Interested in trying Alexa, Amazon’s digital assistant, but don’t want to shell out a ton of cash for an Echo? If you’ve got an iPhone, you may want to check out Lexi.
Lexi is a new app on Apple’s App Store that enables you to use Alexa features without an Echo device. In addition to supporting general questions like “What’s the weather?”, you can use Lexi to place orders, use Skills, control your smart home devices.
Lexi requires an Amazon account as well as iOS 9 or higher. It’s priced at $4.99, which is quite a bit cheaper than the $89.99 Echo Dot or the $179.99 Echo. And while Lexi may not have all of the features of an Echo — it doesn’t integrate with Amazon Prime Music or Amazon’s books — that’s not a bad trade-off considering that you’re getting to try Alexa for $5 rather than almost $100.
If you try Lexi, be sure to let us know how the Alexa-enabled app works for you! You can also see a brief demo of Lexi in action right here.