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Hi, whenever I request that Alexa play song through my Sonos system, it will play through the 2 One SL‘s set up as a speaker pair, but not through the sub. They are all paired as a system through the Sonos app. If I Airplay or use the Sonos app it works as intended but only when I request through Alexa does the sub not play. The 2 One SL’s play as the stereo pair but nothing comes from the sub. What could it be??

Hi.  As these are One SLs, what device are you using to receive the Alexa commands ?   (That may not be relevant, but just trying to get the full picture.)


Hi John. Thanks for asking for clarification. I am using an Alexa echo show with the Sonos Skill enabled. 


 Try using Sonos Voice control.  Who knows, might work.

 When you use Alexa are you specifying the room name?


I am specifying the name of the room, yes. Is Sonos voice available on the One SL?


 I guess the SL is not voice control capable.  So using an Alexa device, in your case the Show, is not playing through the sub.  Is the sub bonded to the SLs?  Is that even an option?


 I’m learning.  I know now a sub has to be bonded to speaker(s).  It cannot act as a stand alone speaker which is of course a Duuuuuh!  Hey I’m old!  
 So I don’t understand, why if you ask Alexa to play on your Sonos room ( whatever you named it ), why it would not include the sub.  That is odd.


 Just ran a test using my Arc-Sub-300s.  Asked “what’s her face” to play a Spotify playlist I created that has heavy bass.  Because Alexa is active on the Arc I used an Echo device whose Wake Word has been changed to “Ziggy”.  There was definitely some serious bass.  My wife complained so I guess the sub works.


Thanks MoPac. They are linked through the Sonos app as a system with two One SLs and an original sub. Must be the older hardware maybe. 


 That doesn’t seem right.  If they are bonded and Sonos app play works along with AirPlay then I would think Alexa would also play the room as structured.  Confused.


Hi @modernoutlaw 

Welcome to the Sonos Community!

Sorry to hear of this issue you’re having with your Sub not playing when the playback to your Era 100 pair is initiated by Alexa - the Sub absolutely should be playing, but Alexa playback does work differently from standard, so it seems there is scope for this to go wrong. I’d like to look into this for you.

Could you please initiate some playback to the room with Alexa and submit a support diagnostic while is it playing? Please then stop playback and initiate playback from the Sonos app, of the same source, and submit a support diagnostic while that is playing too. Please let me know once you have done this, but please don’t share the numbers given. If you have several rooms, please let me know which room I should be looking at. Thanks!


https://open.spotify.com/track/2nJNPhWow5sEgc8xaOmntV?si=U_qxXYXqQdOMW0r3zpvv1A

 a great bass test.


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