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Using voice commands with NOW
If you're using a NOW Smart Stick, or you're watching the NOW app through an Amazon Fire TV device, you can find your favourite movies and shows in seconds just by talking into your remote.
With a Fire TV device, you can also use voice commands to control playback when watching a show or movie.
Using voice search with your NOW Smart Stick
Simply press and hold the voice search button on your remote (it looks like a microphone) and say the name of a show, movie, actor or director to get started. You can search for movies and shows, or the name of your favourite actors and directors to see all of their shows and movies available on NOW. Simply say the name of what you’re searching for, or say “find” or “show me” first.
For example, you can say “Game of Thrones”, “show me Game of Thrones” or “find Game of Thrones”.
Keep in mind: Voice search won't display results from your NOW Sports Membership.
You can also use voice search to launch apps on your Smart Stick. Just say the name of the app to open it, or say “launch” or “open” first.
For example, you can say “open YouTube”, “launch YouTube” or just "YouTube".
Using voice commands with your Amazon Fire TV device
You can use voice commands with any of our supported Fire TV devices, except for the Fire TV Stick Basic Edition.
Keep in mind: You can only use voice commands to control playback for on demand shows and movies. You won't be able to rewind or fast forward live channels using voice commands.
Open the NOW app
You can use Alexa to launch the NOW app - just press the mic button on your Fire TV remote and say "Open NOW app".
Searching for NOW shows and movies
To search for your favourite shows or movies on NOW, just press the mic button on your Fire TV remote to start Alexa, and say the name of the show or movie out loud. Shows and movies in the NOW app will be included in your results.
Good to know: If you've got a Fire TV Cube, you can simply say "Alexa" to start your search, instead of pressing the mic button.
Controlling playback using voice commands
When watching on-demand episodes or movies, you can use the voice commands below to control playback:
| Command type | Sample voice command | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Play | "Alexa, play" "Alexa, resume" | Plays/resume the episode or movie |
| Pause | "Alexa, pause" "Alexa, stop" | Pauses the episode or movie |
| Rewind | "Alexa, rewind 30 seconds" "Alexa, rewind" | Rewinds by the given duration. If no duration is provided, the default is 10 seconds. |
| Fast-forward | "Alexa, fast-forward 30 seconds" "Alexa, fast-forward" | Fast-forwards by the given duration. If no duration is provided, the default is 10 seconds. |
| Skip to next episode | "Alexa, next" | Plays the next episode in the series |
| Restart | "Alexa, restart" | Goes back to the start of the current episode or movie |
Does voice search show results from live TV channels?
Voice search will only show you on-demand movies and shows. To see what’s on now and next on the live TV channels, just hit TV Guide on your Smart Stick remote. On a Fire TV device, open the NOW app and then go the 'TV guide' section.
Why wasn't my search term recognised?
If voice search doesn’t understand what you’re saying, there’s a few things you can try:
- Make sure you’re holding your remote close enough to your face (about 6 inches should do the trick), and that you're speaking into the microphone.
- Speak at a normal volume. If you’re too quiet or too loud, the microphone might not pick up what you’re saying.
- If all else fails, you can still search using the on-screen keyboard. Just go to your home screen, and select Search. From here you can search by movie, show, actor and director too, as well as look for apps.
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