Espressif has launched a new kit called EchoEar, a smart AI development kit. The demo application acts as a voice assistant. It listens to what you say, understands it, and responds naturally. It shows that it can go beyond talking like a human; it can even sing. The built-in conversational AI allows it to mimic human-like flaws and fillers like “like” and “you know”.
The assistant can turn on lights, adjust room lighting to suit mood (e.g., cozy or cool lighting), and turn on air conditioning. It does not need direct commands; it understands statements like “it's too hot” or “make it cozy” and performs reasonable actions. It has a memory for personal events and preferences. It remembers stuff like the user’s birthday, favourite dessert, and previous decisions.
The reference project displays a bit of entertainment as well, reading stories like “The Fox and the Grapes” or generating and playing custom songs. It offers support for Over-The-Air (OTA) software setup and helps set up OTA partitions. With a power-saving configuration, it even helps users recall prior power-saving settings. EchoEar is open-source, with a Developer Edition board shared on OSHWHub, code on GitHub, and firmware flashing done through Espressif’s Launchpad.
