Top critical review
3.0 out of 5 starsDecent Functionality, But Overall Mediocre Experience
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 2 February 2024
Having looked at other alternatives for a clock that can tell me the weather and have some smart home functionality the Echo Show 5 isn't a bad choice however, for the price I was quite disappointingly surprised.
I managed to get the device in the sale at £45 making it somewhat worth while however, at its full price of £89.99 I would look at other alternatives such as Googles Nest Hub for a better overall experience.
The setup was quite straight forward and only took about 3 - 5 minutes in total and the customisation options provided are quite a nice touch as it makes the device more personal.
The overall build quality of the product feels quite in line with the price and is quite robust and sturdy when in use. The cable seems well insulated and the speakers are fairly clear with substantial bass for the size of the product.
However, the reponsiveness of the touchscreen is poor and feels like what original touchscreens felt like back in 2012 with a second or so delay, sometimes the screen finds it hard to register touch input and when altering the settings it can freeze up or go a bit haywire.
Another point in which disapointed me the most is the amount of spam Amazon pushes through its devices, where it cycles through random services and info not relevant to you or your account. You have to disable them in the settings which is quite nice but I would like to see these off as default, I have also found out that with some updates they add aditional service promotions which are automatically enabled.
Moving on to the camera, the image quality seems pretty poor with washed out grainy feed at what seems to run at a very low fps making the camera pointless in my opinion. When it comes to the mics they seems to be very well placed providing exceptional coverage for the device to pickup your voice when asking a question or function which I really liked.
The physical slider for the camera, and physical button to disable mic gives me some piece of mind and are a great feature if it does what Amazon says it does. The light on the mic button and the red bar at the bootom of the display make for good indication however, I think a small red symbol in the corner of the screen would be sufficient as I think the red line kind of ruins the aesthetic and could cause burn in or dead pixels after long use.
Overall if you want a mediocre smart home device for £90 then feel free in getting it but I would not recommend at its current price point, if the device goes on sale again then £45 I think is the sweet spot and makes the device worth while.