Review on 📞 Facebook Portal Mini White 8-inch: Enhance Video Calling Experience with Built-in Alexa for Smart Hands-Free Communication by Greg Harris

I bought the portal to replace our little echo dot in the kitchen and video call the family on Facebook messenger. It does a good job with video calls. A camera that automatically zooms in and follows you is a neat trick. But over time, I quickly noticed a few design flaws. At first you would think that a product designed primarily for communicating with elderly relatives would offer a really loud ringer volume that could be heard throughout the house. Well, you can do that, but there's only one volume control. So if you want to play music at low volume during the day, your portal will ring at the same low volume when someone calls. The Echo would typically have music playing most of the day, and if I'm at my desk in another room and want to change the volume, I can easily do it through the Alexa app on my phone without leaving the bed. Although Portal "includes Alexa," you can't remotely control the volume this way. You also can't "get in" like the Echo products I've used as a makeshift intercom between floors in our home. The portal mobile app is largely useless. You can stream photos or videos from your phone to the portal, which seems like a no-brainer to me considering the screen is only a few inches larger than my phone. You cannot "talk" to the portal through the phone application. And the Alexa app is also useless to communicate with the portal. And don't even think about buying this for someone who doesn't have a Facebook account. This is required to use the device. Overall, I regret not having bought the Echo Show instead.