Amazon launches Bee Frontier wearable and Bee Eclipse phone attachment

Two devices for different habits

Bee is a personal AI that, according to Amazon, remembers what matters from conversations and turns it into summaries, to-dos, reminders and insights. The first Bee device, Bee Pioneer, was in Amazon's words one of the original personal AI products to offer more than audio transcription.

Bee Frontier is the next generation of the wearable. It can be worn on the wrist or clipped onto clothes, has an ultra-soft silicone wristband and comes in Lavender, Sage and Onyx. Amazon lists IP67 water resistance, up to seven days of battery life and USB-C charging. Dual microphones with advanced noise filtering are meant to pick up what matters in noisy places such as a crowded restaurant or open office.

Bee Eclipse is a new form factor: a slim, lightweight device about the size of a credit card that attaches magnetically to the back of a phone. Amazon says it offers more than 21 days of battery life on a single charge. It works like Bee Frontier and is aimed at situations such as phone calls, where users can turn it on to capture logistics like arrival times or restaurant choices.

How Bee works and what it connects to

Summaries can be read in the Bee mobile app or in an all-new desktop app, with templates for uses such as lectures, care plans or brainstorms. Users can review memories from the past few days, and Bee picks up recurring themes and recommends personalized goals and actions.

Bee can be linked to apps including Gmail, Google Calendar and Microsoft Outlook. After a call or meeting, it can surface action items, draft follow-up emails or create calendar invites. It can also connect to Apple HealthKit and to photos.

The new links to Alexa+ and Amazon.com are the main additions on the ecosystem side. With Alexa+, users can ask Alexa for a meeting summary, check to-dos or look up the name of a book a friend suggested, without pulling out a phone. When Bee is connected to Amazon.com, items a user mentions can appear as product recommendations on the Amazon homepage and in the Bee apps.

Privacy approach

Both devices are built on Bee Private Compute, which Amazon describes as a security architecture that processes conversations in a secure, isolated environment where no one, including Amazon, can access the data. According to Amazon:

• Audio is processed in real time and deleted afterwards, and is never stored.
• Transcripts are encrypted with keys that only the user's device creates and controls, and are accessible only to the user unless shared.
• A single press turns each device on or off, and an LED light shows when it is active.
• Users can delete transcripts and summaries at any time.

Bee Frontier can also be set to switch off automatically after a period without sound, for example 5 or 15 minutes. For Bee Eclipse, users are prompted to get permission from call participants each time a recording starts. If Bee is connected to Alexa, an Echo device uses voice ID to recognize the user's voice before providing Bee insights.

Pricing and availability

Bee Frontier is available now at Amazon.com for $74.99 in Onyx, Lavender and Sage. Bee Eclipse will be available soon, starting at $99.99 in Silver, Midnight, Honey and Blush.

Every purchase includes conversation summaries, recaps and 14-day memory at no extra cost. A Bee Pro subscription costs $11.99 per month and adds unlimited recent conversation summaries, the Amazon.com and Alexa+ integrations, third-party app integrations, suggested to-dos, daily memories, a personal chat assistant, conversation templates and the desktop application. New Bee customers get 30 days of Bee Pro free.

For buyers, this means the Alexa+ and Amazon.com connections, along with other integrations, sit behind the subscription rather than the hardware price alone.