The Verge · Technology

The Vergecast

The Vergecast is the flagship daily podcast from The Verge about small gadgets, Big Tech, and everything in between. Every Friday, Nilay Patel and David Pierce hang out and make sense of the week’s most important technology news. And Monday through Thursday, David leads a selection of The Verge’s expert staffers in an exploration of how gadgets and software affect our lives – and which ones you should bring into yours.

Episodes

Computing paradigms are shifting as major tech companies pivot toward AI-integrated hardware, moving away from traditional app-centric models. Amazon’s new premium Alexa tablets and Microsoft’s AI-forward Surface laptops signal a strategic focus on local compute and agentic interfaces, challenging the cloud-first domin...

The many pluses and minuses of Alexa Plus

08 Oct 2026

34m

AI processed

Amazon’s Alexa Plus is evolving from a basic voice assistant into a more capable smart home controller, though its ambitions to function as a general-purpose AI agent remain inconsistent. While the platform now excels at managing complex routines and understanding natural language, it frequently fails when attempting t...