When you activate the Blink SmartHome Skill, Alexa can announce Motion Alerts and provide camera views for Outdoor, Indoor (gen 2), Mini, and XT2 cameras.

Alexa announces Blink Video Doorbell motion alerts and ringer button presses, but does not support Live View at this time.

This feature is currently available for English language Alexa devices in the North American (US and Canada) region. Alexa motion announcements do not get triggered for the following:

• Cameras using Local Storage to record directly to a Sync Module 2 with attached USB drive.
• Systems that do not use Cloud Storage or Local Storage.
• Cameras with "Motion Recording" set to "Off".
• Indoor (gen 1) or XT cameras are not compatible.

Motion Announcements is an Alexa Routine we made to connect a Blink system with cameras to Alexa speech services. When a connected camera has the "Motion Recording" setting "On", and it is part of an "Armed" system, motion alerts are sent to Alexa. Alexa uses the camera name you set in the Blink app to announce the following: "Motion Detected at the [camera name]." 

If you tap the alert, a Live View session is started from the camera that sent it.

To receive Alexa spoken alerts as soon as motion is detected by a particular camera, tap the Camera Settings icon in the Blink app, then set "Early Notification^Beta" to "On", as shown in the image below.

The motion alert is sent after a motion clip completes recording. If Motion Recording is "Off" the clip is zero length, so the alert is sent right away. You can change the Clip Length, and the pause afterwards (Retrigger Time), in the Camera Settings screen. Click to learn more about motion sensitivity and camera settings.

Notice the following are enabled for the best experience:

• Motion Detection
• Early Notification
• Motion Recording

To receive spoken alerts of camera activity:

1. Enable the Blink SmartHome Skill in the Alexa app:

• Click here for detailed instructions.
  

2. Enable Motion Announcements in the Alexa app:

• Tap the “Devices” icon on the bottom right corner of the screen to reach the Devices view, then tap the "Cameras" icon on the upper left.
   
  
  
• Tap a Blink camera that you wish to use for Alexa interaction, and enable the “Motion Announcements” toggle on the settings screen. Also make sure you have an Announcement Device visible to perform spoken alerts.
   
  
  If the toggle is not visible, update camera settings by asking: "Alexa, discover my devices." This will result in a response of "No new devices discovered." but the settings should update.
  
  

Tap the back arrow "<" (upper left corner of the screen) to return to the Cameras list.

Now, when the camera system is armed, motion alerts from the selected camera activate the Alexa device to announce "Motion Detected at the [camera name]." For greater convenience, you can also say: "Alexa, ask Blink to arm the [Blink system name]." You can use the same method to disarm a system when desired. To disarm, Alexa will request the PIN that you created when the Blink SmartHome Skill was enabled and connected to your Blink app. 

How to disable Motion Announcements in the Alexa app:

1. Tap the “Devices” icon on the bottom right corner of the screen to reach the Devices view, then tap the "Cameras" icon on the upper left.
    
   
   
2. Tap a Blink camera that you are using for Alexa interaction, and disable the “Motion Announcements” toggle on the settings screen.
    

Tap the back arrow "<" (upper left corner of the screen) to return to the Cameras list.