Get Started
What is the Alexa Skills Kit?
- About Voice Interaction Models
- Index of Skill Types
- Glossary
Create Your Developer Account
Contact Alexa Developer Support
Skill Types
Alexa for Apps
- Use the Command Line
- FAQ
- Alexa for Apps V1 to V2 Migration Guide
Automotive Skills
- Connected Vehicle Skills
- Alexa Skills for Driving
Custom Voice Model Skills
- Steps to Build a Custom Skill
- Get Custom Skill Sample Code
- Understand How Users Invoke Custom Skills
- Choose the Invocation Name for a Custom Skill
- Create a Custom Skill from a Quick Start Template
- Host a Custom Skill as an AWS Lambda Function
- Host a Custom Skill as a Web Service
- Configure a Skill for Multiple Languages
- Create the Interaction Model (Intents, Slots, and Dialogs)
- Use Built-in Intents and Slot Types
- Entity Resolution
- Handle Requests Sent by Alexa
- Understand Name-free Interaction for Custom Skills
- Add Audio to a Custom Skill
  - Stream Long-Form Audio with AudioPlayer
- Alexa Quick Links
  - Create a Quick Link for Your Custom Skill
  - Create a Quick Link for Your Custom Task
- Use Display Templates to Show Content on Screens
Flash Briefing Skills
- Steps to Build a Flash Briefing Skill
- Tips to Create a Great Flash Briefing Skill
- Flash Briefing Skill Certification Checklist
- Normalize the Loudness of Audio Content
- Flash Briefing Skill API Feed Reference
Game Skills
- Alexa Web API for Games
Music, Radio, and Podcast Skills
- Steps to Build a Music, Radio, or Podcast Skill
- Radio Skills Kit
  - Use No-Code Radio Skills
- Implement Podcast Skill Features
- Upload Music or Radio Catalogs
- Upload Podcast Catalogs
- Add Premium Audio, Badging, and License Retrieval to a Music Skill
- Internationalize a Podcast Skill
- Catalog Reference
- Understand Voice Modeling
- Testing Guide
- Event Subscriptions
- Troubleshooting
- Music, Radio, and Podcast Skill API
Smart Home Skills
- Steps to Build a Smart Home Skill
- Smart Home Skill Concepts
- Smart Home Skill Types
- Tutorial: Build a Smart Home Skill
- Troubleshooting Guide
- Smart Home Skill APIs
Video Skills
- Steps to Build a Video Skill
  - Implement Video Skill Code
- State Reporting for Video Skills
- Video Skill Testing Guide
- Video Skill APIs
- Video Skills for Fire TV Apps
- Video Skills for Echo Show
Skill Development Process
Design Your Skill
- Alexa Design Guide
Build Your Skill
- Use AI-Driven Dialog Management
- Add Visuals and Audio to Your Skill
- Add Account Linking
- Use Alexa Advertising ID
  - Steps to Add Advertising ID
- Earn Money with a Skill
- Add Alexa Shopping Kit
- Include Reminders in a Skill
- Personalize the User Experience
- Expose Skill Functionality with Tasks
- Expose Skill Functionality with Triggers
- Let Skills Work Together with Skill Connections
  - Use Skill Connections to Request Tasks
- Offer Pre-Built Routines from Your Skill
  - Pre-Built Routine API Reference
  - Pre-Built Routine Primitives
- Include Timers in a Skill
  - Set Up Voice Permissions for Timers
  - Best Practices for Timers
- Use Events in a Skill
- Add Dash Replenishment
- Display Suggestions on the Home Screen
- Add Rich Media to Your Skill Detail Page
- Deprecated Features
Test and Debug Your Skill
- Test and Debug Your Custom Skill
- Test and Debug Your Smart Home Skill
- Test with the Alexa Simulator
- Beta Test a Skill
Certify and Publish Your Skill
- Requirements
- Certification Testing
  - Certification Functional Tests
  - Certification Tests for VUI and UX
- Troubleshoot Certification Failures
- Works with Alexa Certification
Monitor Your Skill Metrics and Earnings
- Analyze Your Skill Metrics
- View Your Payments and Earnings
Tools to Create and Manage Skills
- Manage Your Developer Account
- Alexa Developer Console
- Alexa-hosted Skills
- ASK Toolkit for VS Code
- ASK SDKs
- ASK CLI
- Skill Management API
- AWS Tools
Skill Developer Reference
Alexa Interface Reference
- List of Alexa Interfaces
- Message and Property Reference
- Foundational APIs
- Smart Home Skill APIs
- Video Skill APIs
Custom Skill Interface Reference
- Request and Response JSON Reference
- Request Types Reference
- Interfaces
REST API Reference
- Access Token Retrieval
- Account Linking Management
- Alexa-hosted Skill Management
- Audit Logs
- Beta Test Management
- Beta Tester Management
- Catalog Management
- Customer Profile
- Device Settings
- In-Skill Product Management
- Intent Request History
- Interaction Model Catalog Management
- Interaction Model Management
- Linked Data
- Locale Cloning
- Metrics
- Monetization
- NLU Annotation Set
- NLU Evaluation
- Person Profile
- Proactive Events
- Proactive Suggestion
- Progressive Response
- Reminders
- Resource Schema
- Skill Certification
- Skill Credentials
- Skill Development Notifications
- Skill Enablement
- Skill Invocation
- Skill Manifest
- Skill Messaging
- Skill Package Management
- Skill Publishing
- Skill Rollback
- Skill Simulation
- Skill Validation
- Smart Home Skill Evaluation
- SSL Certificates
- Timers
- Utterance Profiler
- Vendor Management
Skill Schema Reference
- Skill Manifest Schema
- Skill Manifest Examples
- Account Linking Schemas
- Interaction Model Schema
- In-Skill Product Schema
- Paid Skill Schema
- Proactive Events Schemas
- Skill Development Event Schemas
SSML Reference
- Best Practices for Using Amazon Polly Voices
- Alexa Skills Kit Sound Library
- Speechcons (Interjections)
- Test SSML Examples with the Audio Sandbox

