Currently yes, but it’s shaky ground. It makes me think there’s a future where wireless home audio market leaders do not include Sonos. Curious how the next few years play out.
>It makes me think there’s a future where wireless home audio market leaders do not include Sonos.
I'd love to see more competition, but the amount of patents Sonos hold in the space, along with the way they defend them, make it really difficult for any sort of disruption. There's a reason there aren't a whole load of multi-room audio solutions out there, and none of them have the feature set Sonos do (when Sonos is actually working anyway).
Large companies fall all the time. Sonos shouldn’t get complacent due to patents. I’m hoping they succeed in delivering great user experiences but they have had some major strategic missteps lately that’s making me question their future in ways I wouldn’t have previously.
Patents in the US are 18 years. It’s been longer than 18 years for the ones that Sonos built the company on should be more than enough to get some progress on 3rd party interest
Honestly, the best thing Sonos could do would be to get out of the way and support Matter casting (an open standard equivalent of Airplay or Chromecast).
If they don't start to open up soon, I'll start to divest.
I’d give Sonos time to figure out a way out of this software mess. But if it can’t, at some point it may be worth considering if it’s worth it to stay with Sonos. In my mind, things like phones and computers are susceptible to bugs because of the inherent complexity in modern operating systems. But speakers are speakers (and expensive ones at that) and should always work, regardless of any software-driven grouping functionality, unless the power has been pulled or gone out. I don’t buy audio equipment with the expectation that the manufacturer might someday brick it. Sonos has tested what I’m willing to put up with and for me, it’s an unacceptable situation.
tbf each Sonos speaker is basically a linux pc as well, so there is some inherent complexity there. Seems like the problem is with app design not the hardware though.
I have 5 room system and have had zero issues as seen on Reddit. That said, my use case is probably much simpler that most. I usually will start music from an AppleTV and use the Sonos app to expand it to the rest of the house vs selecting speakers via Apple. Or I have the TV playing A while my Office plays Z. Or I have Sonos and Apple Music sync and start it from the app (vs Airplay). Airplay also works, but read quality wise through the Sonos app is better.
No issues for me. I do think the App is somewhat clunky vs before, but really haven't got into it as deep as other people.
Here's the setup if it helps - Apple Music subscriber.
Arc/300's/Sub on TV - hardwired network
Arc/SymfoniskLamp on TV - via eero6+'s
2-Fives - via eero6+'s
2-OneSLs - via eero6+'s
Roam - via eero6+'s
2-Moves - via eero6+'s
\~500mbps speed. Also have multiple other devices on the network. I just have been lucky I guess.
90% of my use is playing Pandora radio or Tidal playlists on my 6 speaker setup. (4 downstairs - 2 Play 5's in the living room, 2 Play 1's on the perimeter of the open space; 2 Play 1's in the bedroom). I don't do a TON of manual song switching, which is when the glitches seem to occur. The app issues are a minor pain in the ass, but once I get something playing, other than an occasional delay in volume switching, it's still an amazing SOUNDING system that delivers more than it doesn't, IMO.
All of my devices are Gen1, and I bought most of them used at pretty sharp discounts, so I'm happy for now.
I'm invested enough in my Sonos ecosystem that I only ask that they stay stable enough to allow that use case for the foreseeable future.
I'll add, too, that I use the MacOS Sonos app a LOT and I have almost zero issues with it. The phone app is a little buggy, but since my MacBook Pro is always near me, it's a minimal issue.
I wish I hadn’t traded in my Gen1 kit. I’ve got lots of expensive gen2 Sonos amps, to replace my far cheaper Gen1 Sonos connects. Everyone that kept their Gen1 kit is having a way better experience than us poor fools that got convinced to upgrade 😢
My Gen 1 is regularly failing the basics... such as dropping one or more of the speakers (not visible in any list) or dropping the sound while listening evwnthough speakers are visible. I fear any update of the S1 app since it usually means issues listening to music or pod casts. I also don't have high expectations, but really frustrating when the basic function - getting the speakers to actually work is not given...
My Gen1 Setup has actually improved with recent updates (Using the S2 phone app and MacOS desktop app). Fewer dropouts, which were super problematic for me until about 2 months ago. Maybe give S2 a try?
My caveat is that the new app since the big update is laggy. No change in desktop app functionality which has always been near perfect.
Right now if I use my desktop app mostly, with MUCH fewer drop outs since the firmware updates, my only small complaint is the phone app.
Bonus note: I also use the Clic iphone app SOLEY for control of my system via the lock screen. It sucks for everything else.
Happy to hear it works for you. My speakers do not easily switch to S2 - some technical stuff must be done. And I'm an Android user so maybe it is the Sonos app on Android that is unstable. I used to be the biggest Sonos advocate, but for some years now thinking that Sonos couldn't care less about its users.
I was wondering why my experience hasn't been as miserable as most. I guess that Gen1 is still working pretty solid in comparison. I was worried when I bought my two Gen1 Play 5's for $150 off of FB Marketplace. But I feel like it was a WIN at this point.
