Can I use an Amazon Echo as a Bluetooth speaker?
Yes, you most definitely can use your Amazon Echo as a Bluetooth speaker. However, before you do so, it’s worth considering if Bluetooth is the best way to skin this particular rabbit.
If you want to stream music from a service such as Spotify or even Amazon’s own music service, you simply need to dive into your Amazon Alexa app, click the More button > Settings > Music and Podcasts and link your chosen music service. You can then ask Alexa to play songs directly from that service.
Alternatively, if you have Spotify installed on your phone, and it’s on the same Wi-Fi network as your Amazon Echo speaker, you can play your Spotify tunes through the speaker without connecting via Bluetooth. In the Spotify app, start playing a song and then look for the little icon at the bottom of the screen that looks like a speaker with a computer screen behind it. Hit that and your Amazon Echo speaker should appear amongst the devices you can select to play music through.
That said, there might be other reasons why you still want to use your Amazon Echo as a Bluetooth speaker, so here’s how to set it up.
Related reading: Can I use an Amazon Echo as a computer speaker?
How to set up an Amazon Echo as a Bluetooth speaker
- Open the Bluetooth settings menu on your phone (or whichever device you want to connect to your Echo speaker)
- Say “Alexa, turn on Bluetooth”
- On your phone (or other device), search for available Bluetooth devices – the Echo should appear in the list
- When you click on the Echo’s name, you might be asked to click to confirm pairing
- You should get an audio confirmation on the Bluetooth that the two devices are paired
- The Echo speaker should now play the audio of anything you select on the phone – when the session has finished, just say “Alexa disconnect my phone”
- You don’t have to repeat this entire process every time. The next time you wish to connect your phone to the speaker via Bluetooth, just say “Alexa, connect my phone”
There are a couple of things to note about using your Alexa as a Bluetooth speaker. First, you can still continue to use Alexa voice commands while it’s playing back audio from your phone. It will simply duck the volume while it listens to and responds to your commands.
Second, if it’s connected to your phone, you can’t use the Alexa’s mic to make phone calls. It’s audio output only. Click here for more on making phone calls via Amazon Alexa.
Barry Collins
NEXT UP
Dell, Hyundai AutoEver and Intel team up for AI edge ecosystem expansion
Dell Technologies has expanded its edge ecosystem with Hyundai AutoEver, a subsidiary of Hyundai, and Intel to boost manufacturers’ ability to optimise output from edge data with AI.
Jeff Engle, Head of Product at BlueVoyant: “Protecting a company from cyber attacks isn’t just the role of the CISO or his team”
In this interview, we hear from Jeff Engle, Head of Product at BlueVoyant, President of Conquest Cyber and a recipient of a Purple Heart, who served in the US Army Special Operations.
State-sponsored attackers backdoor Cisco firewalls to hack into government networks
Cisco has revealed that hackers used zero-day vulnerabilities to gain access to government networks – but we don’t yet know who exactly was behind the attacks