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How Amazon Alexa Can Help You Sleep

Eight free skills that can help you relax and fall asleep using Amazon Echo/Alexa.

I’ve had a lot of trouble falling asleep lately, and have been trying many things to help me fall asleep faster. For the last few nights, I have been trying out functions on my Amazon Echo Dot to see if they helped, and I have been pleasantly surprised. While these might not work for everyone, here are some of the ways Amazon Alexa can help you sleep.

“Alexa, enable white noise.”

No need to buy a white noise generator or leave a fan on all night, just ask Alexa to enable white noise, and it will play for an hour. If you want it to go indefinitely, ask Alexa to turn the loop on, and it will play until you ask it to stop.

“Alexa, enable winter storm sounds.”

One of my friends was telling me how they find the sounds of a snowstorm to be very relaxing. So if you like the sounds of wind howling and snowflakes falling, this skill is for you. It plays two hours continuously and does not have a loop option as of now.

“Alexa, enable ocean sounds.”

Maybe the thoughts of wind and cold weather aren’t very peaceful, and you want something to remind you of the sunshine. Ocean sounds plays the sounds of crashing waves on a beach for two hours continuously, unless it is paused.

“Alexa, enable campfire sounds.”

Missing the days of summer camp or just sleeping under the stars? This skill allows you to experience the relaxing crackling of a campfire, without the stress of a real fire. Another friend commented that this skill reminded them of sleeping next to a fireplace when they used it in conjunction with a heated blanket.

“Alexa, tell me a bedtime story.”

By enabling parental permissions in the Alexa app (which takes about a minute), you can listen to a selection of stories from Amazon Rapids for free. When I enabled this skill, I was given a five minute Christmas-themed story with great voice acting. While it may not help adults fall asleep, it’s awesome for kids, or anyone who might want a distraction.

“Alexa, read from Kindle.”

When this skill is enabled, Alexa (not voice actors) reads whatever book I was last reading in the Kindle app, and can also read books from my library when I ask her to. However, I don’t want the book being read all night, so I set a sleep timer- more on that in a minute.

“Alexa, help me meditate.”

Alexa has an assortment of meditation skills to help with breathing and relaxation. I don’t have a particular favorite, as they all seem the same to me, but there’s many different kinds that can be enabled.

“Alexa, set a sleep timer for __.”

In case you don’t want Alexa playing all night, set a sleep timer so that the audio shuts off after a given amount of time. Alarms are not affected by the sleep timer.

I hope these tips help you to fall asleep and hopefully, stay asleep. I have loved using my Amazon Echo Dot for all sorts of things, and I can’t imagine life without one. As of publishing time, Echo Dots are currently on sale for $30- get one here. You won’t regret it

 

By Veroniiiica

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