Amazon’s new smart shopping cart looks like it has a pair of eyes peering at your groceries - The Verge
Amazon’s Dash Cart uses cameras to automatically scan items and charge shoppers, letting you skip the checkout line. The company has announced an upgraded version that is lighter, tougher, and with longer battery.
Amazon has announced an updated version of its smart Dash Cart — a shopping cart that lets users scan and pay for their purchases as they shop to avoid waiting in checkout lines.
The original Dash Cart launched in 2020 and Amazon has been slowly rolling them out (ho ho) to its Fresh grocery stores and Whole Foods Market stores. It’s clear they’re still a bit of an experiment, though, and Amazon says the new Dash Cart will only be available at its Westford, Massachusetts Whole Foods store some time “in the coming months,” before slowly heading to other Fresh and Whole Foods locations across the US.
The cart’s main feature is a sensor array in the rim that uses AI-powered cameras and barcode scanners to identify whatever you put in (or take out) and create a live receipt. As you can see in this video from 2020, the system is very quick, and recognizes items pretty much as soon as you place them in the cart without much fuss. A touchscreen lets you check how much you’ve spent and a built-in scale lets you weigh loose items.
The Dash Cart has a touchscreen in the handlebars that shows shoppers a live receipt and suggests nearby products and deals.
Image: Amazon
The new Dash Cart keeps this same basic functionality with some added upgrades. The carts weigh less but carry more (doubling their capacity from two grocery bags to four) and are now better at locating themselves in stores. This means the touchscreen (which can be used to find goods via a search function) will also display nearby products and deals.
Amazon says it’s also improved the carts’ battery life, which should make them available all day rather than keeping them in their charging stations, and upgraded their durability so they can be taken outside to shoppers’ cars. As per the company press release:
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