Will Alexa Alarm Stop By Itself? How Long Does It Last?

Your neighbors hate it when you forget to disable your alarm before leaving on vacation. The longer that alarm goes off, the more strain you put on your friendly relationship with them.

In this article, we’ll look at how long the Alexa alarm lasts, whether it turns off by itself, and how you can make it shorter or turn it off remotely.

Will the Alexa Alarm Stop By Itself?

Alexa’s alarm will turn off automatically after one hour. The auto-off feature works with all the Echo devices that I tested (Echo, Echo Dot, and Echo Show).

Others have reported the alarm going off for several hours and potentially never stopping on its own. However, I was unable to recreate that problem. If you’re worried about that happening to you, I’ll show you a hack to prevent it later in this article.

How Long Does the Alexa Alarm Last?

All of Alexa’s basic alarm tones stop after one hour of continuous ringing. If you set an alarm for 9:00 AM and never snooze it, that means it will stop ringing at 10 AM.

However, snoozing the alarm will delay the auto-off time, too. Alexa’s alarm snoozes for nine minutes. So if you set your alarm for 9:00 AM and snooze it at 9:01 AM, it will start again at 9:10 AM. That means that auto-off won’t trigger until 10:10 AM.

You can extend the length of your Alexa alarm by chaining together multiple alarms. In other words, set one for 9 AM, one for 10 AM, and so forth. That way, you can make the alarm last as long as you want.

Making the alarm shorter is harder, but you can do it by replacing the standard alarm with a music alarm, as we’ll discuss next.

How to Make Your Alexa Alarm Shorter

The one-hour auto-off applies to all of Alexa’s basic and premium alarm sounds, but it doesn’t apply to music alarms. If you set your alarm to wake you up to a particular song, the alarm will turn itself off as soon as the song is over.

Depending on the length of the song or playlist you choose, you can have an alarm that runs for any period of time. I haven’t tested whether this can create an alarm that is longer than one hour, but it can definitely create one that just lasts a couple of minutes.

Setting an Alexa Music Alarm

You can’t set a music alarm in the Alexa app without first setting it by voice command. Don’t ask me why; it’s one of the dumber limitations of the device. But here’s what you need to do.

1. Go to More -> Settings -> Music & Podcasts in the Alexa app, and make sure you’ve linked at least one music service. I’d suggest setting your preferred service as the default while you’re on this menu.
2. Ask Alexa to create an alarm based on a song or playlist from your library. You can also ask for songs from an artist or genre, but you won’t have control over the alarm length in those cases.
   1. For a song, say, “Alexa, set an alarm for 9 AM to Don’t Stop Me Now by Queen.” Of course, you’ll want to change the time, song, and artist name to your preferred choice.
   2. For a playlist, say, “Alexa, set an alarm for 9 AM to Zak’s Wakeup Playlist.” Again, you’ll want to use your own time and playlist name. Make sure you’ve created the playlist in your default music service first.

Once you’ve used a song or playlist in an alarm, Alexa will remember it for future use. You can create alarms using the same music either by voice command or by selecting the music from the Alarm Tone list in the Alexa app. You’ll still need to use voice commands for any new songs or playlists you want to use in your alarms.

How to Stop Alexa Alarm

You can stop the Alexa alarm by voice command, on the Echo device, or in the Alexa app. Here are the easiest ways to stop your alarm:

• Say, “Alexa, stop.” or “Alexa, stop alarm.” These commands work on all Alexa devices.
• Press the action button on the device. This works on the Echo, Echo Dot, and other non-screen Echo devices that have an action button.
• Press the “Stop” button on the screen. This works for the Echo Show, which doesn’t have an action button.
• Toggle the alarm off in the Alexa app. The alarms menu can be found under More -> Alarms & Timers.

What’s Next?

Once you get used to it, Alexa makes an even better alarm than your smartphone. The music alarms are especially great if you connect Alexa to apple music or Spotify or if you have iHeartRadio Stations to play on Echo.

Unlike most other Echo features, the alarms work even if Alexa is offline. Your Echo does need to be plugged in to sound its alarm, though, unless you’re using an Echo battery accessory.