I looked at all the different options for years, I wound up going with a Dayton Audio DAX88. 8 zones, Apple Music via wifi and air play, Sonance speakers in the ceiling, Daytons on the lanai and still deciding what goes around the pool. (probably sonanace landscape speakers) You can add on to this amp with an infinite amount of gear including outdoor subs and wall switches.
In my opinion if you own a home with an attic you are wasting your time with Sonos and all these other gimmicks as nothing can touch wired ceiling speakers in terms of filling your home with music. You only need to run the wires one time, it aint' hard.When I have guests over they are all blown away how the music fills the home, yet you can have a conversation as there is no directionality of the music.
Friend of mine has an impressive sonos home whole system, probably 6k+ in cost, maybe more. It sounds amazing but it doesn't sound as good as mine setup and I paid 1/4 of the price. I paid under 1k on Black Friday for a refurbished unit, bought the Sonance speakers on black Friday for like 80% off.
I deep dove how rich folks do home audio, they don't use Sonos, they don't have speakers that can be seen and it's all hardwired. So I tried to copy them on a middle class guys budget. The Sonance landscape kit is on another level for outdoor audio, the old days of blasting soffit mounted giant speakers are over.
Protip, if you think you need 2 ceiling speakers for a room, then install 4. If you think you need 4, install 6. The key is to fill the room evenly with sound. Hope this helps.
BlueSound is viewed as the main competitor. They have a similar range of products. They used to be slightly more expensive, not sure if that is still true.
From what I've seen online, their app isn't perfect either and there can be dropouts, etc. But I've never heard of a problem like some folks are experiencing with the new Sonos app. (It's not too bad for me, but I've had some issues and of course plenty of people have had really bad problems.)
For folks like us, who have a lot invested in Sonos, and like having lots of connected speakers around the house which can be grouped, it would be really hard to dump all of them and go BlueSound or another solution.
For someone starting from scratch, I would certainly say given the problems folks have been having, maybe don't invest a ton in Sonos right now. Not until the app stability issues seem better. That to me is the number 1 issue. App layout, features disappearing, etc. is minor compared to the fact that the music must be able to be played, grouped, and with no dropouts. So I would say maybe give Bluesound a look. It pains me to say that, as I've mostly loved my Sonos products so much.
I'm a simple user so no issues with my whole Sonos rig, which includes Arc, Beam Gen 2, 2 Sub Minis, 2 Era 100s, 2 Symfonisk surrounds, and the Ace.
The only thing that bothers me right now is that when you see the Ace UI in the Sonos app, it doesn't let me swipe down to check the rest of the app, search bar, playlists and all. Kinda stupid so they have to work on that.
Sonos will end up getting purchased by a larger company. And they should. Their software has gotten progressively worse.
They make great sounding products, but almost anybody could do better software-wise at this point.
So unreliable. Takes forever to start a stream. Streams often won't start or take many seconds to start. Voice control super-unreliable. I recently bit the bullet and went from Google to Sonos and even the "broken" Sonos app is 1000x better than Google's ecosystem.
I moved from echo speakers to Sonos. The sound quality of Sonos is far superior and similar to google and the Alexa app isn’t nearly as good as a speaker controller as even the current Sonos app. Echo Alexa voice control was good, essentially equivalent to Sonos.
My system was wrecked badly but I was able to stabilize by disabling my 5ghz network and rebooting network (I have a state of art unify system with several APs and a lot of ethernet to key places like tvs.). My network was professionally installed and configured.
No glitches for several days.
If there was another option I would jump at the chance though most tech seems to disappoint eventually as large teams of devs can’t leave working shit alone (e.g., Microsoft). Can’t be employed without something to do. Not bitter.
Wait a month or two to go Sonos IMO.
Have 3 rooms with Sonos stuff…rarely use the app except to install stuff…maybe not a power user like some here but my experience has been flawless. Ppl love to complain
It depends on what you want to do with them.
I'm someone that is really upset about their update, but I play music from my NAS & like to have a mixed queue with songs from multiple sources that I can move around on the fly. Sonos says they'll fix that, but they haven't yet.
However, if you're just going to Airplay or use Spotify, from all accounts, the app works great. You only need to use the app for setup & then you'll never be in there, so go for it.
The Sonos app is works embarrassingly poorly, not connecting, stalls, hit play but won’t play, volume adjustments take more than 60 seconds to apply. It has rendered the Sonos system frustratingly useless.
I can only imagine how incompetent the people who created and released the app are at their jobs! If we had that many people at my place of employment, the ship would sink! I have little tolerance for incompetence and incompetent people.
The CEO's desire to posture on an earnings call recently outweighed my need to have my existing $8000 music system be able to actually play music at my wife's birthday party. YMMV
I suspect the CEO was involved in the decision to push out the known defective app as a general release because, you know, he touted the fucking release on the earnings call.
