Amazon’s Alexa voice assistant has integrated itself to work with a variety of smart home devices, but up until now, you needed to buy an Amazon Echo or an Echo Dot to enable those interactions on a thermostat.
The ecobee4 smart thermostat is the first device to have Alexa built in.
The new thermostat also answers other questions that Amazon Echo can handle like reading the news, order pizza, play music or request an Uber and more.
The Ecobee4 looks similar to the Ecobee3. Its face is a rounded black square with a smartphone-sized touch screen in the middle. The biggest noticeable difference is a small blue LED bar along the top, which lights up when Alexa is activated.
The interface is largely the same, with the current temperature displayed prominently and a slider along the right to adjust the heat or cooling. A small microphone icon in the lower right lets you activate Alexa manually.