JAM Voice Bluetooth Speaker with Amazon Alexa Impresses

JAM Voice is tiny and lightweight but packs a punch. Once you get it set up, it can do some pretty neat things. You get full access to Amazon’s Alexa Voice Service, the Siri-like voice-activated assistant. You can set up and connect multiple speakers for a surround sound or full home experience. You can also use JAM Voice as a smart home controller for products from companies such as Philips Hue, Belkin Wemo, SmartThings, Insteon, and Wink. Unlike the Amazon Echo, the JAM Voice is not always on and listening; you do need to press the button.

First, you’ll need to charge it for about 3 hours to get 4 hours of play time. It does come with a charging cable, but not an AC adapter. Download the JAM Wi-Fi app get set up. Using the app, you can connect the JAM Voice to your Amazon account, or create one here. You’ll also want to download the Amazon Alexa app to get full use out of the speaker.

With the JAM Wi-Fi app, you can connect the JAM Voice to your favorite music sources, such as Spotify, TuneIn, iHeartRadio, Tidal, Amazon, or your own music library. You can also use the app to control your tunes if you’re not near the speaker.

Another neat thing you can do with this app is broadcast to other speakers. Record a message within the app and it will play on the speaker. If you have multiple speakers set up throughout the house, your message will play on all of them.

The Amazon Alexa app shows you the kinds of things you can ask Alexa to do. For example, you can ask her to sing you a love song, play a certain kind of music, add items to a shopping list contained within the app, order things from Amazon, get local movie listings, general facts, and much more. Anything you’ve asked of Alexa on the JAM Voice, you’ll see more details in the app.

I used the JAM Voice to ask Alexa to order me some chocolates. Alexa gave me a couple of choices based on popular Amazon chocolates and asked if I’d like to purchase them now. Later, I went into the Amazon Alexa app, and those chocolates were listed in the app along with some other options. Similarly, more information about other questions I’d asked with the JAM Voice was there for further perusal.

The JAM Voice’s sound quality is quite nice. I like that you can pull music from so many different music sources. I don’t own many songs and I don’t subscribe to any music services other than Amazon Prime, but I’ve been having fun telling Alexa to play music for me. I just press the button on top of the the JAM Voice and tell her to play me 80s music, dance music, Adele, or whatever I’m in the mood for. The volume goes pretty high with no noticeable sound distortion.

If you’re an Amazon Prime member and you’ve been thinking about picking up one of Amazon’s Alexa Voice Service products, the JAM Voice is one to consider. While you do have to press a button to activate it, it’s substantially cheaper than the Amazon Echo or Amazon Tap. The JAM Voice is just a little more than the Amazon Echo Dot, which isn’t a speaker itself. The JAM Voice comes in black for $64.99 or white for $69.99 on Amazon.