Amazon Echo Spot (2024) Review: A tad too simple

If you’re looking for a small alarm clock with smart features, there are a few devices you can choose from. However, many don’t include a screen, demanding that you use a voice command to see basic information such as the weather or time. That’s where the new Amazon Echo Spot comes into play, which offers all of these handy features just by glancing over at the device – without requiring you to use the magic phrase.

Amazon has previously made several good Echo Show smart displays and smart speakers in various forms, shapes, and sizes, but none of them are as compact as the new Echo Spot. The new speaker offers everything users have been asking for the past few years, including a small footprint, an impressive speaker, and a display — without any other distractions.

Price, availability, and specs

The Amazon Echo Spot (2024) retails for $80 on Amazon and at Best Buy for the same price. The smart speaker comes in three colors: Black, Glacier White, and Ocean Blue — all available at other retailers, too. The Echo Spot costs a little more than its predecessor, and while you’re getting a smaller display, you still have a familiar compact size and, all things considered, rather enjoyable audio quality.

What’s more, both Amazon and Best Buy often have the Echo Spot on sale, so it’s rare that you’d ever buy or find it at its normal retail value. It’s frequently available between $45 and $55, which is a rather appealing price tag, and relatively affordable when compared against other devices in its category.

What’s good about the Echo Spot?

Great audio, straightforward setup, snappy performance

Like in the past, the Echo Spot is easy and straightforward to set up. Once it’s plugged in, the speaker prompts you to download the Amazon Alexa app where you sign in and go through the steps to set up the speaker. It took about 5 minutes, and it was a fast process.

The Echo Spot measures 113 x 103 x 111mm, slightly larger than the original. The new Spot comes with a fairly small, 2.83-inch 240 x 320 resolution display housed on the top half of the face, while the bottom section is dedicated to the 1.73-inch single driver. A motion sensor on the top, too, can recognize when you approach the device, increase the brightness, and activate a routine.

Generally speaking, the Echo Spot looks minimalistic and very stylish. It’ll fit in nearly every environment, whether that particular room follows a certain design and theme. The Echo Spot will blend in seamlessly without a problem. The sound, too, feels very good overall. It’s loud enough to jam to your favorite songs and fill your office or bedroom. It’s great for general listening, but you shouldn’t expect the best sound quality as it lacks the features of a high-end driver. Still, it’ll get the job done and make music listening enjoyable enough.

The top of the device houses three easily accessible buttons: two volume controls, and a mute button for the microphone. It’s a pretty standard button combination for Echo devices. For those wondering where the snooze button may be, it’s not present on the new Spot. Instead, you can tap anywhere over the top of the device to temporarily silence an alarm.

The Spot has all the features you would expect from a smart speaker, and it can activate routines based on the motion sensor, time, location, and various other settings. It can tell you the weather and answer any other queries you may have. It’s pretty standard in terms of voice commands, and if you used an Echo product in the past, you’ll find yourself right at home.

It’s worth mentioning that the speaker is powered by a MediaTek MT8519 chipset, coupled with 1GB of RAM and 8GB of storage, which is plenty enough for a smart device, such as the Echo Spot. Everything was answered instantly, and I never faced any connection issues.

What’s bad about the Echo Spot?

Limited display that’s more difficult to read in low light and off-angle

The display is fairly bright in most environments, and I had no problems looking at it directly during the day. However, off-angle and in low light, the screen is much harder to read, and I found that the brightness was a bit too low at night. If you have a light or a TV on when you go to sleep, the clock will be more difficult to read.

Luckily, this will only affect the time and weather on the clock’s face, as notifications aren’t shown on the display. Instead, they simply use a bell icon that can show you Amazon notifications and send you updates regarding your recent orders.

The clock face is pretty limited, and Amazon offers a small set of customizable clock faces and colors to choose from. There are six clock faces and six unique colors that can be applied to those faces, including blue, orange, violet, lime, magenta, and teal. Other than the provided sets, there’s no way to set a custom photo or to see a more visual and realistic representation of the weather.

If you want to customize your experience a little more and have a bigger display, you might want to consider the Amazon Echo Show 5 instead. The Echo Show 5 offers even more features for your money, and it has a camera and a full-fledged display for roughly the same price.​​​

Some may argue that setting a photo on such a small display seems unnecessary. Still, it would make the device a little more personalizable and better in some environments, especially bedrooms. The calendar could also be useful in kitchens, but most people would likely use it on their bedside table as an alarm clock, which is perfect for that.

Additionally, the screen offers little to no additional features other than changing the clock face, changing the brightness, connecting to Bluetooth devices, and turning on night mode. There’s no option to slide to see the weather without using a voice command, and likewise, you can’t control any of your smart home products using the screen.

Some might be disappointed that the Spot lacks a video camera. As someone who is more privacy conscious and uses it beside their bed, I was more than happy with this sacrifice as I didn’t have to worry about another device spying or watching me while sleeping. For those wanting to make video calls, an Echo Show may be a better option.

Should you buy it?

The Echo Spot is a great overall device, offering respectable audio quality for the price in a small and compact form factor that fits in any bedroom and confined space. It’s stylish, and the added display is a nice bonus – even though it’s severely limited and offers very few features and customization options.

If you’re looking for a bedside smart speaker that shows the time and weather, lacks a camera for the more privacy couscous, and has a decent speaker that fills the room, then the Echo Spot is, dare I say, spot on. It blends in with most furniture and room layouts and is ideal for answering queries, controlling your smart home products, and listening to music.