What Does The Purple Light On Your Alexa Speaker Mean?

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Amazon's Echo lineup of smart speakers and smart displays is a popular and useful suite of lifestyle products. These internet-connected devices can help you stay up-to-date on news, weather, and personal calendars. They can also pull double duty as a whole-home audio system, not to mention the smart home automations they can carry out. Echo speakers and displays are easy to set up and require little in the way of maintenance or supervision. Amazon even went as far as to build a multicolored light system into all Echo tech to let you know when your speaker or display is listening, or if it's locked in a certain mode. The color of the light can also let you know if there's anything wrong with your device.

If you happen to see a solid purple light on your Echo speaker's LED light ring, or at the bottom of your Echo Show touchscreen, it more than likely means that the product is set to Do Not Disturb mode. This ensures that the affected device won't receive notifications, calls, or messages until Do Not Disturb is turned off. The purple light should only appear briefly after you've issued a voice command or used the Alexa app to perform a smart speaker or display action. The only other time you might see a purple light is when you're first setting up your Echo device. In that case, it probably means that your speaker or display is having a tough time connecting to Wi-Fi.

Should your Echo speaker or display be stuck in Do Not Disturb mode, pulling it out is about as straightforward as it gets. You can either say something like, "Alexa, turn off Do Not Disturb," or open the Alexa app and tap Devices, select your Echo device, then Device Settings, and, finally, Do Not Disturb. Do keep in mind that Do Not Disturb only impacts device notifications, calls, and messaging. Timers, alarms, and reminders should all still be functional. 

As far as Wi-Fi issues are concerned, one cause for your Echo device's purple lights might be that you're not using the most up-to-date version of the Alexa app for device onboarding. Another reason could be that you're attempting to set up an Echo device with Amazon eero Built-in to turn it into a Mesh Wi-Fi extender before you've actually set up an eero Network (Echo speakers only). Setting up an eero mesh network is relatively straightforward, and once you've done so, it should be easy to configure your Echo speakers as eero nodes. Just open the eero app, tap Discover, then select Amazon Connected Home and choose eero Built-in and toggle the setting on.