Sonos Admits Its Recent App Update Was a Huge Mistake

When setting up Mine Sonos home theater systemI’ve been having a persistent problem. I’ve been trying to add a Sonos wireless subwoofer to my network, but according to the Sonos mobile app, the Sub is nowhere to be found. The app will either give me a “Unable to connect” message or—even more bizarrely—show me that I’m trying to connect a gray box labeled “product” with a serial number that has nothing to do with anything.

“I think smart homes are supposed to make your life easier“My husband commented gently as he watched me factory reset the Sub several times, turn my phone on and off, turn Bluetooth on, switch phones, and finally bang my head against the wall and cry before calling Sonos tech support.

As we all know, I’m not the only one having problems with New Sonos App; the company rolled out a radical redesign in May that broke some key features—like the ability change volume on some of its speaker systems—and angered countless longtime Sonos fans.

Today, more than two months after the controversial redesign, Sonos CEO Patrick Spence finally acknowledged the general frustration among customers in a lengthy note posted on the company’s website. Instagram account“We’ve had a few issues since launch,” he wrote, with a touch of British humor and sarcasm. Spence apologized for the frustration the update caused, noting that fixing the broken app remains Sonos’ “number one priority.”

This post introduces customers to a detailed list Update Sonos software has been released and provides a roadmap for further improvements to the buggy app. Here are some of the issues that Sonos promises to fix in the coming months:

• Deploy Music Library configuration, browse, search and play (in July and August)
• Improved response to volume (in August)
• Improved alert consistency and reliability (in September)
• Restore edit mode for playlists (in September and October)

That’s a short list, and probably too short. The number of improvements the company needs to make is—no need to beat around the bush here—ridiculous. I’m having trouble thinking of an app update debacle that’s big enough to compare to this one, because in my time as a consumer technology reporter and editor, I can’t think of another software update that took away the ability to control a user’s volume.

Furthermore, I can’t think of any other update that would take away the user’s ability to control volume and then no immediate fix. For months! I reached out to Sonos to ask why Spence’s fix took so long. The company has yet to respond.

The point here is that Sonos hardware remains the gold standard in the world of high-end consumer audio. My colleague Parker Hall calls the Era 100 the new smart speaker standard; Ace wireless headphones score 8/10 and WIRED Recommends badgeWhen I finally got my Sonos home theater system set up, I was amazed at the richness and depth of the jungle sounds. Arid. (The bomb exploded!)

Yet this sense of frustration is strangely familiar. My family used to be an all-Sonos household, with Play speakers spread throughout the house and into my husband’s workshop. I ditched the Play system in 2020 because I couldn’t stand the company’s decision to split the control software into two separate Sonos appsone for the new speaker and one for the old speaker. Why do I have to do mental math to remember which app controls which speaker every time I want to change music?

But here I am, held hostage by hardware, trapped by software, unable to edit my Sonos playlist until September. Maybe I’m just a foolish beauty dreamer. At least my Roku TV still works.