The days of cramming Alexa into every possible form factor seem to have passed, but Amazon has created yet another body for its voice assistant. The Echo Pop smart speaker makes Alexa more accessible with a modern, compact design that fits almost anywhere in the home.

With a fabric-covered face supported by a circular wedge, the Echo Pop looks like an Amazon Echo Dot cut diagonally in half. But it's not half the price; the Echo Pop costs $39.99, only $10 less than the Echo Dot. So why not buy an Echo Dot, you might ask?

Amazon has tried before to make an Alexa speaker that doesn't look like an Alexa speaker. I have a soft spot for the Echo Flex, a voice-activated plug-in device that supports modular accessories such as nightlights. (When I could no longer find it on Amazon.com, I asked Amazon if this product had been discontinued. The rep replied that it was out of stock.)

There are many smart home devices that offer Alexa for ambient IoT automation. Amazon has long promoted the ideal of a frictionless smart home experience, and from what we've heard about the Echo Pop, it seems intended to fill the last place where voice speakers are out of reach.

As someone who has tried dozens of Alexa-enabled devices, I think I can freely say that there are few smart home scenarios that cannot be achieved with the infamous Echo Dot. The orb-shaped speaker's sound quality, built-in home sensors, and eero support make it the best smart speaker for the price.

The Echo Dot with Clock, which is $10 more, offers a useful display. But for only $10 less, you lose the temperature sensor, speaker size, and beautifully glowing base in the Echo Pop. Sure, you might be able to choose fun new colors like Lavender Bloom or Midnight Teal. But we don't know if that will be enough.

We haven't heard the sound quality of the Echo Pop, so we don't know how the front-directional speaker will sound compared to the Echo Dot. I also may not appreciate that by supporting Matter, the Echo Pop may appeal to new adopters of smart home protocols. (It could also serve as a satellite to the Eero mesh router.)

Still, if the real goal is to make Alexa more accessible, I can't help but feel that the Echo Pop should be even more affordable; half the price of the Echo Dot would be about right; and the Echo Dot's price is probably about right. At the very least, deals events like Amazon Prime Day are likely to bring discounts to the latest Alexa speakers.