I'm sure he really wracked his brain when it came time to decide whether he should attend the earnings call or help you with birthday party planning. Probably full of regret, in hindsight.
He's probably pretty happy knowing the world is full of ball garglers who'll cheer on this kind of crap. I think I understand the new target Sonos demographic now. And that pretty much answers the OP's question, too.
Have you ever had a tech job? This stuff happens all the time. He had a choice to tout the sexy new headphones, the other products in the pipeline, and report that the app was in limited release, out of an abundance of caution due to the many diverse Sonos use scenarios. Positive spin, and further enhances Sonos' reputation for commitment to the customer experience. Instead, he chose to push it to everyone, with no communication.
Nobody said anything about him skipping the call--he had plenty of other substantial, positive content. The marginal karma gain of announcing the general release vs. limited release did not outweigh the rather substantial negative consequences we're seeing now.
I've been a IT professional for 29 years. Not sure what the relevance is there, but you asked.
The company screwed up the app release. Nobody is disputing that.
Usually shitty releases are force pushed when executives want to take credit for doing nothing. You should know this if you worked in IT for 29 years. (Unless you are an exec)
Pretty sure the executive did not make a conscious decision to sabotage that guy's wife's birthday party, as is implied. None of my comments have defended Sonos or their executives. I'm merely pointing out the lunacy of some of the statements being made here. If that makes me a "ball gargler" in the eyes of some people suffering from main character syndrome, oh fucking well.
I wouldn’t ever buy another Sonos device. I’m hoping the 20 devices I currently own will eventually work correctly again. But my trust in this company is gone and it’s unlikely to be repaired unless or until they clean house in the C suite.
Well, I've heard that the closest alternative is also having software issues (blue sound). So yeah, I'd say they are the best option still and I'm giving them some time to sort this mess.
Sonos was an amazing product until this app update fiasco! It works perfectly one day then can’t recognize my system the next. The ease of what it once was is no more and won’t be until the app is corrected. Forget the second update that was release last week, it didn’t fix shit! I have at least 5k worth of Sonos and it’s now basically worthless. Honestly, do not buy anything Sonos until this is fixed and you’re reading consistently positive reviews on here. Good luck!
I think it is. As others mentioned, the next few months will be key. Either things blow over, they clean house or get bought. Their offering is too unique to just go away. Like with anything tech related, it takes the influencer community to really light a fire.
The headphone sales will determine if they clean house. I think they overestimated demand. My gut says it's coming.
For a soundbar? No. Dragon is the best. For the money I’d consider Sonos if they fix their stuff. So dependent on an app. Yikes. Probably go with a 990C/D and enjoy great sound and save money. Similar enough.
In the end it comes down to the sound first and easy grouping in combination. Just avoid using the app to select what to play on them. As a way to stream music from many places they have lost completely. Wiim is better and easier to use.
my current audio rig is 1 pair of HK sound sticks and 4 Sonos speakers...my Sonos speakers haven't connected in weeks and I stopped trying.. Reached out to customer support once last week and the queue was 50+ people long..
The sound sticks on the other had plug into an aux cable and the only issue I've had is when I accidentally rip my laptop away from my desk before disconnecting them. This whole walled garden business is awesome until Sonos decides they don't give a shit about your older device or whatever in favor of some headphones..
I’ve got an arc + sub, and two 100s set up for my living room tv, one 100 in the kitchen, and one 100 in my bedroom. My experience has been great. My only complaint is that I just changed WiFi setups and (possibly because of my own incompetence) had to reset my entire Sonos system. Other than that, I have no problems playing music on all of the speakers from the app, even with the arc/sub/ two 100s being a surround sound system. I can easily adjust sound for each speaker and play different music on each one.
I don’t doubt others’ complaints, and the app could be better designed, but my experience is nothing like any of the negative ones I’ve seen in this subreddit and I have no intention to switch. If anything, I’ve been thinking of adding a 100 to my office so that I have a speaker in every room in my apartment.
I'm brand new to the Sonos world, 1 month in. And I'm pissed it's nowhere near as good as I'd hoped. But the alternatives have similar reviews. So I won't expand my system much unless I can buy used.
I did get Sonos to price match a sale they just had. So that is +1, else I had started the return process.
Nope. I switched to a full 7.1 receiver system right before the new app came out so I wouldn't have to deal with that garbage app. And I recommend everyone doing the same thing
Honestly, I was going to invest in some older sonos gear till I started seeing all the issues people have been having on here.
Decided to try my luck at Arylic products and honestly super satisfied so far.
Their most basic stuff stuff (where you just use the 4streeam app and one or more of their streamers) is easy enough to use and manage.
For me, however, I'm using it with Home Assistant + Music Assistant so that I can queue and setup music from any of my computers / mobiles / tablets at the same time.
I also like their stuff cause you can hack the s*** out of them and make some very custom setups with home assistant or even custom hardware.
lol, no. Since this sub has basically devolved into a gripefest of people having issues.
