Main points
- Amazon product recommendation ads can be blocked by disabling several switches in the Settings menu.
- Turning off the All Family Content option will remove ads, but will also disable notifications, news, and weather forecasts.
- Use an ad-free subscription to eliminate ads when playing music or videos on your Echo Show.
Choosing the screen-based Amazon Echo Show instead of speakers opens up many new possibilities for your smart home hub. However, the screen also opens up the possibility for more advertising. I loved my Alexa, but always found on-screen ads intrusive—until I learned how to remove all spam from my Echo Show. If you want your Echo Show to stop showing ads on its rotating screensaver, there’s a way to disable many of the ads that pop up on your screen.
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Advertising is increasingly entering homes, no longer just through TV and radio ads, but now also on smartphones and, yes, even smart home devices. If you’re wondering how to remove Amazon spam from your Echo Show screen, just follow a few steps to stop scrolling through Amazon product recommendations. However, ads can also come into play through Alexa Skills, so in this guide, we’ve taken a deep dive into ways to prevent ads from appearing on your Echo Show.
How to turn off Amazon ads on Echo Show
You need to turn off multiple options
- In the Echo Show, swipe down from the top of the screen to bring up menu.
- tap set up.
- choose Home & Clocks.
- tap Home page content.
- Click the switch to turn off options you no longer want to see on the Home screen.
The list of possible family content is long, and turning off all ads will require switching through multiple categories. You can choose to turn off everything and set Echo Show up as a digital photo frame. However, be sure to read everything you want to turn off, as turning off all family content options will also disable things like notifications, news, and weather forecasts.
Some of the biggest culprits you need to make sure to turn off ads to eliminate Amazon spam from your Echo Show include shopping inspiration, Shopping recommendationsand your frequent orders. Shopping Inspiration provides general advertising for popular products on Amazon. Shopping recommendations are personalized ads for Amazon products based on your previous purchases. Your Frequent Orders option will display reminder ads to remind you to reorder products that you frequently re-purchase.
While these three options are the biggest offenders of Amazon ads on the Echo Show, there are other options you can turn off if you want to get rid of as many products as possible on the screen.this entertainment options Suggested videos will be displayed – these are free, but if you don’t want to see these, just turn off the entertainment options.this Fire TV and video games The advice is similar. Explore the local area Allowing local businesses to pop up on your show is another option you may want to disable.
Ads may pop up in unexpected places on your Echo Show. For example, some Alexa themes are sponsored by brands and come with logos. If you want to completely remove ads from the Echo show screen, you can turn off all Home content. When you turn this off, your Echo Show will only display the clock and photos. You can follow these instructions to customize these photos and set up your Echo Show up as a digital photo frame. You can use your own photos or choose from pre-installed themes that include stock photos to display. Alexa will still display content on the screen when asked, but setting up the Echo Show this way means you won’t see anything other than photos and a clock when Alexa is inactive.
How to adjust third-party advertising preferences on your Amazon Echo device
While the Echo Show home screen is one culprit for ads, another culprit is the advertising ID Amazon uses to share your interests with third parties. Interest-based ads are ads that highlight products based on your previous interactions with Amazon Connect. For example, if you use your Echo Show to look up recipes, you might see ads for products related to those recipes on the website. Alexa shares this data to serve personalized ads when using third-party skills activated on your device. Although these advertising IDs are not linked to identifying information such as name or email, you may want to turn them off. While turning these settings off won’t eliminate ads, it will provide generic ads rather than messages relevant to your interests.
Ad preferences on Alexa accounts control interest-based advertising on all Echo devices, including the Echo Show as well as smart speakers and the Alexa app. There are two ways to adjust Alexa ad privacy settings: on the Echo Show itself or within the Alexa app. This setting affects your entire Alexa account, so you only have to do this once, even if you have multiple Echo devices.
To adjust your ad preferences on Echo Show:
- Swipe down from the top of the Echo Show screen.
- tap set up.
- choose Alexa Privacy.
- tap Manage skill permissions and Advertising preferences.
- Click the switch next to Receive interest-based advertising from third parties Skills and content to close them.
To adjust ad preferences from within the Alexa app:
- Open Alexa app on your phone and tap more The icon is located on the bottom navigation bar.
- tap set up.
- choose Alexa Privacy.
- tap Manage skill permissions and advertising preferences.
- Scroll down to the following section Interest-based advertising from third parties.
- Click the switch next to Receive interest-based advertising from third parties Skills and content providers on Alexa (gray/left when off, blue/right when on).
FAQ
Q: Can all Echo Show ads be turned off?
Alexa users can turn off screen-based ads on Echo Show devices by disabling Home Content settings using the steps listed above. This will prevent Amazon product recommendations from displaying on the screen. While this requires disabling multiple switches instead of just one, it allows the screen to display only photos and clocks, rather than ads and suggestions.
However, in addition to home screen content, many other Alexa Skills may also have their own ads. For example, if you ask Alexa to play music but don’t have a music subscription, Alexa will play ad-supported music. That’s true for many of the free music and video services that are compatible with the Echo Show, as the ads allow the company to continue offering its services to listeners for free. In addition to Alexa’s own ad-supported free music, ads will also play a role on third-party music and video services, such as iHeart Radio. The only way around this is to use a service that’s supported by a paid subscription, not a service that’s supported by a paid subscription. One that is supported by advertising. Amazon Music is part of a Prime subscription and is ad-free. Many Amazon Music Unlimited plans are also ad-free. Many third-party music services that offer paid, ad-free options, such as Spotify and Apple Music, will also be compatible with Alexa. The same goes for watching videos on the Echo Show—if you really want to get rid of all the ads on the Echo Show, you’ll have to choose a platform that offers an ad-free option.