Sky is always adding new features to its Sky Q set-top box, including new shortcuts to jump to your favourite movies and dedicated landing pages for hit shows and sporting events. The latter brings together clips, news and boxsets for the biggest telly events, like the Euros 2020 tournament, Love Island, and more.
Both of these are only available to those with the Sky Q Voice Remote. This must-have accessory unlocks a number of awesome features, including the ability to find films from a certain director, the next fixture from a specific football team, or shows with your favourite actors by simply holding down the Voice button – denoted with a microphone icon – and saying the name into the remote.
This saves a truckload of time compared to typing with the alphanumeric pad at the bottom of all Sky Q remotes. While this works well enough, tapping the same button four times to type an “s” isn’t really ideal.
Better yet, anyone with a Sky Q Voice Remote can ask “What should I watch?” for inspiration. This brings together suggestions of new boxsets, films, and live channels based on your viewing history. It’s important to note there are no voice recognition smarts built into the Sky Q, so the suggestions are based on what has been watched on the box… not specifically by you. Anyone in your household can ask the Sky Q Voice Remote and get the same suggestions.
However, if you have a Sky Q Mini box in another room of your house, the suggestions will change based on what has been watched on that box – compared to the main set-top box in your living room. So, if younger viewers in the household have a Sky Q Mini box in their room, expect plenty of CiTV and Cartoon Network shows to be found in the landing page that appears when asking “What should I watch?”.
Sky has previously offered its Sky Q Voice Remote for free to some customers. These promotions crop-up from time to time, however, there’s no such offer around at the moment. While new Sky Q subscribers will find the Voice Remote in the box, those who have had the satellite box for some time might have the previous iteration of the remote, with a button on the side, or no voice controls at all.
Thankfully, Amazon has slashed the cost of the Sky Q Voice Remote in half as part of a new summer sale. Usually priced at £34.99, you can now pick up the Sky Q Voice Remote for £17.99 – that’s the lowest price we’ve ever seen on Amazon UK. Previously, the best you could hope to pay was £19.99 during a limited time sale.
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