Alexa Multiroom music simultaneously on Sonos and Echo devices

I'm adding my voice to the resounding appeal for Alexa 3rd party MRM integration on Sonos products. My new Ecobee thermostat got me interested in voice control. I started with one echo device, an echo dot driving my B&W MM-1's. That system displaced the Airport/Beosound 3000 configuration in our kitchen/living area, the convenience of streaming and voice control means we listen much more now. Digging out the B&O remote and a streaming device+app to control the system and stream music just had too much friction for everyday use. A second echo was soon added in our TV area to control heating and stream music to the relocated Beosound 3000.

So I decided to dip my toe in the water and try voice control speakers with better sound quality built in. In my ignorance I assumed Alexa enabled meant, just like an Echo, but with better sound quality. So I bought a Sonos One for our den and a Bose Home Speaker 500 for the bedroom. The Bose went back after a couple of weeks even though I loved the device, and it's sound, because of it's crippled Alexa implementation. I want all of the convenience, voice queries and web knowledge, smart home control, music streaming, stereo and mono music, intercom, calling and messaging. Specifically for the bedroom Bose, it let me down by not implementing Music Alarms/Timers (& MRM) and BOSE could give me no info on plans to support them; my $20 clockradio has handled those for over 40 years. I almost swapped it for a pair of Sonos One's but it has the same limitations so instead I chose a pair of the Echo Plus Gen 2's.

I want whole home coverage using devices at a range of price points appropriate to the location, I'm not putting a $500 Bose in every room. I might use a Sonos One everywhere but I don't want to be locked out of ANY voice/smart functionality. In addition, while I'm using Alexa now, I want a path to switch voice platforms in the future if I need to without replacing all my high quality sound and entertainment system components. Maybe the solution is to go with cheaper voice control speakers everywhere and integrating higher quality sound and entertainment devices in entertainment spaces. But I still want whole home and zone MRM and all my devices/stereo pairs/zones/groups need to be compatible with all smart control functions e.g streaming alarms/timers, any available streaming service/program source. I.e. I want no functional limitations because of brand choice.

I'm starting to look at home cinema sound now, but it needs to fit into a home wide MRM system. So with their recently announced support for Alexa MRM, Polk Audio would be the front runner.

Just bought two Sonos Ones and could not believe this.

 

I plan to return them and get the new echo studio. Supposedly a small step down in audio quality, but worth it for the seamless integration into groups for me! 

Just want to add my voice to the calls for MRM.
Beam in the living room, Dot in the Kitchen... It feels like it should just work.

While I get why Sonos might want to force us into buying more Ones, I hope the chat around it prompts them to add it in.

Keep rattling the cage!

I am reequiping my home and my holiday house with multiroom in the very near future, and this MRM integration will decide which brand I'm going into.
Love Sonos, but lacks two important things for me now, MRM and handling two locations by saving all data in the cloud, and not only locally in the speakers.

Hi everyone,

We're constantly working with the Amazon Alexa team to bring more features and to improve the experience, in fact, we're in the middle of launching Alexa Groups with them right now. This does not include grouping Sonos players and Echo devices to play the same music at the same time, but it's a feature we've certainly heard requests asking for the functionality. I don't have any specifics I can share as to if multiroom music with Sonos and Alexa playing together will be available, but I'll make sure to let the team know continues to be requested.

I can't speak specifically to that chat, but if it was from a year ago, the Alexa integration has changed considerably since then (and as already pointed out, there were other mistakes/inaccuracies in it). As development continues, features are added and some may move lower on the list of priorities. We'll continue to bring new features and experiences to Alexa on Sonos and are hard at work to bring voice control to Sonos in many different ways, in order to bring the best possible music listening experience.

I just bought a Sonos Beam after my research failed me and I interpreted Group capability as MRM. Arrived today and love the sound, but contemplating returning it b/c it cannot connect to my echos.

I just spent an hour trying to put my new Sonos play:1 Speakers in a multiroom group. Thanks to this thread, i discovered i was wasting my time. If i had know this before, i would not have brought the speakers. I have my existing Bose system playing through an Alexa Pair Gadget in parts of the house, as well as echos in Kitchen, etc. I wanted the Sonos to support mh Music Everywhere Group. I add my voice to those who would like to add quality Sonos Speakers to their existing setup. Thanks for this thread.

In the same boat! Just got mine today and really thought I could just add them to my existing echos and go about listening to the same song all throughout the house, with an elevated sound in the kitchen through the shiny new sonos :)  I thought I did my research beforehand but I guess not. This might be a deal breaker forcing me to return both my sonos 1 and beam :/ bummer!!  If i could use them with my existing echo speakers i have in every room of my house, I might be able to slowly phase the sonos in and swap them out one at a time, (since we don’t really use the features like drop in) but to make this work simultaneously like my echos, I would have to buy 10 sonos speakers which is just not happening overnight. All that frustration being said -The posts im reading were from a while ago. Has there been an update in the past year on a projection date? 

