The Complete Guide To… Smart Screens

You’ve met the smart speaker… now meet the smart speaker with a display attached, which gives you a whole lot of extra options when it comes to what you can do

- David Nield

Way back slightly odd because it didn’t have any kind of screen – it went all in on voice. Wouldn’t that limit what you could do with it? Was voice input (and output) really as versatile as it needed to be for the Echo to be a success?

Well, yes, as it turned out – Amazon had no qualms about launching a device without a screen, the Echo went on to sell in huge numbers, and it’s now commonplace to see a smart speaker or seven tucked away in the corners of a home. Kudos to Amazon for the foresight.

The screen, though, is making a comeback. A speaker might be attractive in its simplicity and in its low price, but add in a display and the whole approach changes: think videos, photos, maps, on-screen controls and more. It turns out that having a device with a screen was a good idea after all.

Now these smart screens are propagating as fast as the smart speakers before them – Amazon alone has three different models on the market (plus one, the Echo Spot, that now seems to have been discontinued). It’s no exaggeration to say you’ve now got dozens of options to pick from when it comes to smart screens and smart speakers.

As with smart speakers, you’ve really got two choices when it comes to what’s powering your smart screen: it’s either Amazon Alexa or Google Assistant (though third-party manufacturers besides Amazon and Google may make the external hardware). That’s not a lot of choice, but it does make it easier to decide on a purchase.

Facebook has a couple of smart displays of its own, built primarily as ways of video-calling friends and family over Facebook Messenger. These devices, the Portal smart screens, come with Alexa on board and so do function in the same way as other smart displays, but we’re not going to dwell on them much here because Facebook comes with so much baggage over privacy right now that we think few will choose them.