Amazon just edited the photos out of the Echo Show 8 Photos Edition

Summary

• The Echo Show 8 Photos Edition is losing its sole unique feature with the shutdown of Amazon’s PhotosPlus subscription in September 2024.
• Customers who paid $10 extra for this device and a $2 subscription fee every month thereafter will now have a standard Echo Show 8 with a limit on slideshow time before ads take over.
• While users can keep their 25GB Amazon Photos cloud storage, its future is uncertain too, disappointing those who invested in this smart display.

An interactive touchscreen smart display is one of the best additions to a smart home setup, because it can serve as a smart device control hub, a helpful assistant on command, and a picture frame when not in use. Amazon’s Echo Show range is a popular choice, and they are available in an assortment of sizes too, but the company recently pulled the plug on its PhotosPlus subscription, leaving last year’s Echo Show 8 Photos Edition devoid of its primary differentiating feature.

Amazon’s 2023 Echo Show 8 Photos Edition was a $160 smart display that cycles through user-selected images in 30-second intervals. It differed from the $10 cheaper regular Echo Show 8 in that you could have this slideshow run indefinitely, or in Amazon’s words, make those photos “the primary content you see,” because all other smart displays from the brand switch to ads and other promotional content after three hours of running the slideshow.

That $10 price delta bought customers a six-month trial for Amazon’s $2 per month PhotosPlus subscription accompanied by 25GB of Amazon Photos cloud storage for your media. However, Amazon is now mailing customers about PhotosPlus’ upcoming shutdown planned for September 23, 2024.

What happens to the Echo Show 8 Photos Edition post-shutdown?

The shutdown announcement less than a year after the debut is certainly disappointing for people who paid the premium for this device. An Amazon spokesperson told The Verge the Photos Edition has been unavailable for sale since March. However, the Photos Edition is now a standard Echo Show 8 with the usual three-hour limit on slideshows before ads take over. You’ll find the slideshow option under Settings → Clock & Photo Display. Alternatively, you can say, “Alexa, start Photo Frame.”

Amazon is letting customers retain access to their Amazon Photos cloud storage post-shutdown, and that’s the only silver lining to this cloud. However, we suspect the convenience won’t be extended for long, even though the company doesn’t mention a concrete shutdown date.

We aren’t happy about customers being upsold on a smart display only to be downgraded to the standard version less than a year later. The only reasoning the Amazon representative provided wasn’t very helpful, simply stating the company regularly evaluates its products and services based on customer feedback. WE just hope other Amazon Echo products don’t meet a similar fate. Not now, not ever.