So you could say, for example:
Alexa, tell me the news
Amazon, tell me the news
Computer, tell me the news
Echo, tell me the news
You can choose a different wake word in the Alexa app. Just go to the Devices tab, select your Echo device and scroll down the list of options.
Tap the “Wake Word” heading and choose from the list of four.
The changes you make to the wake word only affects the device you have just chosen in the Alexa app. This means that you can set different Wake words to different Echo devices around your home, to help avoid the wrong speaker activating when you start a voice command/request.