Sonos User Reviews

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App ruined the company

If I could give this zero stars, I would. I’ve had Sonos hardware since their early days — the ease of use between the app, setting up the network, and the integration between products used to be flawless. But that is no more—for over a year since their S2 app update Sonos has lost its way. Basic functionality is extremely unstable, to the effect that I consider the majority of the speakers I have unusable, or at best extremely unreliable. I’m not even concerned about “nice to have” features; I’ve resigned to simply hoping that some fraction of the speakers are online each day, and if they are not, then ots a matter of hoping they factory reset and are identified again by the app. There is no clear rhyme or reason to this behavior – I have multiple generations of multiple products and they will non-deterministically fall off the network. To make matters worse, it seems that every release or update of the app has somehow degraded the functionality. This week I’ve lost about 75% of the speakers and see no apparent path to getting them back. I have a strong home network with very little attenuation and pucks just about everywhere. I wish anyone the best of luck who decides to go down the journey of using Sonos because it’s led to unbelievable amount of frustration time and energy without improvement.
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Original was awesome - this is terrible.

The original Sonos app was amazing - easy and natural navigation, clear and logical to operate. This new version is driving me absolutely crazy. Compared to the previous app (S1) the audio controls lack logic, the steps to control multiple speakers is no longer intuitive and the whole thing has taken a huge step backwards. What’s amazing to me is how much the app ‘defined’ Sonos. The speakers are nothing without the app and this latest iteration is horrible. Sonos have recognised that this is a problem and promised to fix it but after many updates we are no closer. I am now upset that my extensive Sonos speaker investment is becoming ‘orphaned’ by this useless app and I’m going to have to change everything. Fix it Sonos, for the love of god.
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Unmitigated disaster of an app

I was once a really happy Sonos customer having bought 6 portable speakers and installed an arc on my AV system. The app had some issues but was generally stable and offered a great UX - my technophobic family had no issues playing music using it in any room. Then you changed to the brand new app for some reason that will only be known to some mad person on your product team that hopefully has emigrated to Mars. The UX of the new app is a hopeless mish mash of cool looking design elements that takes no account of how people actually use the system. That is when it works. The bugs are so innumerable I am not sure I will live long enough to list them all. I have reset my system 3 times and even that is an exercise in torture as it is a lottery whether the app will recognise any of the reset speakers. That and the innumerable times the speakers that have been added appear and disappear, the volume controls that sometimes disappear, the error messages saying the app can’t connect to one of the speakers but is fine with the others, the lags in the interface updating. I am sick of it. I think the best use for them will be to use them as speaker stands for some Apple HomePods - a device where the app works really well and is a breeze to use. Never again.
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GO WITH DENON INSTEAD: Every SONOS update/patch makes it worse

SONOS execs should be ashamed of the great reputation they’ve ruined; their entire, clueless C-suite should be exited, immediately. Considering the increasing issues with each update/patch, SONOS should be offering their products at 1/4 of the price. No joke, every time the devs TOUCH the app, 0 improvements are made, and more issues are created. This app is nearly, if not already unusable. Amazon/Google/Apple products work better than these “premium” products. Sound quality doesn’t matter if the products don’t work at all. Shameful on SONOS. I’ve recommended these products in the past to others and purchased MANY of their products myself for more than a decade. Denon HEOS is my new recommendation and what I’m replacing my SONOS gear with. SONOS have transformed from a company focused on quality and good sound whilst incorporating flexibility with music services, to making SONOS headphones (too little too late, Bose makes a better set) and SONOS radio; need I say more? Instead of making great PRODUCTS, they’re out to make great PROFITS. WHICH YOU AND I PAY FOR. CANCEL SONOS (the company, etc.) AND GO TO DENON. Stop buying their [SONOS] products and let’s see how quickly their moronic C-Suite changes their mind on direction once they have shareholders jumping down their throats. SONOS is a SCAM
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Hmmmmm

Sonos was my default choice for streaming and playing music for decades. I loved the sound quality and enjoyed using it. Although IMHO the Sonos app was never a delightful part of the system to use -but at least it worked. Until …………… the maddest update in digital history was issued and the App was totally, utterly ruined. Functionality was destroyed and my Sonos system (and presumably many others) became impossible to use for quite a while. Que a number of desperate attempts by Sonos to dig themselves out of the hole they had dug but I found it impossible to sort it all out and gave up on Sonos for a while. However, eventually I tired of having a house full of speakers, ports, amps etc. that I couldn’t use and recently I spent almost a full day trying to make my system functional again: resetting, updating hardware and so on. Success. But as they say, trust walks into town slowly and gallops off on a fast horse - especially when something quite as dreadful as this update happens. I don’t recall ever having an experience like this with any other product that I’ve bought.
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App update has ruined the Sonos experience

I’ve got a Sonos system of 5 different speakers, and zones. I also vouched for the Sonos experience and had thousands of dollars worth of speakers installed at my work.
With the latest update it just doesn’t work properly anymore, speakers in different zones turn on and off randomly, and there’s terrible lags. It’s embarrassing. I want to ask for our money back!
I miss the design of the old app too. Will now look at third party apps and see if they’re any better.
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S.O.S - Sick Of Sonos

I am so fed up with going to my Sonos app to play music and getting the message “SOMETHING WENT WRONG” or having to continuously “REAUTHORISE APPLE MUSIC” or “UNINSTALL THE APP AND THEN REINSTALL” or “RESET YOUR MODEM/ROUTER/ENTIRE NETWORK/REBOOT YOUR BRAIN” or “ITS NOT OUR APP/EQUIPMENT - IT’S EVERYTHING ELSE YOU HAVE THAT’S CAUSING THE ISSUES”.

