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LAS VEGAS—BMW has been touting its Neue Klasse (New Class) design language and car tech for several years now, but it brought a near-final version to CES 2026 that’s slated to hit showrooms later this year. The big news? The company has integrated the Amazon Alexa+ smart assistant, which is on board to take you from here to there and engage in conversation along the way. I got a demo in a new iX3, and it’s hard not to be impressed.
Many cars, including BMWs, already offer basic voice assistants that can take actions such as calling your spouse or sending a message. The AI-powered BMW Intelligent Personal Assistant with Alexa+ is a big step up from that.
As you might imagine, it has many of the same powers and capabilities that Alexa+ already offers when accessed from your Alexa+ enabled smart home devices. However, in your car, it can be far more effective.
Accessed by saying, “Hey, BMW,” the BMW Intelligent Personal Assistant can help you navigate from A to B and find interesting or necessary stops along the way. In the demo I experienced, a BMW representative asked the car to route us to a local ski resort, to find and plan a stop at a CVS on the way, to determine whether the ski resort had skis and boots available for rental, and to entertain us with Las Vegas-themed music along the route. The car was able to respond to each request (albeit somewhat slowly) and make adjustments to the route as needed.
It behaves similarly to how Google Gemini or Siri would respond to a series of requests. What’s critical is that it can handle natural-language interactions. There’s no stultifying syntax to learn. In fact, the BMW representative made a series of vocal errors and mistakes when making the series of requests, and Alexa+ handled them all without issue.
The BMW Intelligent Personal Assistant is based on a large language model and relies on generative AI. Your requests are processed in the cloud, rather than in the car, but it’s capable of formulating its own responses to your input. BMW says this particular feature will be rolled out to cars with BMW OS 9 and BMW OS X starting in the second half of 2026. Alexa+ integration will be initially limited to the US and Germany, with additional markets to follow over time.
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I’m PCMag’s managing editor for consumer electronics content, overseeing an experienced team of reviewers and product testers. I’ve been covering technology for about 25 years. Prior to PCMag, I worked at outlets such as Android Authority, Fortune, InformationWeek, and Phonescoop. 
My main tool for getting work done is a 14-inch MacBook Pro. It’s a silent and fast machine with a good keyboard and excellent battery life. When I’m not using my laptop, you can find me working (and relaxing) with an iPad Pro. I’ve come to rely on its 5G data connection when traveling, which makes it an essential part of my workflow. 
I consider myself an audiophile. That means my office and living room audio setups are total overkill, featuring Denon receivers, a turntable, and Polk Audio speakers complete with subwoofers for the best possible sound, whether I’m listening to music or watching movies. My favorite earphones for private listening are the Sony WF-1000XM5.
When on the go, I typically use an iPhone 17 Pro Max for photos, but I don’t need much of an excuse to pull out my Sony mirrorless for high-resolution photography—especially when shooting sports. 
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