If you’re looking for a way to use more than one account on your Alexa-enabled device, Alexa Households might be worth looking into! Designed for many family members inside a home, with Alexa Household you can now create multiple profiles for your entire family. You get to share content with your family members and at the same time have a customized experience.
What is Alexa Household?
Amazon’s Household feature brings into play bespoke experiences to you and your family members via Alexa-enabled devices. You can share media content and different benefits between all members of your household. Each individual can connect and link their Amazon account to the Echo device, and switching from one account to another is effortless.
The Household feature supports adding up to two adult accounts, four teens between the ages of 13-17, and four kids under age 12. Teenagers and kids will have limited access to certain features, leaving it up to you to approve or decline purchases, choose payment options, and so on.
So that makes a total of ten accounts per household, which is quite convenient.
Benefits of Alexa Household
Enabling the Household feature on your Alexa-enabled device brings plenty of benefits for the entire family.
Same device for the entire family
Everyone in the family can use the same Alexa-enabled device – without any additional costs.
Sharing digital content
When linking an individual account to the same Household, digital content such as audiobooks, and video libraries become available for everyone. This means you can share your podcasts or favorite tunes with all family members.
Tailored responses
Whether you ask Alexa to fill you in with the latest news or just want to check today’s weather forecast, what you will get is a response tailored specifically to each individual.
Access to wallet and subscriptions
When two adults join the same Household, they can also have access to the same wallet and share the same payment methods. Individual existing subscriptions will become accessible and ready for use by everyone.
Parental control
As an adult, you can decide what limitations you want to set for your kids – like choosing the content they are allowed to access. For teenagers, access to the credit card and shipping is given via the adult account, so you can keep an eye on the expenses.
Household Profiles on Alexa Devices
What is a Household profile?
Household profiles are a way of defining and customizing the experience of each individual who has joined the same household. Once you set up your Amazon Household, you can create different profiles suitable for all family members.
The adult profile has unrestricted access to all features and can be seen as an administrator role. As an adult, you can then create profiles for teens and kids and grant them access to the Alexa device.
Setting up a Household profile
- Open the Alexa app on your smartphone.
- Go to the main menu and look for Settings.
- Open Settings and navigate to Household Profile.
- Under Household Profile you will see a Start button. Hit Start.
- Next, you will be asked to pass your device to the person you would like to add to the Household.
- Ask the new member to add his Amazon account credentials to join the household.
- Once the account information of the new member has been added, tap Verify Account.
- Now, just tap Join Household and you’re all set.
Alternatively, if you don’t have access to your phone or tablet you can still set up a Household profile from your laptop. Open the browser, navigate to alexa.amazon.com and follow the same steps as described above.
Note that, your family members need a valid Amazon account otherwise you won’t be able to invite them to join the household.
Voice Profiles
When different family members interact with Alexa you don’t want to mix up your orders, contacts, or calendars with someone else’s. Voice profiles have been introduced to deliver a unique and personalized experience for each user – based on voice recognition.
All you need to do is teach Alexa to recognize your natural tone of voice. Once all household members have set up their voice profiles, Alexa will provide responses tailored to each individual. Works great for kids’ profiles as well.
How to set up a voice profile for yourself
- Open the Alexa app on your smartphone.
- Go to the main menu and choose Settings.
- Select your own account and then choose Recognized Voices.
- Tap to Add Your Voice.
- Follow the on-screen instructions to teach Alexa your voice. Just say out loud the sentences displayed so that Alexa can learn the nuances of your tone.
- Now your voice is configured. Try it out by asking Alexa something.
How to set up voice profiles for your family members
- Ask a family member to open the Alexa app on the smartphone.
- Make sure the new member logs in with the same account used to set up the Alexa device.
- When prompted, simply select I’m someone else.
- Fill in the name of the new family member.
- Then navigate to Settings and choose to Add a New Voice.
- Follow the on-screen instructions to teach Alexa the family member’s voice.
- Once the new voice profile has been configured, the family member can start interacting with Alexa using his voice.
The Verdict
Alexa Household makes it easy to integrate different accounts into a single one so that the whole family can benefit from what it has to offer. It’s a great and convenient way to share not only your Echo device but also the functionalities offered by Amazon.
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