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Amazon’s Alexa Cast lets you cast music to Alexa devices and groups

Amazon has introduced a new feature called Alexa Cast that, as you can probably guess, lets you cast music to Alexa devices. It is being rolled out in an update to the Amazon Music app for iOS and Android. Tapping the new casting icon in the app brings up a list of your Alexa devices as well as your Alexa groups as destinations for music. Control between the app and the device remains in sync and can be controlled through either the device or the app simultaneously.

Alexa Cast currently works with Amazon’s Echo line of smart speakers and third-party Alexa devices, but some Alexa devices, like Fire TVs are not supported. While the Amazon Music app is the only app that supports the feature, it’s easy to see how Alexa Cast can be expanded to work in other apps, like Spotify or Pandora, the same way Google Cast is widely supported. However, no such third-party app support or developer API has been announced.

It has always been possible to remotely control music playback on an Alexa device through the Alexa app, but it is a cumbersome experience at best. Using the Amazon Music app is much more intuitive. I wouldn’t be surprised if music control is eventually removed from the Alexa app entirely, as it would not be needed if Alexa Cast is widely adopted.