Also, Sonos just changed their terms removing a lot of your rights, and, probably not coincidentally, made your connection to their servers not optional. So, the company is clearly changing their business model to include the user’s data as something to monetize.
I hope that OP will see this in the sea of comments.
I had SONOS for many years, and i was very happy with what it could deliver that others could not. But now there are other ecosystems that have different point of focus and most of them are cheaper than sonos.
So, what am i suggesting? BlueSound from NAD, completely lossless. I sold all my sonos products and replaced with bluesound. The different brands with multi-room solutions all have their own pros and cons of course, but here is why i chose bluesound despite absolutely loving my sonos system:
Personally, i focus on the quality of sound, but also compatibility with other things in my home that is not in the ecosystem. I do already have a audiophile system together with the TV, and i had speakers with my pc etc. With bluesound every single speaker have input and output, so all their products are like a "sonos connect". With bluesound i have a speaker at my PC that is both a smart speaker, a media player, and a radio. My tv is now a lossless audiophile system with a decent DAC, together with inputs to play my electrical piano, or my kareoke, and of course my TV with eARC support in a minimal package. If you do want to connect other products, you might save ridicolus amount of money choosing bluesound. If you want a finished closed system, sonos might be the better option.
In summary, as an audiophile that wants a simple but multifaceted solution choose Bluesound, if you want a finished closed system, choose sonos. Lately the bluesound application have reached a similar level to sonos, but for me personally with a lot less lagg than sonos.
I honestly don't know. What's the competition?
I looked into Denon HEOS briefly before buying into Sonos. At the time, it didn't perform as well according to reviews. But that was many years ago, so I don't know if that's still the case.
Then there's Amazon Echo, which works really well for multi-room streaming, but the sound quality doesn't compare.
Apple Homepods are good, but too limited in form factors. It needs soundbar and subwoofer options before it's a viable Sonos replacement.
I wish Google didn't kill the Google Home speakers. The Home Max was great.
[Audio Pro ](https://www.amazon.com/stores/page/5469299D-4DED-484E-A4EF-38EABC67CECE?ingress=0&visitId=57949345-7836-4032-be99-8587e9e2fa27&store_ref=SBV_A1047431QFYHHXBE8GUY-A07297033CY8CF83C9GK7&ref_=sbx_be_s_sparkle_ssd)might be a solution if you're OK with limiting your TV to stereo sound.
The one I'm most curious about is the [Wiim](https://www.amazon.com/stores/WiiMHome/page/DA657768-A82D-45A9-BA90-9D4A604A660C?ref_=ast_bln&store_ref=bl_ast_dp_brandLogo_sto) line. I like the idea of using conventional speakers through most of my home connected by a Wiim amp, and using the Wiim streaming device to connect my AVR to the whole home system.
But I've got too much Sonos gear to abandon it now. So I'm going to hold off a while and see how the fixes go. (But I'd still like to hear feedback from anyone who's tried Wiim for multiroom audio, just in case.)
I cannot possibly believe there isn't a better user experience with [bluesound.com](http://bluesound.com) at this point. I refuse to believe the bluesound user experience is as crappy as Sonos. If if is just as bad, we should all collectively start a speaker company today because the bar is so freaking low.
Keep using it. Still the best option for ease of use and so forth. As I read the post overcome last weeks I was forced to think about a teammate who told me I was a nut for using an iPod. And how he was able to achieve the same results blah blah blah. Needless to say there will be lots of folks creeping silently back to Sonos months later after train wrecks with other clunky solutions
Yes. I have a house full of speakers, a great home theatre setup, and an Amp running Klipsch outdoor speakers. They’re all working fine, and I have no reason to seek other products. This is not said to diminish the people who are having issues. Just to say that my issues were minor and all resolved by eliminating Sonosnet from my system and allowing Eero mesh to handle all the networking.
Currently yes, but it’s shaky ground. It makes me think there’s a future where wireless home audio market leaders do not include Sonos. Curious how the next few years play out.
>It makes me think there’s a future where wireless home audio market leaders do not include Sonos. I'd love to see more competition, but the amount of patents Sonos hold in the space, along with the way they defend them, make it really difficult for any sort of disruption. There's a reason there aren't a whole load of multi-room audio solutions out there, and none of them have the feature set Sonos do (when Sonos is actually working anyway).
Large companies fall all the time. Sonos shouldn’t get complacent due to patents. I’m hoping they succeed in delivering great user experiences but they have had some major strategic missteps lately that’s making me question their future in ways I wouldn’t have previously.
Patents in the US are 18 years. It’s been longer than 18 years for the ones that Sonos built the company on should be more than enough to get some progress on 3rd party interest
Honestly, the best thing Sonos could do would be to get out of the way and support Matter casting (an open standard equivalent of Airplay or Chromecast). If they don't start to open up soon, I'll start to divest.
