When it was first released, it was hard to see how the Tap was useful. It made a decent Bluetooth speaker, but the lack of hands-free commands meant it was much easier to just control it from your phone. Since there are other, cheaper Bluetooth speakers on the market, the Tap went largely ignored.
Better yet, when I took an out-of-town trip, I tossed the Tap and its docking cradle in my suitcase. When I arrived at the hotel, I plugged it in and connected it to Wi-Fi. Now I had the same convenient music player in my room. If I wanted to set an alarm for the morning or listen to an audiobook as I fall asleep, it was just a voice command away.
Now that the Tap has hands-free voice commands, it’s hard to justify the full-size Echo. It costs $50 more and does less. While you can connect to it with Bluetooth to play music, it’s not portable. It’s bulkier, so moving it from one place to another is tougher. And it has to be plugged into the wall at all times. If you haven’t bought an Echo yet, there’s almost no reason to buy the Echo over the Tap unless you really love that blue ring on the top.
If you have a Tap, here’s how to turn on hands-free mode. First, open the Alexa app on your phone and tap the menu button in the top right corner. Then tap Settings.
Under “Hands-free,” enable the toggle to turn allow Alexa commands without tapping the microphone button.
The next screen will explain how your Tap will work differently and ask you to confirm your choice. Click “Continue.”
Once you enable hands-free mode on your Tap, it will drain the battery more quickly when it’s not on the charging cradle. To save battery, you can tap the Power button to put the Tap to sleep, or hold the Play/Pause button for three seconds to mute the microphone so it’s not listening for voice commands.
