A TALKING COFFEE MACHINE

Like coffee and voice assistants? You’ll love Lavazza Voicy

Lavazza Voicy is not just a coffee machine. It’s a coffee machine with Alexa in it! That may sound rather odd on the face of it, but if you don’t have any Echo speakers – or at least you don’t have any in your kitchen – we can’t think of a better way to add one than Lavazza Voicy (£249, lavazza.co.uk). Oh and it is also a rather excellent coffee maker, of course.

It both looks and sounds quite like someone has nailed one of the new, spherical Echo speakers to a pod coffee machine. It’s not the best-sounding speaker ever but it is by far the best-sounding coffee machine ever made.

Alexa is also in good voice of course. Ask her to ‘make a coffee’ and she obeys! Of course, Alexa is not a real person so she can’t put a pod in the machine, top up the water, place a cup under the spout and then bring your order to you as you recline on a chaise longue. But if you have placed a pod and cup, Alexa will carry out the arduous task of pressing the single espresso button on your behalf.