What's more, between the Echo's 3-inch woofer and dual 0.8-inch tweeters, bass and lower-range mids are richer and stronger. But the Echo simply boasts more power: the Echo's volume at 85% is about equivalent to the Nest's max.

The Echo sounds better than the last generation, but how does it sound compared to the direct competition? Google's $100 Nest Audio, which dropped only a couple of weeks before the Echo, is a solid device. I personally didn't notice dramatic differences in output from room to room, but the speaker sounded good in the various rooms and on the various surfaces I used for testing. In addition, the Echo has adaptive sound, so it can adjust to the acoustics of the room in which you use it. When it comes to sound, the Echo represents a significant improvement over the third-gen speaker from 2019, likely in part to the fact that the third-gen Echo essentially copped its design almost wholesale from an older device. It's also worth splurging for over Amazon's new, similarly ball-shaped Echo Dot. This Echo has turned up the sound quality and added higher-end smarts than the competition, all for the same $100 price tag, leaving it one of the most forward-looking smart speakers released in years. But 2020's Echo is genuinely different, and it's not just because of the new spheroidal profile. That left the $100 Echo as a sort of undefined middle child in the growing family of Alexa-powered speakers. So why buy a new Echo?Īmazon has faltered recently with its core smart speaker, as the more budget-friendly Dot has become a better entry point to the market and 2019's Echo Studio offers higher-end sound for audiophiles. The big question for Amazon and its new Echo is, well, beyond the superficial, how reimagined is it? Voice assistants are growing and changing all the time, but for the most part, they do what they've been doing for years already: Answer questions, set timers, control your smart home gadgets, play music and so on.

Alexa echo