There was a massive Amazon Web server outage on Tuesday, and Alexa was unable to respond, so many people started giving their own feedback for Amazon. Some wondered whether Amazon was shutting down Alexa. After this Amazon officially said that yes, it is shutting down Alexa.com. This got people worried and led to the question whether Amazon is shutting down Alexa, read on to find out why Amazon is shutting down Alexa.
Is Amazon Shutting Down Alexa?
For information, let us tell you that after Alexa's inability to respond to servers due to a massive Amazon Web server outage on Tuesday, Amazon announced that they have decided to "retire" Alexa.com on May 1, 2022. The decision was taken, after which people started questioning whether Amazon was shutting down Alexa. , Is Alexa in trouble? Let us discuss this topic today. But it is absolutely true that they are shutting down Alexa.com from 1st May 2022. But it has nothing to do with the voice assistant Alexa.
Alexa Internet
Alexa Internet, Inc. is an American web traffic analysis company based in San Francisco. It is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Amazon. In December 2021, Amazon announced that it was closing down Alexa, with service to discontinue as of May 1, 2022. Alexa was founded as an independent company in 1996 and acquired by Amazon in 1999 for $250 million in stock. Alexa provides web traffic data, global rankings, and other information on over 30 million websites. Alexa estimates website traffic based on a sample of millions of Internet users using browser extensions, as well as from sites that have chosen to install an Alexa script. As of 2020, its website is visited by over 400 million people every month.
Why is Amazon Shutting down Alexa?
As we mentioned above, in December 2021, Amazon officially announced that they are going to end the service for Alexa.com (Alexa Internet) on May 1, 2022. Why is Amazon shutting down Alexa? Alexa traffic ranking of a website used to be very important. Not only can website owners compare their properties to those of competitors, but they can also increase their advertising rates if their ranking is high enough. Alexa Toolbar was a popular browser add-on that offered the then novel popup blocker, among other features. However, circumstances change, and Alexa Internet soon found itself in a more competitive market. While there are still many dedicated Alexa.com users, Amazon has clearly decided that the cost of maintaining the site is no longer worth it. As a result, they officially announced that they are going to discontinue the service for Alexa.com on May 1, 2022. You can check the news from the official page by clicking on Alexa.
If you also use Alexa, you will know that Amazon is the owner of both Alexa.com and Alexa, both entities are independent and not related to each other, and that Amazon is responsible for the closure of Alexa.com. The decision will have no effect on Alexa itself. You can visit the official page of Alexa the Voice Assistant (Digital Assistant) or by clicking on Amazon Alexa.
Top 15 Amazon Alexa Alternatives
- Google Home
- Google Nest Hub
- Google Nest Hub Max
- Lenovo Smart Display
- Harman-Kardon Allure
- Apple HomePod
- Bose Home Speaker 500
- Libratone Zipp
- Bang and Olufsen Beosound A1
- Invoxia Triby Smart Speaker
- Mycroft Mark II
- JBL Link View Smart Speaker
- Sonos One
- Ultimate Ears MEGABLAST
- KitSound Voice One
Amazon Alexa
Amazon Alexa, also known simply as Alexa is a virtual assistant technology largely based on a Polish speech synthesiser named Ivona, bought by Amazon in 2013. It was first used in the Amazon Echo smart speaker and the Echo Dot, Echo Studio and Amazon Tap speakers developed by Amazon Lab126. It is capable of voice interaction, music playback, making to-do lists, setting alarms, streaming podcasts, playing audiobooks, and providing weather, traffic, sports, and other real-time information, such as news. Alexa can also control several smart devices using itself as a home automation system. Users are able to extend the Alexa capabilities by installing "skills" (additional functionality developed by third-party vendors, in other settings more commonly called apps) such as weather programs and audio features. It uses automatic speech recognition, natural language processing, and other forms of weak AI to perform these tasks.