Plex Skill, Alexa+ and Echo dots

General Discussions
1

Hello,

I have an echo dot, dot max and Alexa+

I purchased both dots using my USA account.

I have them physically located with me in France.

Both dots are connected to my Amazon USA account.

I run a WD my cloud ultra ex2 to house my music library and Plex.

I am using the Alexa Plex skill to use voice commands to stream my music library

When I tell Alexa to tell Plex to stream music, it starts fine, but after about 2 hours it stops, disconnects from Plex.

When it is playing a specific playlist, it does the same thing.

When it is playing the Music Library it does the same thing.

When it is playing successfully, I see the REMOTE connection to my Plex server on the Plex dashboard

When it stops playing, the remote connection disappears.

My home network is stable

Both devices stream music from Amazon music non-stop

Why does it, Alexa+/Plex Skill, need to issue a remote connection when the music is on my home network?

How do I prevent Alexa+/Plex skill from disconnecting after ~2 hours?

Thank you,

2

I’m not sure why the connection breaks after 2 hours, so let’s work on the first question and that might fix the second.

The “remote” connection is likely caused by your server being on a different “subnet” or network than the one the server is on. Find the IP address of the server, and the IP address range of the wifi router that the Alexa devices connect to (It’s hard to find the actual IP of the device, but all we care about is the subnet network that they connect to). If these networks are different, then Plex thinks “AH! This connection is remote!” and applies all remote connection restrictions.

Without a Plex Pass, you cannot modify a setting that allows you to designate separate subnets as still being local (a restriction added due to Plex demanding money for remote streaming). Your best bet will be to find out why your network separates out the wifi network and your physical network into different subnets, and try to put them together.

3

I wouldn’t bother trying to get this working as Plex are disabling this skill in June.
Recently, due to low usage and shifting priorities, we made the difficult decision to remove the Plex Skill for Alexa from the Alexa app. While it is no longer available to new users, we are reaching out to our existing users to provide advanced notice. Effective June 15th, 2026, the Plex Skill will be disabled completely and will no longer function on your Alexa-enabled devices

4

The Alexa Skill has never been reliable enough for me to use it properly.

They say the removal is because of “low usage”, have they taken the time to work out that’s because the app is not reliable enough. Yet another nail in the plex coffin for me, I was already looking around for alternatives and I have a lifetime plex pass.

5

I agree

I have started testing Emby and Jellyfin

6

Just received notification and am gutted about this.

It works well for my setup and was pretty much the only reason I stumped up for a Plex Pass.

7

I was planning to add the Plex skill to Alexa for a week now. Today I’m actually doing it and discover the news that it got scrapped.

Are there any alternatives ? Like a forked unofficial Plex skill for Alexa …

8

This but it does have an annual fee

My Media for Amazon Alexa

9

I am very upset as well that the skill gets abandoned but I totally agree it was not a smooth experience to use it.

However, a while ago Alexa introduced “routines” with “custom commands” this made it much easier and a whole new experience for me.

The commands were very long, hard to remember and often misinterpreted, but with routines those commands could be triggered and overwritten by simpler commands. Right now I have commands like “Play music”, “Dinner music” or “Play Childs Playlist” and those trigger a playlist in Plex (some renaming was necessary for proper recognition.

So for me it is a downer the skill gets deactivated, can’t they just drop support and leave it in the amazon store? Or publish the code for self-deployment?

If not I will have to write a work-around myself :frowning:

10

I have given up on Plex for streaming music to my 2 dots.

I’ve moved on to Emby, with Jellyfin as an option if Emby does not meet my expectations. With Emby, I am having problem with playlists their support was more responsive than Plex support. Emby plays all my music, it just doesnt play nice with any playlists. I tried the My Media option was painful to setup and so I dumped it. Emby setup was a challenge, but with the help of Chatgpt, I was able to get it to work with very little frustration. Your mileage may vary..

Marvin

11

Why? Neither offer an advantage regarding this specific problem (neither ever offered Alexa integration). You had to pay for an alternative either way.

12

Yes emby offers an alexa skill, I am using it

Jellyfin also offers an alexa skill.. so this is may be next

Regards,

13

That’s my mistake, I apologize.

Though I will add that the Jellyfin skill is a self-hosted application.

Good luck with Emby Premium though!

14

I found this AskPlex DIY Alexa skill. Haven’t implemented it yet.

15

I saw that awhile back, but the major drawback for me was it only processes mp3 files.

My music files are in different formats.

I do wonder if I can create my own Alexa skills, being retired and previously worked as a developer at a major corporation, I do have the time and background needed..

Let me run some thoughts by AI and if it is doable.

16

So here are my thoughts, I am definitely moving from the Plex platform. I will be using Emby. In one afternoon, I have created a skill that allows me to play my music from my NAS to 2 Dots via voice commands. its 80 % done.. it shuffles when I say shuffle, it plays playlist, I just have to work on artists and genre playback. Since the plex skill is moving away soon, I can be completely free before they leave, NICE. My tip other users, if you move to Emby or Jellyfin and you have amazon dots, use the skills and AI to generate the code to make it work the way YOU want it to work. Less stress and more time for beer, wine or soda.