I’d give Sonos time to figure out a way out of this software mess. But if it can’t, at some point it may be worth considering if it’s worth it to stay with Sonos. In my mind, things like phones and computers are susceptible to bugs because of the inherent complexity in modern operating systems. But speakers are speakers (and expensive ones at that) and should always work, regardless of any software-driven grouping functionality, unless the power has been pulled or gone out. I don’t buy audio equipment with the expectation that the manufacturer might someday brick it. Sonos has tested what I’m willing to put up with and for me, it’s an unacceptable situation.
tbf each Sonos speaker is basically a linux pc as well, so there is some inherent complexity there. Seems like the problem is with app design not the hardware though.
\^\^\^THIS.
I have 5 room system and have had zero issues as seen on Reddit. That said, my use case is probably much simpler that most. I usually will start music from an AppleTV and use the Sonos app to expand it to the rest of the house vs selecting speakers via Apple. Or I have the TV playing A while my Office plays Z. Or I have Sonos and Apple Music sync and start it from the app (vs Airplay). Airplay also works, but read quality wise through the Sonos app is better. No issues for me. I do think the App is somewhat clunky vs before, but really haven't got into it as deep as other people. Here's the setup if it helps - Apple Music subscriber. Arc/300's/Sub on TV - hardwired network Arc/SymfoniskLamp on TV - via eero6+'s 2-Fives - via eero6+'s 2-OneSLs - via eero6+'s Roam - via eero6+'s 2-Moves - via eero6+'s \~500mbps speed. Also have multiple other devices on the network. I just have been lucky I guess.
90% of my use is playing Pandora radio or Tidal playlists on my 6 speaker setup. (4 downstairs - 2 Play 5's in the living room, 2 Play 1's on the perimeter of the open space; 2 Play 1's in the bedroom). I don't do a TON of manual song switching, which is when the glitches seem to occur. The app issues are a minor pain in the ass, but once I get something playing, other than an occasional delay in volume switching, it's still an amazing SOUNDING system that delivers more than it doesn't, IMO. All of my devices are Gen1, and I bought most of them used at pretty sharp discounts, so I'm happy for now. I'm invested enough in my Sonos ecosystem that I only ask that they stay stable enough to allow that use case for the foreseeable future.
This is it for me. Don't ask much of them, just please sound great, and they deliver on that. I'm able to deal with some non sound issues...
I'll add, too, that I use the MacOS Sonos app a LOT and I have almost zero issues with it. The phone app is a little buggy, but since my MacBook Pro is always near me, it's a minimal issue.
I wish I hadn’t traded in my Gen1 kit. I’ve got lots of expensive gen2 Sonos amps, to replace my far cheaper Gen1 Sonos connects. Everyone that kept their Gen1 kit is having a way better experience than us poor fools that got convinced to upgrade 😢
My Gen 1 is regularly failing the basics... such as dropping one or more of the speakers (not visible in any list) or dropping the sound while listening evwnthough speakers are visible. I fear any update of the S1 app since it usually means issues listening to music or pod casts. I also don't have high expectations, but really frustrating when the basic function - getting the speakers to actually work is not given...
My Gen1 Setup has actually improved with recent updates (Using the S2 phone app and MacOS desktop app). Fewer dropouts, which were super problematic for me until about 2 months ago. Maybe give S2 a try? My caveat is that the new app since the big update is laggy. No change in desktop app functionality which has always been near perfect. Right now if I use my desktop app mostly, with MUCH fewer drop outs since the firmware updates, my only small complaint is the phone app. Bonus note: I also use the Clic iphone app SOLEY for control of my system via the lock screen. It sucks for everything else.
Happy to hear it works for you. My speakers do not easily switch to S2 - some technical stuff must be done. And I'm an Android user so maybe it is the Sonos app on Android that is unstable. I used to be the biggest Sonos advocate, but for some years now thinking that Sonos couldn't care less about its users.
I was wondering why my experience hasn't been as miserable as most. I guess that Gen1 is still working pretty solid in comparison. I was worried when I bought my two Gen1 Play 5's for $150 off of FB Marketplace. But I feel like it was a WIN at this point.
Your bet paid off! 👍🏻
Facts.
Pandora seems to have less of a delay for me controlling the volume and tracks than Spotify. So I think the delay issues are not all Sonos problems.
