Alexa in Hindi now available on smartphones via Alexa app

Alexa, the brain powering Amazon Echo devices was launched in India in 2018. In September 2019, Amazon brought Hindi support to Alexa and since then the company has added over 60 new features with significant improvements in Automatic Speech Recognition and Natural Language Understanding.

Commemorating the first anniversary of Alexa's Hindi support in India, Amazon today announced that Android or iOS smartphone users in India can now interact with its voice assistant in Hindi via the Alexa app.

Alexa, the brain powering Amazon Echo devices was launched in India in 2018. In September 2019, Amazon brought Hindi support to Alexa and since then the company has added over 60 new features with significant improvements in Automatic Speech Recognition and Natural Language Understanding.

"India's unique cultural and linguistic diversity has always inspired us to make Alexa more local and relevant to users in the country. Introducing Hindi made Alexa accessible to hundreds of millions of native Hindi speakers. Similarly, we will continue to make Alexa interactions in Hindi even more seamless and conversational. It is still Day 1," said Puneesh Kumar, Country Leader for Alexa, Amazon India.

Further, six new Alexa original songs, poems and 20 new stories in Hindi have been added. Just ask "Alexa, hamari dosti par poem sunao" or "Alexa, kuch gungunao" or "Alexa, cloud rap sunao" or "Alexa, cricket story sunao" or "Alexa, dosti ki kahani sunao" to listen to the new poems and stories.

To interact with Alexa in Hindi on your smartphone:

• Open the Alexa app
• Visit settings
• Tap Alexa on this phone
• Select 'हिंदी' from available languages

In a blog post, Puneesh Kumar, country leader for Alexa, Amazon India said since the availability of Alexa interactions in Hindi, Indian households have widely adopted the voice assistant. Each day, the voice assistant gets hundreds of thousands of requests in Hindi and Hinglish each day. He also shared some interesting ways Indian users interact with Alexa in Hindi:

• All Alexa needs is WiFi! But in true desi fashion, customers ask, "Alexa, khana khaogi?
• Customers are concerned about Alexa's well-being. So much so that at least 5 customers ask, Alexa, kaisi ho?" every minute.
• Alexa may not understand the human emotion of love, but her conversations have impressed customers so much that at least 1 customer says "I love you" to Alexa every minute.
• What does Alexa do in the cloud? Now that is something customers wonder quite often, with at least 2 customers asking, "Alexa, kya kar rahi ho?" every minute.