Alexa, what does my day look like?
Alexa is a great personal organizer and assistant, but to really get in control of your day, you need to add your calendars. Alexa works with Google, Apple and Microsoft (Outlook/Hotmail) calendars, so compatibility shouldn’t be an issue.
You can just ask Alexa how your day or week looks, or what appointments you have. To get to that point though, you’re going to need to do some setting up your calendars with your Amazon Alexa account.
How do you set it up and, more importantly, which calendar systems can you connect to Alexa? We will guide you through how to add your calendar to Alexa so you can ask Amazon’s personal assistant what your week looks like..
- The Alexa app
- Your smartphone or tablet
- A compatible Alexa device
- Open the Alexa app.
- Tap More.
- Tap Settings.
- Scroll down to Calendar.
- Choose your calendar service.
- Follow the on-screen instructions.
- Choose default calendar for events.
- Choose default calendar to be used for schedule.
Before anything else, you’re going to have to pop open that Alexa app to connect your calendars. You have three options here: Google, Microsoft and Apple. Ultimately that covers off many of the calendars out there, though if you use anything else, you are out of luck as they are the three available.
It’s also worth pointing out that you have to choose one calendar that Alexa uses to add events to so even if you use Google and Apple for example, you need to choose one. Sadly, you can’t have it add things to different calendars.
You can’t set up multiple profiles each with their own calendar either. So if you have a family, or a spouse, it might be worth creating a shared calendar and using that as your “creation calendar.”
You can also invite people to calendar events, but you’ll need to make sure you have them in your contacts and you have an email address associated with that person. If you don’t, Alexa will put that person’s name in your event information, but you’ll have to invite them without Alexa’s help.
Speaking of inviting other people to your events… if that other person has shared their own calendar information with Alexa, Alexa will crosscheck and see if they’re available. If they’re not, it’ll recommend a better time for both of you. Similarly, if you move your meeting to a time that would make you double-booked, Alexa will let you know.
Boom, you’re all set up. Alexa will now be able to read you your calendar appointments and create new events for you in the calendar you chose.
Now that you have everything set up with Alexa, how do you use it to schedule your calendar? These are the many ways.
“Alexa, add an event to my calendar. (Alexa will then walk you through event creation).”
“Alexa, ddd [event] to my calendar for [day] at [time].”
“Alexa, delete my [time] event.”
“Alexa, cancel my [date] event.”
“Alexa, delete [event] from my calendar.”
“Alexa, move my [event name] to [time or date].”
“Alexa, reschedule my [time or date] event to [new time or date].”
“Alexa, schedule a [event name] with [person’s name].”
“Alexa, create a meeting named [event name] with [person’s name].”
“Alexa, invite [person’s name] to [event name].”
“Alexa, when is my next event?”
“Alexa, what’s on my calendar?”
“Alexa, show me my calendar.”
“Alexa, what’s on my calendar tomorrow at [time]?”
“Alexa, what’s on my calendar on [day]?”
“Alexa, what’s my calendar look like today?”
