For most folks on the Amazon Alexa bandwagon (my parents included), the Echo speaker takes on many roles throughout the day: setting alarms and reminders, settling dinner table debates with random trivia, streaming old classics while sipping tea, and switching off everything from the TV to the water heater through a collection of smart plugs scattered around the house.
The Echo Studio always has had one more role to play, ever since it first launched in 2019, and that is putting the speaker back in ‘smart speaker’. Seven years on, the second generation Echo Studio ( ₹23,999) doubles down on that promise, but does it justify the premium when cheaper Echo devices already do such a competent job of handling Alexa's everyday tricks?
For the latest generation, Amazon has completely overhauled how the Echo Studio looks, forgoing the clunky cylindrical ‘medieval knight helmet’ design for a more sophisticated spherical look that brings it in line with the rest of the Echo lineup.
Switching the iconic Alexa light ring and the volume/mute controls to a flattened circle on one side does lend it a futuristic Death Star vibe, but for me, it’s a visual upgrade—the Echo Studio looks less like a speaker and more like a piece of graphite/white, knit-fabric-sporting piece of home décor. The new Echo’s smaller size (by 40%), paired with a diameter of just about 6 inches, it’s certainly more pleasing to the eye, and looks at home in a larger number of indoor environments than the heftier predecessor. This smaller footprint has one immediate, glaring casualty: the 3.5mm port for standard audio cable input is now gone, as is the micro-USB port for service/Ethernet adapters. The only way to connect to the speaker is via Wi-Fi 6e and Bluetooth 5.3.
The bigger question is whether a significantly smaller speaker can be a good speaker, particularly for something at the top-end of Amazon’s Echo speaker portfolio? The last-generation Studio had three two-inch, side-mounted mid-range speakers, a 1-inch front-facing tweeter, a two-inch upward-firing midrange speaker, and a 5.25-inch downward-firing sealed woofer. The woofer had enough of a cutout to allow for much needed airflow for a powerful and deep bass.
The latest model has just three 1.5-inch full-range drivers and a single 3.75-inch high-excursion woofer. On its own, it’s a very competent speaker, with a balanced soundstage and excellent depth and clarity, evidenced by how well it handles vocals and instrument separation. However, the tuning is certainly biased towards the highs and mids across nearly every genre of music. Lively, dynamic tracks render particularly well, as do beautifully arranged movie soundtracks like Hans Zimmer’s ‘Cornfield Chase’ from Interstellar.
And even as the bass and volume are suitably present and distortion-free for most living spaces—aided in large part by the Automatic Room Adaptation technology—the new Echo Studio does expectedly lack the powerful bass and overall volume of the older model. Like the original Echo Studio, this model supports spatial audio, Dolby Atmos and Sony 360 Reality Audio content with supported streaming platforms. You can do all the usual mix-and-match scenarios like using the Studio as part of a multi-room music setup, or pair with another Echo Studio for an on-the-go home theatre setup.
Much like the Echo Dot Max it launched alongside, the Echo Studio is loaded with sensors and other smarts: It has the same temperature and ultrasound motion sensors as the Echo Dot as well as Omnisense tech, which enables smart home routines using motion, presence and temperature detection. If you’ve used Alexa Routines previously, you can now set them up to run as soon as you enter the room or if the temperature drops below or above predefined thresholds.
The new AZ3 Pro chipset delivers snappy Alexa responses and an uncanny ability to discern the Alexa wake word even amidst noisy conversations, though you likely won’t notice the difference unless you’ve been using older Alexa-enabled devices regularly.
Where you will notice the bump in computing is when Amazon finally rolls out the Alexa+ generative AI-powered assistant for Indian markets in the hopefully not-too-distant future. This enables an Alexa-on-steroids experience—more human-like back-and-forth conversations, deeper understanding of context and nuance for smart home control, and proactive task management.
As it stands, Alexa is the best overall smart assistant integrated to a home speaker. It is certainly more capable than Siri on the HomePod, and answers most questions rather well. The Alexa ecosystem offers far better smart home support than its rivals, aided by its integrated Zigbee and Thread smart home hub and full Matter-protocol compliance for quick connectivity with compatible devices.
Verdict
The second-generation Echo Studio is a more polished and mature smart speaker that comfortably cements its place at the top of Amazon’s Echo lineup. The refreshed design finally gives it the visual appeal and place-anywhere presence its impressive hardware deserves, while the sound remains rich, detailed and room-filling. That said, it doesn’t quite recreate the sheer authority and low-end swagger that made the original Echo Studio such a welcome addition to the Echo lineup. Add to that a handful of headline smart features that are still yet to arrive, and the Echo Studio ends up feeling like a speaker that’s almost brilliant. It’s easy to recommend for what it already does well, but you can't shake the feeling that its best days are still just around the corner.
Tushar Kanwar is a tech columnist and commentator, and tweets @2shar.