Alexa+ on mobile app - Michelle Ma Design Portfolio

Alexa+ in Mobile App

Overview

Alexa+ is Amazon’s next-generation evolution of Alexa, powered by generative AI to deliver more natural conversations, personalized interactions, and autonomous task execution. On mobile, it plays a key role in increasing DAA/MAA by better supporting daily habitual actions and meeting the needs of core groups like smart-home users, while the business focuses on elevating the conversational experience and empowering customers with LLM-driven intelligence. It marks a major leap in how people engage with Alexa across devices—from mobile and smart speakers to displays and the web.

My Role

As the Design Lead for Alexa+ on the Alexa mobile app, I shape how these new AI capabilities manifest within one of Alexa’s most versatile and widely used touchpoints. I partner closely with design leads across Echo devices, web, and Fire TV to ensure coherence across endpoints, while driving the evolution of core mobile experiences and integrating AI-driven enhancements that raise usability and customer value. Beyond execution, I contribute to design planning and product strategy, helping define the long-term vision and roadmap for how Alexa+ expands its role in people’s daily lives.

Project Details

Category: Amazon S-team goal product initiative

Timeline: 2023-2024 (Launched in 2025 Q1)

Team: Product, Engineering, Science

Mobile App AI Assistant Design System Monetization Voice User Interface Conversational Design

Content

Alexa Mobile 2024 Goals

How might we leverage LLM/AI-powered conversational CX to deepen daily habit engagement and accelerate revenue?

As a business, we’re focusing on the conversation CX to engage with Alexa, and empower our customers with Alexa intelligence supported by LLM/AI
Increase engagement as measured by DAA/MAA through better facilitating daily habitual actions
Accelerate revenue through customer purchases and Alexa-related subscriptions

Problem Space

Themes & CXOs

CXO = Customer Expected Outcomes

These are the specific outcomes customers expect when interacting with Alexa, Amazon devices, or Amazon services.They guide product decisions, success metrics, and prioritization.

Inform

Get notified of time-sensitive information ...with fewer misses, false alarms
Be in the know about news and events with more relevance
Review past notifications ...more quickly, easily

Empower

Find something specific I know exists
Control a device/a set of devices...more quickly, easily
Create content matching specified criteria...with more relevance, accuracy
Secure a resource (e.g., book tickets, a table, a ride)...more quickly
Customize how I get to content and actions ...more easily, flexibly

Explore

Know what the solution offers me
Know what I get for my time/effort/money with more accuracy and confidence

IA Simplification

Navigation redesign

Streamline Alexa entry point for voice and type modalities and simplify discovery
De-clutter & organize so that customers have a better mental model of the app

RITE Studies

Rapid Iterative Testing and Evaluation is a usability testing method where designers evaluate a solution to a usability problem multiple times in a rapid and iterative manner. The goal is to identify not just usability problems, but also to react quickly on identified issues and test new solutions that cater to them.
In the RITE studies, we mainly tested navigation to/from home page to other channels and touch ingress of agent. The tasks also touched lightly on lightweight conversation experience interacting with agent and existing key features on habitual usages.

Nav Design Final POR

We observed an emerging finding that more people found and interacted with the Device Channel, which we switched to the two-tabbed nav in Banyan RITE study where Devices channel was located in More. The design includes:

Persistent one-tap to home channel across domains
Catch-all more menu
Top-level agent ingress with voice and type modalities

App Home Page

Home Channel

The redesigned Alexa app home page builds on what the app already does best—providing fast, intuitive access to high-frequency habitual actions, especially smart home controls and music or entertainment features, which continue to drive our strongest user engagement. At the same time, the new design elevates Alexa’s generative AI capabilities by leveraging rich mobile data sources such as calendar, location, and communications to surface personalized, curated content. The result is a home page that becomes the primary destination for users whenever they open the app, helping them complete frequent tasks effortlessly while discovering intelligence-driven, context-aware insights tailored to their daily needs.

For You

Actions or conversations that Alexa believes you would be highly likely to start based on various signals. Also includes Banyan FTUE onboarding.

Content includes:

Banyan progressive onboarding
New conversation starters
Suggested actions based on context and past interactions

Favorites

Displays each customer’s favorite devices, groups, actions, or features that they want to access most often, customized by them.

Continue Conversations with Alexa

The 3 most recent conversations interacted with from any endpoint by PID sorted by recency in reverse chronological order.

Explore and Shop

Promotes device and subscription upsells as well as ads, curated and targeted to customers by internal marketing teams.