Different speakers, different music via Alexa at the same time?


Userlevel 5
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  • Prodigy III
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I have 4 Echo Dots, 2 of which are in the same room as Play 1’s

I have 2 Sonos Ones in different rooms.

Is there any way to get Alexa / Sonos to work with multiple streams in different rooms?

I have Apple Music Family, Amazon Prime (Not Unlimited) and Spotify Premium (Not Family)

All works great for a single user, but now my daughter has started using an Echo Dot it disrupts my listening.

I could be persuaded to move from Apple Music to one of the other Family services if we could use Alexa to stream different music to different speakers at the same time.

Anyone know if this is possible?

I tried to search but all the results I can find seem to be more along grouping multiple zones for streams, which is not what I need.

TIA

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10 replies

Userlevel 5
Badge +13
Thanks , as I feared ☹️

Hopefully Amazon will ease up on this as it is a pain in a multi person home.
Userlevel 7
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I guess you could set the amazon as the default and let daughter use it. And you always say play song (on Spotify). Then at least you won’t get interrupted since no one else will ask for Spotify.
Userlevel 7
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Alexa voice control is limited to playing one stream at a time. Amazon limitation. If you want to play multiple songs multiple rooms on Sonos you need to use the controller (as that’s what Sonos is designed for)
Userlevel 7
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Doesn’t matter the service your using. Voice control only allows playing one song at time.

Use the controller for your music and No one will interupt it.
Userlevel 6
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Alexa voice control is limited to playing one stream at a time.

Not true, at least not in my experience. We use Alexa to control multiple music streams simultaneously all the time. In fact, we are streaming three different stations via my Sonos Ones right now, all initiated by voice controi. The only limitation I'm aware of is one stream at a time directly from Amazon Music. A combination of iHeart, Pandora, TuneIn, and Amazon can be easily managed. However, I have not tried the Apple Family Music or Spotify mentioned by the OP.

Of course, with the Echo devices, you do have the ducking issue.
Userlevel 7
Badge +22
Yes if you use different services
Userlevel 6
Badge +9
Yes if you use different services

I know I can control multiple streams from iHeart at the same time because my wife and I listen to different radio stations in the morning. I haven't tried multiple streams with any of the other services, however.
Userlevel 7
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Must just be the primary music services then.
Userlevel 2
Yes if you use different services

I know I can control multiple streams from iHeart at the same time because my wife and I listen to different radio stations in the morning. I haven't tried multiple streams with any of the other services, however.


Dude, that's only true to the free services... You are right, the free ones don't have a limit to the number of concurrent streams since they are not licensed or limited. The limit is on paid sources and is not just for Amazon Alexa - actually, the limit is in the contract for ALL paid services I checked (Amazon Music, Apple Music, Spotify, Tidal, Google Play) and the one exception is when using Sonos to play the music it registers all rooms in the house as one device so that's how they bypass it.

But what all of them don't get is that Spotify, Apple music or Amazon made their family plans useless for Sonos or Alexa since both Sonos and Alexa don't allow you to add more than one account for the same source, and all these guys made their family plan split between different accounts...

They should switch to the Netflix model of having one account and increasing the number of concurrent streams, that would solve all our problems...
Sonos does allow you to enter multiple accounts for a single service, it is Amazon who does not.