Amazon wants to make it really easy for you to buy things. You can use the Alexa voice assistant in products like the Echo to order items with your voice, or press a Dash button to purchase commonly used household goods instantly. You can also use the Dash Wand to scan the barcode of nearly anything in your home for when you need to stock up on more of the same item. Amazon released the Dash Wand a few years ago, and recently updated the device with Alexa voice control. It can now answer your questions, control your smart home devices, and buy things for you. Its $20 price tag (available for Prime members only) is low enough that you can order one on impulse (you also get a $20 Amazon credit on eligible items after registering it, so it’s essentially free). The Dash Wand won’t replace an Alexa-equipped media device and can’t access Amazon’s media libraries, but it’s a useful gadget to keep on your fridge.

The Wand

The Dash Wand measures 5.7 inches long from the scanner on one end to the rubber loop on the other. It’s just 1.2 inches wide and 0.8-inch deep, making it slimmer than most TV remotes. The Wand consists of two halves. The white half holding all of the electronics is plastic, with a barcode scanner on the end. There’s also a physical button surrounded by a light-up ring and a pinhole for the microphone on one wide side, and another pinhole for the speaker on the other.

The black half of the Wand is rubber, and pulls off to reveal a compartment for two AAA batteries (included). This half is a simple sleeve to protect the battery compartment and provide a longer, more grippy section to hold. A ring on the end lets you hang the Wand anywhere with the included adhesive-backed plastic hook. You can also just slap it on your fridge or any steel surface thanks to the white half’s magnetic back.

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Amazon Dash Wand With Alexa Review

Setting up the Dash Wand is simple, but requires a smartphone or tablet. You need to install the Amazon shopping app for Android or iOS on your mobile device, then visit the Dash Wand setup page. This will launch the app and go straight to the setup process. A series of prompts walks you through installing the batteries, putting the Dash Wand in setup mode by holding the button for a few seconds until the light ring glows orange, then connecting the Wand to your home Wi-Fi network through the app. I got it working through my Moto G5 Plus in minutes.

Shopping

Once your Dash Wand is registered and connected to your network, you can use it for shopping and Alexa. Shopping with the barcode scanner is easy: Just scan the UPC of any item you want to order through Amazon, and if it’s in stock it will be added to your cart. I went on a scanning frenzy through PC Labs, and the Dash Wand instantly put just about every item I scanned in my shopping cart. It even identified the very old PC game Realmyst. The only product it had a hard time figuring out was an obscure board game.

You can also shop using your voice, either adding items to your cart or ordering directly. You have to hold the button on the Wand down to give voice commands, like you do with the Voice Remote that comes with the Amazon Fire TV Stick; you can’t use Alexa hands-free like you can with the Echo, Echo Dot, or Amazon Tap. Saying a product name will add it to your cart, and if the item is too vaguely defined or has too many different options, a button will appear in your cart prompting you to select the specific version of the product you want to buy—you don’t need to worry about blindly ordering something that isn’t the best price. You can order any item directly from the Dash Wand by saying “Order” before naming the product. The speaker will then tell you the full name of the item and its price, then ask for confirmation before placing the order.

The Dash Wand lets you shop both from Amazon and the Amazon Fresh grocery delivery service. Depending on the type of item you order, it will appear in your regular Amazon cart, or in a separate Amazon Fresh cart that appears on the same page in its own green-bordered section with additional information for delivery time slots. Amazon Fresh orders can be scheduled for delivery at specific times, similar to other grocery delivery services like FreshDirect.

Instant orders are convenient, and there’s no danger of accidentally buying something you don’t want. When you tell Alexa to order something, it responds with the closest item it can find, looking through your previous orders and the content of your shopping cart to get a better picture. When I asked the Dash Wand to order tissues, it first asked if I wanted to order a box of lens wipes, since I had them in my shopping cart and haven’t ordered facial tissues from Amazon before. After I turned down the suggestion, Alexa offered the most popular product, a 20-box case of tissues.

I placed the order, and the Wand told me the total amount I paid and that the case would be delivered by the end of the week. However, Alexa didn’t ask what address I wanted it delivered to, and assumed I wanted it sent to my apartment (I had hoped to get it sent to the lab). Fortunately, it let me cancel the order immediately so I could change my options (all of which I was able to do by voice). Like all order modifications on Amazon, it depends on the order’s status, and you can’t always count on being able to cancel or change it on a moment’s notice.

Alexa, Speaker, and Wi-Fi

Amazon’s Alexa voice assistant is what makes this Dash Wand different from earlier iterations, and it’s very useful despite offering only partial functionality compared with other Alexa devices like the Amazon Fire TV Stick and Echo Dot. You can speak into the Dash Wand to ask Alexa questions about news, weather, traffic, and sports; check your own calendar if it’s synced with your account; get information about local businesses; and find nutritional information and recipes about anything in your kitchen. You can also use it to control your Alexa-compatible smart home devices.

However, the Dash Wand isn’t a media device, and Amazon’s extensive media libraries can’t be accessed with it. That means you can’t listen to Prime Music through the Dash Wand’s tiny speaker. Curiously, the timer function is also disabled on the Dash Wand, which is strange, because setting timers is a very handy function for a device that will most likely live in the kitchen.

The built-in speaker does’t get particularly loud, which is why the lack of media features isn’t a big loss. It’s about as loud an average smartphone speaker, with no volume controls to speak of. It’s easy to unintentionally put your finger over the speaker hole, which can muffle the sound. Fortunately, you can adjust your grip readily thanks to the simple design and minimalist controls.

The Dash Wand’s Wi-Fi reception isn’t particularly impressive. In PC Labs, which is admittedly congested with wireless signals, the Wand had difficulty accessing the network more than 40 feet away from the router in testing. Since the Wand can only be used when it’s online, this might be a concern if don’t have a strong signal in your kitchen or wherever else you plan to use it.

Conclusions

The Amazon Dash Wand is an interesting little gadget that provides a ton of convenience to avid Amazon Prime users. If you regularly order items on Amazon, you can simply scan the contents of your refrigerator or use voice commands to save yourself a trip to the grocery store. The addition of Alexa makes the Dash Wand even more useful, providing voice access to information about weather, traffic, and your schedule without needing to check your mobile device. The Alexa integration is incomplete, but the Dash Wand’s inexpensive $20 price tag makes it easier to swallow. It won’t replace the Echo or Echo Dot as a hands-free Alexa device, but at the very least it’s a neat, inexpensive tool you can stick to your fridge and whip out when you need to restock the pantry.