But nothing beats a customized Flash Briefing where you can choose to stay updated on what matters most—with a single command. So let’s explore how you can do that.
Ask Alexa to play your Flash Briefing, and it’ll play you the news from NPR, the default news channel for the US. No matter where you reside, Alexa will play the news based on your country and location. Then it will also play the local weather update.
You can even have Alexa tell you a joke, and even play an inspiring quote or story for motivation. It’s easy to do so let’s see how.
Open the Alexa app on your phone. Tap on More > Settings. Under the Alexa Preferences section, tap on News.
Tap on Flash Briefing or the blue Edit button. The Flash Briefing page will open. Tap on the blue Add Content button or on the circular blue plus button to open the list of briefings available.
Now scroll through the briefings to choose what you’d like to hear. You can also search for a preferred news channel or whatever interests you by tapping the Search icon (magnifying glass) on top. Once your chosen Flash Briefing opens, tap on the Enable to Use button. If you like staying in touch with the latest in business, you can also add the Wall Street Journal briefing. Your chosen news providers will then be featured in your Flash Briefing.
You can add many more Flash Briefings in the same way. For example, if you like reading The New York Times, you can add its briefing too. You can even add the Joke of the Day and Inspire Me briefings to enjoy a joke and also get motivated.
How to Edit and Control Your Flash Briefing
Flash Briefings will play in the order that you have added each news source. But you can choose what you want to listen to first, next, and last by changing the order of the items in your Flash Briefing.
To do that, open the Flash Briefing page on your Alexa app and tap on the blue Edit button on top. The list of your Flash Briefings will open up. Simply long press a briefing and drag and drop it on top or below in the list.
Once you’ve set your preferred order just tap on Done on the top right.
Alexa also makes it easy to control your Flash Briefing. If you want to skip to the next briefing, simply say, “Alexa, next.” You can skip through each briefing like this.
To listen to the weather report during a news briefing, tell Alexa to “Skip to weather.” The weather report will be played, and then the Flash Briefing will resume from where it was playing earlier.
Similarly, you can tell Alexa to “Play Joke of the Day” or “Play Inspire Me,” and it will play that briefing and then resume the news.
In case you miss out on a story from a briefing when it’s playing, just say, “Alexa, repeat.” And that news briefing will play again from the beginning.
Create Flash Briefings That Inform, Inspire, and Entertain
Each briefing in your customized Flash Briefing is usually of 2-4 minutes duration, so you can get updated on whatever interests you in a short time. A Flash Briefing can brighten up your mornings—you can get the news, weather, business stories, a joke, an inspiring quote, and more to prep you for the day ahead.
