Getting Started with Alexa Development 02: Signing Up to Alexa Development Portal

Welcome back to our journey in learning how to program Amazon Alexa Skills via Echo voice search. In the previous article, we walked through the process of setting up an Amazon Web Services (AWS) account. Today, we’ll set up an account at the Alexa Development portal, a distinct entity from the AWS portal.

Without further ado, let’s jump in. Go to https://developer.amazon.com/public/solutions/alexa.

You should land on something like the above screen. Click on the “Sign In” button, you can create a new account from this screen if you need.

Important Note: If you already have an Amazon.com account (regular old Amazon shopping account), use those credentials to log in.

Obviously, if you’re a returning Alexa Development Portal user, you can skip the account creation process shown below. If you’re creating a new account, you’ll need to fill out a screen that will likely resemble the below, and click “Save and Continue” when you’ve finished.

Next, you should be presented with an App Distribution and Services Agreement screen. Be sure to give it a quick read. If you want to use the services, then you’ll need to agree by clicking save and continue. 🙂

The final registration step addresses payments and whether you plan to monetize the apps you develop. For the purposes of my usage, and this learning, I checked “No” to both options before proceeding.

Once you finish that step, you should find yourself in the Amazon Developer Console! Good thing we got the hard material out of the way first, huh?

This should wrap up a pretty quick introductory section for setups. Feel free to visit my previous article on getting set up with AWS, or go to my learning home page on how to start developing Alexa Skills. Thanks and see you at the next article!

Zach