Amazon has updated its voice assistant Alexa with a new music sharing feature that allows users to send songs to each other's Echo devices So if you are enjoying a song and want to share it with a friend, you can ask Alexa to send a prompt to the other person so they can play it on their Amazon Echo, Echo Dot, or Echo Show

You can't unilaterally hijack an acquaintance's smart speaker, but that's interesting Let me briefly explain how to use Alexa's new music sharing

First, everyone involved must have an Alexa device and enable Alexa communication in the Alexa app

You also need the intended recipients listed in your device's contacts, and they, of course, need an Alexa-enabled device or Echo speaker device

From there, you can simply play the song and send the instructions, "Alexa, share this song with (recipient's name)"

On the recipient's end, the Alexa app will send a notification that you shared the song and ask if they want to start playing it on their speaker

Keep in mind that your friend will need to access the streaming service containing the song, such as Amazon Music or Apple Music, in order to play the song If the recipient is unable to play the song, Alexa will instead suggest a radio station based on the artist and song title

As mentioned above, Alexa communication must be enabled in the Amazon account in order to use Music Sharing

This is as simple as opening the Alexa app and navigating to the "Communication" tab From there, you can give Alexa permission for calling and messaging, which will allow you to share music with others

By default, phone contacts are imported into Alexa Communications Skip this if you are concerned about Amazon data sharing

Doing so will clear the imported contacts from the list This means that you will need to manually add the potential recipients to Alexa's own contact list

To see which of your Alexa contacts may be able to share your song, open the Alexa app and find the "Communicate" tab Select "New Message" to find fellow Echo owners and Alexa users

In a post on the Alexa blog, the company states that "this is just the beginning" for the music sharing feature and that it will "continue to evolve this experience over time Therefore, we can expect more music-centric features from Alexa and Echo speakers in the not-too-distant future