The latest Amazon Fire TV Stick with Alexa on board is finally ready to make its debut in the UK, set to go on sale at £40 (about $50).
The Alexa-enabled version of the Fire TV Stick went on sale in the United States back in October 2016, but it's only now reaching the UK. The device will be available in various stores, but for now it's available for preorder on Amazon's website.
Amazon Fire TV Stick With Alexa Hits UK
Interested customers who want to purchase the latest Amazon Fire TV Stick directly from Amazon can preorder the device now and receive it next month, as the gadget will start shipping on Apr. 6. Alternately, customers can just wait for another few weeks and get the Alexa-enabled Fire TV Stick from a brick-and-mortar store.
Aside from Amazon itself, other retailers that will be selling the Alexa-enabled Fire TV Stick in the UK include Tesco, Maplin, Argos and Dixons Carphone. At £40, the Amazon Fire Stick is more expensive in the UK than it is in the United States (it launched at $39.99 stateside), but the premium is not that surprising. Items in the UK are often more expensive than they are in the United States and the Brexit move led to further price increases. Nevertheless, £40 is still a decent price tag for a gadget that serves as a streaming hub, complete with voice remote.
Alexa-Enabled Amazon Fire TV Stick Perks
The main selling point of the new Fire TV Stick is its neat remote control with a microphone baked-in, allowing users to interact with Amazon's Alexa AI assistant. Users can rely on voice commands to tell Alexa to search for content on the Fire TV Stick and Alexa skills are also in the mix.
With Alexa skills on board, the Amazon Fire TV Stick can do far more than just play multimedia files on command. The smart AI assistant can offer useful information about the weather, news, stock prices, sports scores, board game rules and more, order an Uber, detail the latest deals for Prime customers, help out in the kitchen, and a lot more. Head over to Amazon's dedicated page to learn more about available Alexa skills.
The Fire TV Stick itself, meanwhile, is quite similar in design to its predecessor, but it's significantly more powerful and faster. The new iteration packs a quad-core processor that's 30 percent faster than the dual-core one powering the previous version, and it also comes with 1 GB of RAM and 8 GB of native storage space. This allows for a smooth navigation around the new Fire UI, and a neat experience overall. The Alexa voice remote is just the cherry on top.
Since Amazon will start shipping the Alexa-enabled Fire TV Stick on Apr. 6, it's safe to assume that the device will go on sale at other retailers shortly after that. This means that starting on the second week of April, interested customers should be able to purchase the new Fire TV Stick in retail stores across the UK.
