Last year, ‘loneliness’ was an unfortunate buzzword owing to the Coronavirus pandemic. For many who have voice assistants (VA) at home, this paved the way for unconventional conversations to pass the time. That said, Amazon’s Alexa became one of the more popular confidantes during the lockdowns.
According to data shared by Amazon India, Indians expressed their love for the IoT assistant around 19,000 times a day by saying ‘Alexa, I love you’, and even went so far as to pop the question (yes, proposing) around 6,000 times a day. Alexa cracked jokes around 9,000 times a day and even served as a laugh-along buddy around 12,000 times a days.
‘Shaitan Ka Saala’, ‘Muqabla’, and ‘Aankh Marey’ were the most requested Hindi songs in 2020, among the 17 lakh songs requested in total. Speaking of Bollywood, users in India asked Alexa to mimic a celeb every day and asked her around 3,000 times a day to deliver a Bollywood dialogue.
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Alexa was useful in the general knowledge space, too. From questions about who scored the most runs to why we celebrate Diwali, Alexa answered more than 86,000 factual questions every day! The VA also answered over 43,000 animal sounds requests via the Wild Planet Skill every day.
- Alexa saw a 67% jump in user interactions across India last year, as US-based e-commerce behemoth Amazon built a voice ecosystem across the country by embedding it in Amazon’s family of apps and over a hundred third-party devices. Customers from over 85% of India’s pin codes purchased from the Echo range of smart speakers in 2020.
Last year also saw a groundswell of home automation programmes across the country. Users used voice to control their smart lights, fans, ACs, security cameras, air purifiers and TVs, and asked Alexa to control a smart device 8.6 lakh times a day, collectively. Mobiel was also the way to go; on the Amazon shopping app Alexa addressed over 5.8 lakh requests everyday by helping customers search for products and best deals, and make bill payments.
Alexa narrated almost 19,000 stories per day, in Hindi and English. Be it about friendship or hope or even the diversity of food in India, she has a poem for them all. Customers asked Alexa for Kavita over 1000 times a day! The VA also started serving Urdu and Love Shayari and the works of popular poets like Mirza Ghalib. In fact, users requested for Shayari at least 3,000 times a day. It also recited bhajans and played aarthi songs; to round it off, Alexa answered more than 4,000 requests per day during Durga Pooja, Dussehra and Navaratri festivals.