About the Alexa Developer Console

Note: Sign in to the developer console to build or publish your skill.

Use the Alexa developer console to create and publish Alexa skills. The developer console is a browser-based UI that supports all phases of the skill development workflow. You can create a new skill, choose the voice interaction model, add endpoints to the backend service that hosts your skill, submit your skill for certification, and monitor the performance of your skill.

If you want to create and publish Alexa skills from the command line, see Alexa Skills Kit (ASK) Command Line Interface (CLI) Overview. Or, you can create skills in Visual Studio Code (VS Code) with the ASK Toolkit extension.

For details about the skill development workflow, see What is the Alexa Skills Kit?

Skill development overview

The Alexa developer console organizes skill building into the following tasks:

Build – Use the Build page to configure your skill, specify the endpoints for your skill service, and more.
The specific steps that you complete depend on the voice interaction model that you choose when you create your skill. For example, for a skill with a custom model, you create the voice interface with intents and sample utterances. For a skill with the pre-built smart home model, you provide the account linking configuration.
Code – When you choose Alexa-hosted for your backend resources, you can use the Code page to implement your skill code in the console and deploy the code to Amazon Web Services (AWS) Lambda. The Code page is available to custom skills only. For more details about Alexa-hosted skills and the AWS resources available to your skill, see About Alexa-hosted Skills.
Test – You can test the skill in the development stage or the live stage. Use the Alexa simulator in the Test page to test your skill with text and voice.
Distribution – Use the Distribution page to define information about your skill that appears in the Alexa Skills Store.
Certification – Before you can publish your skill to the Alexa Skills Store, Amazon certifies your skill. Use the Certification page to validate your skill, run pre-certification tests, and submit the skill for certification.
Analytics – Use the Analytics page to review metrics for your skill, such as number utterances, customers, and intents invoked.

Developer console UI

The following images show the pages on the developer console.

Screenshot of the build page Build page — Build page for a custom skill on the developer console

Screenshot of the Code page for custom skills that use Alexa-hosted skills — Code page on the developer console for an Alexa-hosted custom skill

Screenshot of the Test page — Test page on the developer console for a custom skill

Screenshot of the Distribution page — Distribution page on the developer console

Screenshot of the Certification page — Certification page on the developer console

Screenshot of the Analytics page — Analytics page on the developer console

Prerequisites

Before you develop an Alexa skill, make sure that you have the following items:

An Amazon developer account. You can use an existing Amazon account to sign in, or you can create a new Amazon developer account. The account is free.
Ideas for the type of skill that you want to build. For details about voice design, see Alexa Design Guide.

Manage access to the developer console

The first user associated with an Alexa developer account is the account owner and has full rights to administer the developer account. As account owner, you can invite additional users to your developer account to give them access to work on your Alexa skills based on their role. For details about roles and adding users to your developer account, see Manage user permissions.

Get started

To get started with skill building in the developer console, see Create and Manage Skills in the Alexa Developer Console.

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Last updated: Jan 26, 2024