I am an EXTREMELY unhappy consumer of Sonos products - i have spent a large amount of my hard earned money on Sonos hardware and I am sick of having to spend A LOT of my valuable time “fixing” issues that only seem to occur on SONOS APP AND HARDWARE!!! I urge EVERYONE - do NOT spend your hard earned money on these products NOW OR IN THE FUTURE - spend your money on a product that takes the time and effort to TEST THEIR APP UPDATES PRIOR TO RELEASE - Sonos seem to think we all want to spend our time BETA TESTING for them!!! NO MORE from me - I AM SO FRUSTRATED WITH THEIR PRODUCTS AND APPS!! I just want to PLAY MY MUSIC on the sound system I HAVE PAID A LOT OF MONEY FOR WITHOUT THESE CONSTANT ISSUES - I hope YOU ALL see sense and find another option! I cannot do this anymore!!!! “S-O-S… SICK OF SONOS”!!!! TAKE A STAND PEOPLE - BUY SOMETHING ELSE THAT WORKS WITHOUT THESE CONSTANT ISSUES!!!! ZERO Star Rating if I could give it!! SONOS - Listen to your Customers - the people who give you your jobs and good salaries!! I AM NOT THE ONLY ONE!!!
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A Once Great Experience, Now Marred by Frustration

I've been a loyal Sonos user for quite some time, enjoying seamless integration and excellent sound quality—until the release of the S2 app many months ago. Since then, the experience has been a constant source of frustration.

The latest version of the S2 app is plagued with issues that show no signs of improvement. The most recent update has now logged me out of my Apple account, and no matter what I try—whether it’s reauthorising from different devices or reinstalling the app—Sonos refuses to accept my music subscription. This is not just a minor inconvenience; it's a complete disruption to my listening experience.

Sonos, why can’t you get this app working properly? Every update seems to break more than it fixes, and as a user, I’m left with an unusable system that should never have been released in this state. After six months of ongoing issues, I’ve lost confidence that Sonos will ever address these problems.

As we’re in the midst of a full house renovation, I’ve made the difficult decision to switch to the Heos system to stream music across the house's levels and each room. I never thought I’d be looking at alternatives, but Sonos's failings in recent months leave me with no other choice. I genuinely can’t recommend Sonos to anyone until these issues are resolved—if they ever are.
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Worst software, good hardware

I have invested a lot of money into the Sonos ecosystem. After upgrading from old obsolete hardware, I now have a collection that comprises an Arc, Sub, 2 current gen Play 5s, 2 Play 1s, 1 Play 3, and a current gen Port linking with cinema system. The hardware is very high quality and sounds great when it works. I recently hosted a party and tried to use the Sonos system for music. After numerous dropouts I was forced to abandon the entire system and use a different sound system. My Wifi is not to blame, I have high speed internet over fibre and a very good router. I also spend excessive time trying to link multiple zones together and control them. The current software/app is the worst I have ever used. I get the same feedback from ALL of my friends and family who use the same system. Once upon a time I would recommend to anyone that Sonos was the best option for home sound, but now I would tell EVERYONE to look somewhere else until SONOS can get things sorted out.
You only have to look at the other reviews to see that my opinion is reflected by many. If I wasn’t so heavily committed with my current hardware, I would be tempted to replace the whole system with another brand.
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Gone totally down hill over last 4 years

We have had a Sonos full system in our house for 10+ years - I wish we had never invested! The customer service always used to be amazing and is absolutely not fit for purpose now (so whenever there is an issue with a product, especially one in warranty, you get absolutely no where and it’s much easier to just buy a new one - ridiculous given the price point of the products). The new update of the app was an absolute shambles and totally consistent with the appalling drop in customer service! Sonos clearly doesn’t value its customers at all and has absolute incompetent people running the company (if there were any kind of quality checks in place the app would NEVER have launched let alone need a series of updates over the course of almost a year to just get it functioning as the old app used to! Absolute mess and embarrassment which CEO didn’t even acknowledge for months and only then did send an email out because of the positive press around CEO who literally emailed and took accountability within hours of a mess up!! We tell anyone who listens now - DONT BUY SONOS!! Which is an absolute shame as it used to be such an amazing company, with great innovative products and customer service that reflected all of that and its price point! As I said this isn’t just complaining because the app update was horrendous the company has been going drastically down hill for over 4+ years!
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