The future you’ve been waiting for has arrived. Amazon has added a new accepted wake word to activate your personal voice assistant: Computer. I don’t need to explain how cool this is to Star Trek nerds.


For everyone else, “Computer” is the trigger word that Star Trek has used to interact with its various voice-controlled systems since the original series in 1966. Now, you can use the same word to activate Alexa with your Amazon Echo. To change your wake word, follow these steps:

Open the Alexa app on your phone. Slide out the left-hand navigation panel and tap Settings. Tap the device that you want to change. Scroll down and tap Wake Word. Tap the drop down and choose Computer from the list. Tap Save.

After that, your Echo will respond to the word Computer, instead of Alexa. Of course, don’t be surprised if you accidentally trigger Alexa more often with this setting. While the Echo tries to ignore instances where it sounds like you’re using the wake word in a sentence instead of as a command, it’s not perfect. The ideal wake word is one you won’t say often unless you’re speaking directly to your voice assistant, and “computer” doesn’t quite fit that bill. It is really cool, though.


Change the Wake Word | Amazon