In short, everything you say to your Echo devices after March 28 will be sent to Amazon’s cloud, and there isn’t anything anyone can do about it. If users continue to make Amazon delete recordings, they will also lose access to features their devices had by default when they were purchased.

The move is seen as connected to the launch of its generative AI-powered Alexa Plus, which is slated to be released later this month

Amazon is killing a privacy feature that let Echo device owners process Alexa requests locally and avoid sending voice recordings to the company's cloud. The change will come into effect from March 28, 2025, as part of the rollout for Alexa+, a subscription-based version of its AI assistant.

All voice recordings of commands or queries given to Amazon voice assistant Alexa on the company’s Echo devices will go to the Amazon cloud starting March 28.

Amazon Echo models that were previously able to process Alexa requests locally will no longer do so, instead sending those voice recordings to the cloud. An Amazon spokesperson confirmed the change to The Verge after a Reddit user posted a PSA about it on Friday,

Some Echo devices have a feature that allows you to block voice recordings from being sent to the cloud, but Amazon is killing it.

If you own an Echo smart speaker, it will soon lose a key privacy feature — and be replaced with cloud processing of all voice commands.