If other vendors can do it most likely because Amazon/Sonos wants to drive their own respective sales… very disappointing from a customer stand point.   It’s right there in plain sight on the Amazon developper page: https://developer.amazon.com/en-US/docs/alexa/mrm/multi-room-music-sdk-overview.html but as the getting started states: 

 

To get started with implementing MRM on your device, contact your Amazon Business Development representative.

 

Who says BS between the 2?

 

There are other features I’m waiting for that Sonos still doesn’t support, such as bilingual Alexa which is extremely convenient on my echo dot around the house except the kitchen/dinning where the Sonos is.

 

Not to say that I can't even leverage my Sonos properly as it cannot be controlled from a different wifi network (still in the same house).  In 2020, where data privacy concerns are at peak, and when everybody recommends to have a dedicated smart home network it is just telling me that Sonos doesn’t consider all security aspect and assume your home is a safe place.

 

Thankfully I only have 1 Sonos speaker… might get it out of the door very soon and replace it with the new Amazon Studio - at least they will all (echo and speakers) act “smart” together.  I haven’t reach an irreversible cost of change yet by buying a ton of Sonos.  I guess the couple bucks I’ll loose reselling it is my cost of being an early adopter.

Just found that the Polk Command Bar supports multi room. Guess that's the leader until the race finishes between Bose and Sonos and that will dictate which direction I build out my system with.

I think the answer to why there's no MRM between sonos and echo is, basically, down to the Sonos Connect. If you can sync echo audio with sonos, why would anyone shell out 350 bucks for a Connect for their existing hifi when they could just spend 50 on a dot and use the line out? Sonos probably know this and won't be keen on losing the connect sales...I think that is the best answer to this topic and therefore why it will never happen

Well, except that you're forgetting that an echo dot can only output the streaming services that it supports. The Connect (now Port) will output everything available in the Sonos network. That includes a lot more streaming services, content generated through Alexa or Google Assistant, local library, TV, and aux input. While the streaming services an echo dot supports will be good enough for some, it won't be for many others.

Don't forget that the Port will output in Coax too, while the Dot is a headphone jack.

And again, the MRM protocol that Amazon and Sonos support are not identical, and have several key differences, probably more that we can't see from the surface. With Alexa, you must specifiy the group you want to play before initiating a stream. It cannot be adjusted afterwards. With Sonos, you can.

I do think there's some business/competitive reasons for this too. Sonos surely would prefer you use a Sonos One, ikea speakers, and their other comparatively lower dollar speakers to fill out your home over echos and echos and echo dots.

And I definitely think going with all Echo/alexa products is the right move for a lot of people. If you aren't going to use a feature, then it's of no value to you. And filling out your home with echos and echo dots is a lot cheaper than using Sonos.

I just spent an hour trying to put my new Sonos play:1 Speakers in a multiroom group. Thanks to this thread, i discovered i was wasting my time. If i had know this before, i would not have brought the speakers. I have my existing Bose system playing through an Alexa Pair Gadget in parts of the house, as well as echos in Kitchen, etc. I wanted the Sonos to support mh Music Everywhere Group. I add my voice to those who would like to add quality Sonos Speakers to their existing setup. Thanks for this thread.

Hello,

Love the sound quality of my Sonos One but I will definitively not buy additional units as long as Sonos does not support Alexa multiroom music mixed with other Amazon devices.

Customer has always the last word, if Sonos does not want to go this way, customer will anyway find a workaround.

I am now considering the Amazon Echo Studio as a serious alternative.

Come on Sonos, just do It

Copying my reply from another thread in case others find it useful:

I have my Sonos speakers (a Playbar and two Ones working as rear satellites in a surround configuration) working in an Alexa multi-room music configuration. Mind you, the music streaming source is not the Sonos player. Here's what I have set up: Fire TV Cube connected to TV via HDMI, TV connected to Playbar via digital optical. Multi-room music group ("Downstairs"): Echo, Echo dot connected via an aux cable to a stereo receiver, Echo Show and Fire TV Cube / Sonos. I can ask any of the Echo devices to play music on the group. I had to tweak the audio sync setting on the Fire TV Cube to get the music playing through the Sonos speakers in sync, but other than that it works great - 4 downstairs rooms, playing the same music, all in sync. So, while the Sonos isn't actually playing the music, the music is coming through the Sonos speakers and I get my music throughout my "Downstairs" as desired. 🙂