Amazon invades ChatGPT’s turf with web-based Alexa+ and a $20 price tag

The sleeping giant of consumer AI has finally woken up, and it is bringing 600 million devices with it.

On January 5, Amazon officially launched Alexa.com, a dedicated web interface for its next-generation AI, "Alexa+." The move ends the company's decade-long strategy of keeping its assistant locked inside Echo speakers and Fire TVs, placing it directly in the crosshairs of OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini. But unlike its rivals, Amazon isn't just selling a chatbot; it is selling an agent that can already control the physical world.

The stakes are massive. With Amazon stock (AMZN) climbing 2.7% to $232 following the announcement, Wall Street is betting that Andy Jassy’s "agentic" strategy will finally monetize the company's massive footprint. The service is free for Prime members, but in a bold aggressive move, Amazon is charging non-members $19.99 per month, a price point that matches ChatGPT Plus exactly.

The "Agentic" Advantage

While ChatGPT and Claude excel at writing code and poetry, Amazon is pitching Alexa+ as the AI that does things. The new web interface allows users to control smart home devices, manage calendars, and book reservations directly from a browser tab.

"76% of what customers do with Alexa+ is not possible with any other AI," said Daniel Rausch, Amazon's VP of Alexa and Echo.

The core differentiator is the "Action" layer. A user can upload a PDF invitation to the web interface, have Alexa extract the date, add it to a calendar, and then crucially set a reminder on the Echo Show in the kitchen. This continuity between the browser and the "ambient" home is the moat Amazon has spent billions digging.

Monetizing the Ecosystem

For years, Alexa was a loss leader, a clever way to sell more toilet paper. Alexa+ changes the math. By gating the web experience behind a $19.99 subscription for non-Prime users, Amazon is attempting to transform a utility into a high-margin SaaS product.

Early data suggests the pivot is working. Amazon claims early access users are generating "three times the purchases" compared to the legacy version of Alexa. If even a fraction of Amazon's 200 million Prime members engage with the web interface, the data flywheel could eclipse anything OpenAI has built.

However, the risks are real. The $19.99 tier forces a direct comparison with ChatGPT’s superior reasoning capabilities. If Alexa+ hallucinates or fails to execute complex "agentic" tasks (like booking a flight), the trust built over a decade could evaporate.

The New Battleground

The launch of Alexa.com signals a shift in the AI wars from "who has the smartest model" to "who has the most utility." Amazon is betting that users are tired of copy-pasting answers from a chatbot and are ready for an assistant that can actually turn off the lights.

As of this morning, the "Chatbot War" has moved from the cloud to the living room. And Amazon just brought a tank to a knife fight.