Amazon is expanding its next-generation voice assistant beyond the US, with Alexa+ officially launching in Canada.
It’s the first country outside Amazon’s home market to get the upgraded experience, and Prime members can try it for free during the Early Access phase.
Alexa+ builds on the assistant people already know, but with a major upgrade powered by generative AI.
Amazon says the new system feels more like talking to a thoughtful, capable helper than interacting with a traditional smart speaker. It can handle half-finished sentences, casual expressions, and multi-step requests through natural conversation. And importantly, it’s tuned specifically for Canada, recognising local phrases, sports teams, and cultural references.
Where Alexa+ stands apart is what it can do. The revamped architecture connects multiple large language models with a wide range of services and devices, enabling what Amazon calls agentic capabilities – tasks Alexa can complete on your behalf. It can schedule restaurant reservations via OpenTable, summarise news from CBC, or help you with everyday shopping.
Support for more Canadian services is coming soon, including Yelp, Uber Eats, Suno, and TripAdvisor.
Alexa+ leans hard into personalisation: adapting to individual tastes and routines, and even moods, with changing tones of voice and advice. Through visual and voice ID, it recognises different household members and tailors its responses, from suggesting recipes that avoid certain foods to dimming the lights and playing your evening playlist when you say you’ve had a long day.
Smart home control also gets a major lift. With Alexa+, you don’t need precise phrasing, natural language is enough. Saying “I’m cold” adjusts the heat, and “It’s dark” turns on the lights. Music can follow you from room to room, camera feeds can be pulled up instantly, and new multi-action routines can be created entirely by voice.
Despite the added intelligence, Amazon says privacy protections remain unchanged. Users can review and manage their data in the Alexa Privacy Dashboard, while devices still offer physical controls for microphones and cameras.
Alexa+ will eventually cost $27.99 CAD per month, but Prime members won’t pay anything, the service becomes an included benefit once Early Access ends. Eligible Echo devices are shipping now, including the new Echo Show 8, Echo Show 11, Echo Dot Max and Echo Studio, which have been redesigned with more processing power and next-gen sensors specifically to support Alexa+.
Early Access begins rolling out, with tens of thousands of Canadians invited each week as availability expands over the coming months.
We’re still waiting for official of when Alexa+ will arrive in the UK, as all we know now is that it will be sometime in 2026.
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