How to Factory Reset Your Amazon Echo Auto

Amazon Echo devices have been at the top of the smart speaker device game for years. With these speakers, your home, front door, and car can become smart. Many people around the world are getting into Echo devices and are even combining multiple devices to create complex systems.

Echo Auto is one of the most recent additions to the Echo lineup and, as its name suggests, it is made for in-car use. It is still a fairly new device, so some batches might still be prone to glitches and problems. When a serious problem strikes, your best bet is factory reset.

Why Reset?

There are many reasons and situations that may warrant a hard reset. The most obvious reason of all would be when the device simply freezes up and becomes completely non-responsive. Given the lack of control over it, a factory reset is pretty much the only way to go.

In some cases, the devices may sync with each other weirdly and start having stutters and issues. Performing factory resets on all Echo devices and reconnecting them can solve this issue.

Finally, your Echo Auto may end up clogged with information and tasks it has been assigned and may start performing badly. A factory reset should handle this with ease.

Things to Keep in Mind

Before moving on to the actual factory resets on your Echo devices, you need to keep a few things in mind. First of all, when you perform a factory reset on an Echo device, it will go back to the state it was in when you bought it. Yes, wiped clean of all the settings, tweaks, and commands that may have piled up over time. A factory reset is always a fresh start, so do keep that in mind.

Factory Resetting Amazon Devices

Here’s how to reset an Amazon Echo device. You’ll find a tutorial on how to perform factory resets on the following Amazon devices: Amazon Echo, Auto, Input, Sub, Dot, Plus, Show, and Spot. If the device that you want to reset isn’t on the list, chances are that the steps for one of the mentioned devices will work on it.

Echo Auto

Amazon Echo Auto is the latest Echo release. With this device, Alexa has finally made its way to cars worldwide, providing greatly needed voice-activated assistance for cars that don’t have this by default. It is very compact and comes with a washable sticky side that makes sure that Echo Auto adheres to your dashboard properly.

Factory resetting an Echo Auto device is as easy as holding the action button for around 25-30 seconds. The light bar will turn orange, indicating that the factory reset was successful.

Amazon Echo

Amazon Echo is the first Echo device released back in 2014. As the original smart speaker from Amazon, it introduced us to Alexa, the world’s most popular virtual assistant.

When it comes to factory resets, there are two different device types here to consider: the first and the second generation.

To factory reset a first-gen Amazon Echo, use a paper clip or a needle in order to access the reset button. You can find this button at the bottom of the Echo device. Once you’ve inserted the paper clip, needle or pin into the tiny hole, wait for a couple of seconds and you should see the light ring turn off and on. That’s it.

With the second generation of the Amazon Echo device, all you need to do is locate the Volume Down and Microphone buttons and press and hold them simultaneously. When the light ring turns orange, you’ve successfully performed the factory reset.

Echo Input

Amazon Echo Input is essentially just the microphone part of the Echo Dot device. Naturally, it’s significantly cheaper than Echo Dot.

The factory reset is performed exactly like with Echo Auto.

Echo Sub

Amazon Echo Sub is a subwoofer for your Echo devices. The factory reset is done like with Echo Auto and Echo Input.

Echo Dot

Echo Dot is a compact version of Amazon Echo. It’s about the size and shape of a hockey puck and shares most functionalities with its bigger sibling. It does have certain limits, however. It has a smaller, less powerful speaker, for example.

Depending on whether you own the first, the second, or the third generation of the device, the factory reset process will differ.

For the first-gen devices, the process is identical to the factory reset process with first-gen Amazon Echo devices. Use a paper clip, needle or pin to press the reset button at the bottom of the device. Hold the button until the light ring turns off and on.

Second-gen Echo Dot devices use the same microphone method that pertains to second-gen Amazon Echo devices. Press and hold Microphone and Volume Down buttons. Wait until the light turns orange.

The third-gen Echo Dot devices are restarted by pressing and holding the Action button. Make sure that you hold for at least 25 seconds.

Echo Plus

Essentially, Amazon Echo Plus is a more powerful version of Amazon Echo. It brings new functionalities to the table, though it is nothing revolutionary.

The factory reset process for the first and second-gen devices is identical to Amazon Echo’s factory reset for its first- and second-gen devices, respectively. To keep your Smart Home connections, you’ll need a different procedure. Quickly press the reset button (first-gen) or hold the Action button for a period of 20 seconds (second-gen).

Echo Show and Echo Spot

These Alexa devices are the only two that actually bring the visual aspect to the table. They are more expensive than other Amazon devices, but justifiably so.

To factory reset these devices, go to Settings, then Device Options, and select Factory Defaults. Select Reset to Factory Defaults, but Retain Smart Home Device Connections if you want to keep the connections.