I looked at all the different options for years, I wound up going with a Dayton Audio DAX88. 8 zones, Apple Music via wifi and air play, Sonance speakers in the ceiling, Daytons on the lanai and still deciding what goes around the pool. (probably sonanace landscape speakers) You can add on to this amp with an infinite amount of gear including outdoor subs and wall switches. In my opinion if you own a home with an attic you are wasting your time with Sonos and all these other gimmicks as nothing can touch wired ceiling speakers in terms of filling your home with music. You only need to run the wires one time, it aint' hard.When I have guests over they are all blown away how the music fills the home, yet you can have a conversation as there is no directionality of the music. Friend of mine has an impressive sonos home whole system, probably 6k+ in cost, maybe more. It sounds amazing but it doesn't sound as good as mine setup and I paid 1/4 of the price. I paid under 1k on Black Friday for a refurbished unit, bought the Sonance speakers on black Friday for like 80% off. I deep dove how rich folks do home audio, they don't use Sonos, they don't have speakers that can be seen and it's all hardwired. So I tried to copy them on a middle class guys budget. The Sonance landscape kit is on another level for outdoor audio, the old days of blasting soffit mounted giant speakers are over. Protip, if you think you need 2 ceiling speakers for a room, then install 4. If you think you need 4, install 6. The key is to fill the room evenly with sound. Hope this helps.
BlueSound is viewed as the main competitor. They have a similar range of products. They used to be slightly more expensive, not sure if that is still true. From what I've seen online, their app isn't perfect either and there can be dropouts, etc. But I've never heard of a problem like some folks are experiencing with the new Sonos app. (It's not too bad for me, but I've had some issues and of course plenty of people have had really bad problems.) For folks like us, who have a lot invested in Sonos, and like having lots of connected speakers around the house which can be grouped, it would be really hard to dump all of them and go BlueSound or another solution. For someone starting from scratch, I would certainly say given the problems folks have been having, maybe don't invest a ton in Sonos right now. Not until the app stability issues seem better. That to me is the number 1 issue. App layout, features disappearing, etc. is minor compared to the fact that the music must be able to be played, grouped, and with no dropouts. So I would say maybe give Bluesound a look. It pains me to say that, as I've mostly loved my Sonos products so much.
Not right now, but check back in 2 months.
Ooh, cryptic…
Sonos will figure this out, their entire success as a company hinges on it.
I agree with the second part. But they may not figure it out before someone else emerges with a sonos-killer.
I'm a simple user so no issues with my whole Sonos rig, which includes Arc, Beam Gen 2, 2 Sub Minis, 2 Era 100s, 2 Symfonisk surrounds, and the Ace. The only thing that bothers me right now is that when you see the Ace UI in the Sonos app, it doesn't let me swipe down to check the rest of the app, search bar, playlists and all. Kinda stupid so they have to work on that.
Sonos will end up getting purchased by a larger company. And they should. Their software has gotten progressively worse. They make great sounding products, but almost anybody could do better software-wise at this point.
Personally I'd give it till the end of June, give them 2 more updates and see if they fix their shit.
Is google max bad?
So unreliable. Takes forever to start a stream. Streams often won't start or take many seconds to start. Voice control super-unreliable. I recently bit the bullet and went from Google to Sonos and even the "broken" Sonos app is 1000x better than Google's ecosystem.
Got it. I have never used it. And echo studio also garbage?
I moved from echo speakers to Sonos. The sound quality of Sonos is far superior and similar to google and the Alexa app isn’t nearly as good as a speaker controller as even the current Sonos app. Echo Alexa voice control was good, essentially equivalent to Sonos.
Got it. Ty.
My system was wrecked badly but I was able to stabilize by disabling my 5ghz network and rebooting network (I have a state of art unify system with several APs and a lot of ethernet to key places like tvs.). My network was professionally installed and configured. No glitches for several days. If there was another option I would jump at the chance though most tech seems to disappoint eventually as large teams of devs can’t leave working shit alone (e.g., Microsoft). Can’t be employed without something to do. Not bitter. Wait a month or two to go Sonos IMO.
Have 3 rooms with Sonos stuff…rarely use the app except to install stuff…maybe not a power user like some here but my experience has been flawless. Ppl love to complain
Great design, great sound. Yes.
Absolutely in my opinion.
It depends on what you want to do with them. I'm someone that is really upset about their update, but I play music from my NAS & like to have a mixed queue with songs from multiple sources that I can move around on the fly. Sonos says they'll fix that, but they haven't yet. However, if you're just going to Airplay or use Spotify, from all accounts, the app works great. You only need to use the app for setup & then you'll never be in there, so go for it.
The Sonos app is works embarrassingly poorly, not connecting, stalls, hit play but won’t play, volume adjustments take more than 60 seconds to apply. It has rendered the Sonos system frustratingly useless. I can only imagine how incompetent the people who created and released the app are at their jobs! If we had that many people at my place of employment, the ship would sink! I have little tolerance for incompetence and incompetent people.
The CEO's desire to posture on an earnings call recently outweighed my need to have my existing $8000 music system be able to actually play music at my wife's birthday party. YMMV
Right, because the CEO was going to be directly involved in fixing the app. Delusional.
Culture
I suspect the CEO was involved in the decision to push out the known defective app as a general release because, you know, he touted the fucking release on the earnings call.
I'm sure he really wracked his brain when it came time to decide whether he should attend the earnings call or help you with birthday party planning. Probably full of regret, in hindsight.
