The Echo Hub is Amazon’s first true smart home controller

Amazon announced the Echo Hub ($179.99) at its fall hardware event on Wednesday. Designed specifically as a smart home controller, the Echo Hub is a slimline version of an Echo Show 8 or a shrunken version of a Show 15. It should sit flush on your wall or could be propped up on a table or shelf with a desktop stand. 

An eight-inch touchscreen device, the Echo Hub shares the same DNA as an Echo Show smart display, but it is fundamentally a new device. Its slim look resembles a tablet, and while it runs the same OS as the new Show 5, Dave Limp, Amazon’s SVP of devices and services, says the Echo Hub has a different processor, and there’s no camera.

Specifically billed as a smart home hub because it contains Zigbee, Thread, Bluetooth LE, and Amazon Sidewalk radios and functions as a Thread border router and Matter controller, the Echo Hub connects to Wi-Fi or ethernet with a compatible power over ethernet (PoE) converter. It is a full Alexa device with a speaker and mic array.

Instead of a camera, the Echo Hub has an IR sensor that it uses to wake up as you approach, so there’s no need to tap once and then tap again to activate any of the smart home widgets on the touch screen — such as turning on the lights or viewing a security camera. 

Available to preorder soon and shipping later this year, the Echo Hub will come with a wall-mount bracket, power adapter, and six-foot cable (USB-A to C). Amazon will sell decorative frames in wood, white (which can be painted), and metallic for $19.99 each, and the tabletop stand will cost $29.99.

In an interview with The Verge ahead of the event, Limp explained that the device relies on widgets similar to those you see on current Show devices but that are “smart home forward.” (That’s very much not the case on current Echo Show smart displays.) 

The widgets include icons or larger group tiles for your favorite devices, cameras, climate, locks, and security (arming or disarming a Ring security system). You can customize the screen, and along the side, a rooms panel gives you access to other defined rooms in the house and the option to run Routines directly from the panel.

Limp says the company worked hard to bring down any latency between tapping on the screen and a responding device. Locally connected devices over Thread, Matter, Bluetooth, or Zigbee respond very quickly — “as fast as a light switch,” he says.

Built-in speakers and a microphone array allow for two-way audio to talk to anyone at your video doorbell or via Drop In with Echo devices. You can also use Alexa voice control, listen to audio, or watch video. Limp says it will support Prime Video, Hulu, and Tubi, “among others,” at launch.

However, he says the Echo Hub’s sound capabilities are somewhere between an iPad or Fire Tablet and an Echo Show 15 — so not great.

Limp says Amazon designed this device for its “best customer,” those with 20 or more connected smart home devices who perhaps find it all a bit too much to manage scrolling through endless device lists in the Alexa app.

“It’s for customers who want to do more but find the smart home too intimidating or wanted a panel and found it’s too expensive,” he says, referring to high-end smart home control panels and remote controls you might find with a Crestron or Control4 system. “Because of the price point and how approachable it is, I think lots of people will find the Echo Hub a great addition.”

I’ve written a lot about how the smart home needs an affordable, approachable control panel option for the times when voice doesn’t suit, you don’t want to reach for your phone, or you want visitors in your home to be able to turn on the lights. I had hopes that the Pixel Tablet might fit this niche, but so far in my testing, it’s been underwhelming as a smart home controller; it also doesn’t provide the connectivity the Echo Hub does.

I recently reviewed the Brilliant smart home control panel, which has a similar function as this (again without the hub features) but at a much higher price point ($400). Limp is not wrong that these devices are expensive. In the pro-installation smart home range, they are easily in the thousands of dollars.

However, whether the Echo Hub can match the speed and power of these devices is my biggest concern. Speed is essential for a control panel; it needs to be as responsive as a regular light switch while doing so much more. Limp says it’s as fast as the new Echo Show 5; whether this will be fast enough, we’ll have to wait and see. If it is, it will be a compelling product.

In terms of other things I’ve been asking for for a long time, Amazon is finally bringing a new UI to its Alexa smart home app, which Limp says the company also plans to port to the Echo Hub early next year.

Map View is a new map interface option that lets you build a digital version of your home’s floor plan, pin connected devices to each room, and then control them individually just by tapping on them.

“It’s super fun,” says Limp. “If I want to change the thermostat, I just tap on it, and the controls just pop up. If I want to zoom into the upper floor and turn on a bedroom light, I can just tap and get the controls to dim it or do whatever. It’s a different paradigm; it’s really interesting.”

Amazon isn’t the first to do this — Samsung has a map interface for its SmartThings platform available on its smart monitors and 2022 TVs and newer, and the approach clearly makes a lot of sense. It means you don’t have to remember the exact name of the light to the right of the sofa; you can see it and tap on it. 

The Alexa Map View will be available in the US later this year through the Alexa app — but only on compatible lidar-equipped iOS devices (Pro and Max models from the iPhone 12 and newer) at launch. It is due to come to the Echo Hub early next year.