Amazon Echo Show 16, Echo Dot, Echo Time: price, release

Amazon has announced five new Alexa devices: a redesigned Echo Show 16 smart display, a new Echo Dot, an Echo Studio with a built-in camera, a bedside smart clock called Echo Time, and the Alexa Photo Frame. They were unveiled on Wednesday, October 28, and most of them are on sale in the US today.

Prices run from $99.99 for the Echo Dot to $569.99 for the Echo Show 16 with an anti-glare screen. Here is what each device costs, when it ships, what is actually new and what to think about before you buy.

New Echo devices: prices and release dates at a glance

Echo Dot: $99.99, on sale today in Graphite, Glacier White, Agave Green and Coral Pink. Two Amazon Kids versions (Octopus and Penguin) start at $109.99 with a year of Kids+. An optional stand costs $39.99.

Echo Studio with Home Camera: $249.99, on sale today in Graphite, with a $39.99 optional stand. The regular Echo Studio without a camera stays on sale at $219.99.

Echo Time: $199.99, on sale today in Graphite, Glacier White and Coral Pink, with a $39.99 adjustable stand. Amazon Kids Echo Time (Galactic Grape or Cosmic Lime) starts at $209.99 with a year of Kids+.

Alexa Photo Frame: $199.99 with a black frame, or $229 with a real birch or walnut frame. Amazon says 90 days of Alexa+ comes with every frame.

Echo Show 16: $499.99, or $569.99 with the Nanomatte anti-glare screen. Pre-orders are open now and pre-orders get $100 off, which brings them to $399.99 and $469.99. Amazon says it ships later this year; Bloomberg, as cited by Quartz, reports a December ship date. A stand costs $69.99, or $124.99 for a swivel-and-tilt stand.

All prices are Amazon's US prices from its October 28 announcement. Amazon did not give prices or dates for other countries in these posts. Certain features need Alexa+, which is included with Prime.

Echo Show 16: a bigger, thinner screen with Fire TV

The Echo Show 16 is the headline device. It has a 16-inch full HD screen with 10% more viewing area than the Echo Show 15, in an anodized aluminum frame that Amazon says is nearly 40% thinner. The optional Nanomatte screen uses the same etched anti-glare glass as the Alexa Tablet 12 Pro, which Amazon says cuts glare by more than 90%.

It has a new 13-megapixel wide-angle camera with auto-framing for video calls, and for the first time on an Echo Show there is night vision, so you can check a room through Live View in the Alexa app in the dark. Amazon says Visual ID can now recognize people from up to 17 feet away, up from 8 feet.

Inside there is 20% more computing power, eight small woofers and two tweeters, and Fire TV built in with a remote in the box, so it doubles as a small TV for Netflix, Prime Video, YouTube and other apps. New Screen Styles turn the home screen into a family organizer, a smart home dashboard or a full-screen photo frame.

Echo Dot: now a smart home hub and Wi-Fi extender

The new Echo Dot keeps the small round shape but adds two things that used to need separate gadgets. It has a built-in smart home hub with Zigbee, Matter and Thread support, so it can talk to lights, locks and sensors directly, and a built-in eero Wi-Fi extender that adds up to 1,000 square feet of coverage to an existing eero network.

It runs on Amazon's own AZ3 chip with an AI accelerator for on-device processing, adds a fourth microphone, and has a new full-range driver that Amazon says gives 50% more bass than the last model. Omnisense sensors detect room temperature and whether someone is present, so routines can turn on lights or the heating automatically.

Echo Studio with Home Camera: a speaker Alexa can see through

Echo Studio with Home Camera is Amazon's best-sounding speaker, with a woofer, three full-range drivers and Dolby Atmos, now with a camera built in. Hold up a board game box and Alexa+ can explain the rules, or show it a cereal box to reorder it, Amazon says. You can also check the room from the Alexa app while you are out.

Amazon says the speaker will soon pair with compatible Fire TV devices for video calls on a TV. A button turns off the microphones and camera, and an LED lights up when it streams images or video to the cloud. If you do not want a camera in your living room, the regular Echo Studio is still sold for $30 less.

Echo Time: a camera-free smart alarm clock

Echo Time is a round bedside clock with a 3.2-inch touchscreen and no camera. You can pick from hundreds of clock faces, including characters such as Batman, Harry Potter and the Powerpuff Girls. In the morning the screen brightens like a sunrise, and at night it dims and cuts blue light.

Its optional smart alarm tries to wake you during lighter sleep, anywhere within 10 to 60 minutes of your set alarm. Amazon says it uses ultrasound to detect breathing and nearby movement, plus temperature and presence sensors, with no wearable needed. Sleep sensing is opt-in, and the device has earned the National Sleep Foundation's SleepMark.

Alexa Photo Frame and Alexa Home Map

The Alexa Photo Frame is a 10-inch semi-matte touchscreen inside a real frame with a soft-white mat. It syncs from Amazon Photos, and Alexa+ picks pictures based on faces, time and sentiment, skips screenshots and receipts, and can pull up photos on request, like the kids or a beach trip. You can also attach voice notes to photos, and family members can send pictures straight to the frame.

Amazon also previewed Alexa Home Map, an interactive 3D map of your home. You add your address, scan each room with a compatible iPhone and place your devices, then control lights, locks and Ring or Blink cameras from the map. It starts rolling out in preview later this year in the Alexa, Ring and Alexa Home Map apps on iOS, on larger Echo Shows including the Echo Show 16, the Ember Artline Fire TV and the new Alexa Tablets. Some Ring features need a Ring Protect Pro or Virtual Security Guard plan.

Privacy: cameras, sensors and what you can switch off

Two of the new devices have cameras (Echo Show 16 and Echo Studio with Home Camera), and three use Amazon's Omnisense presence and temperature sensing (Echo Show 16, Echo Dot and Echo Time). Amazon says every device has a button that turns off the microphones and any camera, and a light that shows when Alexa is listening or a camera is streaming. Echo Time has no camera at all, and its sleep sensing stays off until you turn it on.

If that is still too much, the plain Echo Studio remains on sale, and you can manage voice and video history in the Alexa Privacy dashboard. It is worth reading these settings before you put a camera speaker in a living room or a sleep sensor in a bedroom.

Should you buy one?

The Echo Dot is the easiest upgrade to justify: at $99.99 it replaces a separate smart home hub and adds Wi-Fi coverage, which is useful if you already use eero. Owners of an older Echo Dot who do not care about smart home control can wait.

The Echo Show 16 is the most expensive and the one you cannot get yet. If you want a kitchen screen that also works as a TV and family calendar, the $100 pre-order discount makes it much easier to justify. If you live in Apple's ecosystem, compare it with Apple's $299 HomeView smart display first.

Echo Time and the Alexa Photo Frame are niche but well defined: a $199.99 bedside clock with smart wake-up, and a $199.99 photo frame that fills itself from Amazon Photos. Both are easier gifts than a camera speaker. We have not tested any of these devices yet, so treat this as a guide to what Amazon announced, not a review.