In my never-ending search for efficiency, I realized that if I could stop constantly checking my phone all morning, I could save quite a bit of time. More important: I could stop getting distracted by all the other stuff on my phone.
So as I thought about all the stuff I checkāmy calendar, my to-do list, the newsāI wondered how much I could replicate with Alexa in order to keep my phone in my pocket.
A lot, it turned outāand all it requires is a handful of commands. I hope you find them as useful as I do.
CHECK YOUR CALENDAR
Alexa has pretty good support for Google, Microsoft, and Apple calendars. To add your calendar, open up the Alexa app, tap More in the lower-right corner, then Settings, and choose Calendars.
![](https://images.fastcompany.net/image/upload/w_596,c_limit,q_auto:best,f_auto/wp-cms/uploads/2022/03/Calendar.png)
Once youāve added your calendar, simply say, āAlexa, whatās on my calendar?ā and youāll get a readout of your daily schedule. If you need to add things or shuffle them around, you can tell Alexa to āadd an eventā or āmove a meetingā to a different time or day.
ADD TO YOUR TO-DO LIST
If youāre like me, you make mental notes constantly and then never remember to execute on any of them. Itās no way to live.
Alexa can help. Tell it to add something to your to-do list and thenāand this is importantāask it whatās on your to-do list later so that you can actually get things done.
If youāre feeling really ambitious, you can create multiple lists outside of the default to-do list. Tell Alexa to create a list and itāll ask you what to name it.
Later onāthis is also importantāyouāll need to remember what you named your list in order to ask whatās on it.
FIND YOUR PHONE
Bellās law: You can never find your phone when youāre running late and on your way out the door. Your Alexa device, however, is almost always within earshot.
Ask Alexa to find your phone and, after a quick initial setup process, itāll call your phone so you can (ideally) hear it ringing in between the couch cushions you could have sworn youĀ just checked.
And while this is an Alexa-focused article, the service is limited in that it canāt audibly ring a muted or vibrate-only phone. You can, however, do so via the official Android and iPhone phone-finding apps: GoogleāsĀ Find My DeviceĀ and AppleāsĀ Find My iPhone.
CHECK YOUR COMMUTE
The pandemic may be hanging around much longer than any of us hoped, but pandemic non-traffic is a thing of the past.Ā If you live in a part of the country with wildly variable commute times, asking Alexa to check your commute is a godsend in the morning.
![](https://images.fastcompany.net/image/upload/w_596,c_limit,q_auto:best,f_auto/wp-cms/uploads/2022/03/Commute.png)
To set your home and work addresses, fire up the Alexa app, tap More in the lower-right corner, then Settings, and choose Commute. Then enter your work and home addresses.
Each morning, ask Alexa what your commute is like and itāll give you an idea of when youāll need to leave the house.
GET CAUGHT UP
Depending on how much time you have, you can get a quick rundown of the dayās headlines or a more robust helping of the noteworthy news stories.
For the quick version, ask Alexa to tell you your āFlash Briefingā for a few minutes of news from a handful of providers that you can customize.Ā To select your Flash Briefing providers, tap More in the lower-right corner of the Alexa app, then Settings, then News, then Flash Briefing.
For the long version, simply ask Alexa for the news and itāll relay more in-depth stories from your favorite news source. To select your source, tap More in the lower-right corner of the Alexa app, then Settings, then News, then My News Channels.