I have added SmartThings in the Alexa app as a Skill for all devices. That is not the problem. In the SmartThings app under My Home|Things|Add a Things|Add Device Manually|Voice Control|Amazon Echo Dot, when I select this choice there is no option to add my existing Echo Dot to my devices. I only get Instruction Manual, Buy New, or Support Article, but no option to add the Echo Dot to my Things. Why? Is it due to my integration with the Echo Dot in my SmartThings Skill in the Alexa app? If not, why can I not add the Echo Dot to my SmartThings Things?
Thanks.
The app is simply letting you know that it is possible to link SmartThings with Alexa/Echo. As you are aware you can add the skill to Alexa which allows it a degree of access to, and control over, SmartThings ‘things’. There isn’t an official integration that works the other way around to make an Echo device one of the ‘things’, so there is nothing for the app to offer you.
There is an unofficial integration called Echo Speaks which might be of interest.
Thanks so much. I sort of suspected as much, but I am glad you confirmed this.
Echo is not officially A device that smartthings can control: it is an integration where voice instructions to echo can be used to control smartthings-connected devices. That’s very different than, say, Sonos.
As @orangebucket mentioned, there are some custom projects which do you allow you to have more control over echo as a device, but they are fairly complex to set up.
A simpler method is to hook into the existing echo routines (not smart things routines) and trigger those based on logic on the SmartThings side. It’s not as powerful as echo speaks, but it’s a very popular method for use cases like getting echo to speak a particular phrase when something happens or playing specific music based on a smartthings trigger.
I don’t know if that would match what you were looking for, but here’s the FAQ:
(The topic title is a clickable link)
Thanks, JDRoberts
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