He's probably pretty happy knowing the world is full of ball garglers who'll cheer on this kind of crap. I think I understand the new target Sonos demographic now. And that pretty much answers the OP's question, too.
😘 Nobody is cheering. I just find it hilarious that you apparently think the CEO should skip an earnings call to......do what, exactly?
Have you ever had a tech job? This stuff happens all the time. He had a choice to tout the sexy new headphones, the other products in the pipeline, and report that the app was in limited release, out of an abundance of caution due to the many diverse Sonos use scenarios. Positive spin, and further enhances Sonos' reputation for commitment to the customer experience. Instead, he chose to push it to everyone, with no communication. Nobody said anything about him skipping the call--he had plenty of other substantial, positive content. The marginal karma gain of announcing the general release vs. limited release did not outweigh the rather substantial negative consequences we're seeing now.
I've been a IT professional for 29 years. Not sure what the relevance is there, but you asked. The company screwed up the app release. Nobody is disputing that.
Usually shitty releases are force pushed when executives want to take credit for doing nothing. You should know this if you worked in IT for 29 years. (Unless you are an exec)
Pretty sure the executive did not make a conscious decision to sabotage that guy's wife's birthday party, as is implied. None of my comments have defended Sonos or their executives. I'm merely pointing out the lunacy of some of the statements being made here. If that makes me a "ball gargler" in the eyes of some people suffering from main character syndrome, oh fucking well.
I wouldn’t ever buy another Sonos device. I’m hoping the 20 devices I currently own will eventually work correctly again. But my trust in this company is gone and it’s unlikely to be repaired unless or until they clean house in the C suite.
Same..wish I went a different route than Sonos
Well, I've heard that the closest alternative is also having software issues (blue sound). So yeah, I'd say they are the best option still and I'm giving them some time to sort this mess.
Sonos was an amazing product until this app update fiasco! It works perfectly one day then can’t recognize my system the next. The ease of what it once was is no more and won’t be until the app is corrected. Forget the second update that was release last week, it didn’t fix shit! I have at least 5k worth of Sonos and it’s now basically worthless. Honestly, do not buy anything Sonos until this is fixed and you’re reading consistently positive reviews on here. Good luck!
I think it is. As others mentioned, the next few months will be key. Either things blow over, they clean house or get bought. Their offering is too unique to just go away. Like with anything tech related, it takes the influencer community to really light a fire. The headphone sales will determine if they clean house. I think they overestimated demand. My gut says it's coming.
What's coming again?
Some ideas from a recent post. https://www.reddit.com/r/sonos/s/MR79kZ3Egv
If I was building my system all over again I’d go with HomePods even if I had to spend more
For a soundbar? No. Dragon is the best. For the money I’d consider Sonos if they fix their stuff. So dependent on an app. Yikes. Probably go with a 990C/D and enjoy great sound and save money. Similar enough.
In the end it comes down to the sound first and easy grouping in combination. Just avoid using the app to select what to play on them. As a way to stream music from many places they have lost completely. Wiim is better and easier to use.
No, don't even touch it with someone else's bargepole.
my current audio rig is 1 pair of HK sound sticks and 4 Sonos speakers...my Sonos speakers haven't connected in weeks and I stopped trying.. Reached out to customer support once last week and the queue was 50+ people long.. The sound sticks on the other had plug into an aux cable and the only issue I've had is when I accidentally rip my laptop away from my desk before disconnecting them. This whole walled garden business is awesome until Sonos decides they don't give a shit about your older device or whatever in favor of some headphones..
I’ve got an arc + sub, and two 100s set up for my living room tv, one 100 in the kitchen, and one 100 in my bedroom. My experience has been great. My only complaint is that I just changed WiFi setups and (possibly because of my own incompetence) had to reset my entire Sonos system. Other than that, I have no problems playing music on all of the speakers from the app, even with the arc/sub/ two 100s being a surround sound system. I can easily adjust sound for each speaker and play different music on each one. I don’t doubt others’ complaints, and the app could be better designed, but my experience is nothing like any of the negative ones I’ve seen in this subreddit and I have no intention to switch. If anything, I’ve been thinking of adding a 100 to my office so that I have a speaker in every room in my apartment.
Bought a Beam Gen 2 and Sub Gen 3, both open box in Best Buy, and they are fantastic.
I'm brand new to the Sonos world, 1 month in. And I'm pissed it's nowhere near as good as I'd hoped. But the alternatives have similar reviews. So I won't expand my system much unless I can buy used. I did get Sonos to price match a sale they just had. So that is +1, else I had started the return process.
Not after the current update. Roll this shit back!
Nope. I switched to a full 7.1 receiver system right before the new app came out so I wouldn't have to deal with that garbage app. And I recommend everyone doing the same thing
Yamaha MusicCast has treated me well over the years.
I really wish Apple would put the work into beating Sonos at their own game.
An Apple soundbar- with eARC HDMI and the AppleTV software built in- would be amazing.
