Amazon is ending the “Do Not Send Voice Recordings” option that kept audio from being sent to Amazon’s cloud and had it process locally on the device instead.

Amazon is discontinuing a feature that allowed users of some of its Echo smart speakers to choose not to send their voice recordings to the cloud. According to an email the company sent to users that was posted on Reddit, it will disable the feature that allowed select Echos to process Alexa requests locally on the device on March 28th, 2025.

Amazon is mandating cloud-based processing for Echo voice commands, removing local storage and disabling Alexa’s voice ID to expand its generative AI capabilities.