Dish customers can now talk to their televisions, thanks to a new voice-enabled remote that controls navigation, search, and content selection on Hopper 3 and 4K Joey set-top boxes.

While Comcast's voice-controlled remote for the Xfinity X1 platform looks like a conventional remote control, Dish's device is about half that size. A touchpad takes up most of that real estate, which also doubles as a virtual backlit keypad if you'd prefer to type in channels the old-fashioned way.

Dish says the voice-control feature can interpret natural language to populate search results based on program title, actor, or genre. It also recognizes voice commands to control basic functions of the receiver, like starting and stopping DVR recording and changing channels.

The voice remote is available to all Dish customers who have the Hopper 3 or 4K Joey, though it's a $30 add-on. The boxes themselves cost $7 a month.

Like the conventional Hopper 3 and 4K Joey remotes, the voice remote uses a radio connection so you don't need to point the remote directly at the box for it to work. For people who hate remote clutter, the new Dish clicker is also a universal remote, with the ability to control two additional devices via conventional infrared signals. Beyond the keypad, the entire remote has backlighting and can last up to six months on two AA batteries.

"Voice Remote is simple to use, affordable and, most impressively, operates with incredible speed and accuracy," Vivek Khemka, Dish's executive vice president and chief technology officer, said in a statement. "Leveraging modern navigation paradigms like touch and voice, this remote represents a complete reinvention of the outdated remote control customers have come to expect from cable providers."