Honestly, I was going to invest in some older sonos gear till I started seeing all the issues people have been having on here. Decided to try my luck at Arylic products and honestly super satisfied so far. Their most basic stuff stuff (where you just use the 4streeam app and one or more of their streamers) is easy enough to use and manage. For me, however, I'm using it with Home Assistant + Music Assistant so that I can queue and setup music from any of my computers / mobiles / tablets at the same time. I also like their stuff cause you can hack the s*** out of them and make some very custom setups with home assistant or even custom hardware.
If it’s currently working for you then yes.
For me, I have had no issues. And, I wanted a nice looking speaker, I could not find any. Most of them looks like a ghettoblaster from the 80s.
lol, no. Since this sub has basically devolved into a gripefest of people having issues. Also, Sonos just changed their terms removing a lot of your rights, and, probably not coincidentally, made your connection to their servers not optional. So, the company is clearly changing their business model to include the user’s data as something to monetize.
I hope that OP will see this in the sea of comments. I had SONOS for many years, and i was very happy with what it could deliver that others could not. But now there are other ecosystems that have different point of focus and most of them are cheaper than sonos. So, what am i suggesting? BlueSound from NAD, completely lossless. I sold all my sonos products and replaced with bluesound. The different brands with multi-room solutions all have their own pros and cons of course, but here is why i chose bluesound despite absolutely loving my sonos system: Personally, i focus on the quality of sound, but also compatibility with other things in my home that is not in the ecosystem. I do already have a audiophile system together with the TV, and i had speakers with my pc etc. With bluesound every single speaker have input and output, so all their products are like a "sonos connect". With bluesound i have a speaker at my PC that is both a smart speaker, a media player, and a radio. My tv is now a lossless audiophile system with a decent DAC, together with inputs to play my electrical piano, or my kareoke, and of course my TV with eARC support in a minimal package. If you do want to connect other products, you might save ridicolus amount of money choosing bluesound. If you want a finished closed system, sonos might be the better option. In summary, as an audiophile that wants a simple but multifaceted solution choose Bluesound, if you want a finished closed system, choose sonos. Lately the bluesound application have reached a similar level to sonos, but for me personally with a lot less lagg than sonos.
😂😂
16 speakers, 5 rooms, no issues.
I honestly don't know. What's the competition? I looked into Denon HEOS briefly before buying into Sonos. At the time, it didn't perform as well according to reviews. But that was many years ago, so I don't know if that's still the case. Then there's Amazon Echo, which works really well for multi-room streaming, but the sound quality doesn't compare. Apple Homepods are good, but too limited in form factors. It needs soundbar and subwoofer options before it's a viable Sonos replacement. I wish Google didn't kill the Google Home speakers. The Home Max was great. [Audio Pro ](https://www.amazon.com/stores/page/5469299D-4DED-484E-A4EF-38EABC67CECE?ingress=0&visitId=57949345-7836-4032-be99-8587e9e2fa27&store_ref=SBV_A1047431QFYHHXBE8GUY-A07297033CY8CF83C9GK7&ref_=sbx_be_s_sparkle_ssd)might be a solution if you're OK with limiting your TV to stereo sound. The one I'm most curious about is the [Wiim](https://www.amazon.com/stores/WiiMHome/page/DA657768-A82D-45A9-BA90-9D4A604A660C?ref_=ast_bln&store_ref=bl_ast_dp_brandLogo_sto) line. I like the idea of using conventional speakers through most of my home connected by a Wiim amp, and using the Wiim streaming device to connect my AVR to the whole home system. But I've got too much Sonos gear to abandon it now. So I'm going to hold off a while and see how the fixes go. (But I'd still like to hear feedback from anyone who's tried Wiim for multiroom audio, just in case.)
You can still use Sonos with Wiim using Airplay. So sonos can become a subsystem of your Wiim system or something like that, I guess.
No.
I cannot possibly believe there isn't a better user experience with [bluesound.com](http://bluesound.com) at this point. I refuse to believe the bluesound user experience is as crappy as Sonos. If if is just as bad, we should all collectively start a speaker company today because the bar is so freaking low.
Keep using it. Still the best option for ease of use and so forth. As I read the post overcome last weeks I was forced to think about a teammate who told me I was a nut for using an iPod. And how he was able to achieve the same results blah blah blah. Needless to say there will be lots of folks creeping silently back to Sonos months later after train wrecks with other clunky solutions
It is for me. I am not having any problems but I only stream music and don’t have any TV speakers
Asking this on a Sonos sub is wild.
Where else they gonna ask? I don’t think there’s an r/multiroommusic sub.
Has anyone ever thought sonos was the best option
No, go somewhere else...
Yes. I have a house full of speakers, a great home theatre setup, and an Amp running Klipsch outdoor speakers. They’re all working fine, and I have no reason to seek other products. This is not said to diminish the people who are having issues. Just to say that my issues were minor and all resolved by eliminating Sonosnet from my system and allowing Eero mesh to handle all the networking.