Toyota announced this week that Alexa, Amazon's digital assistant found in its line of Echo devices, is coming to Toyota and Lexus cars later this year.

This is great news for people who own compatible vehicles or want to buy one. I've been using an Echo Dot with Alexa in a car for six months, and it is clear that this is the future of car infotainment.

The idea to put an Echo Dot in a car came to me when Amazon put the Echo Dot on sale. My reaction was probably like that of a lot of others: Should I buy another Echo, and if I do, where would I put it?

Then, with a little help from a funny moment involving my 6-year-old daughter, it hit me: Why not put an Echo Dot in my car? So I did, and it turned out to be the best $35 I have spent in a long time.

I'll walk you through how I installed it (it's easy), what I use it for (just about everything), and why it is the best car infotainment system I have ever used (it turned out to be better than I imagined):

This post was originally published in July 2017 and has been updated.