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How to activate Alexa mics on Sonos One surrounds?

N
I have a Beam with two Sonos One surrounds, and it's my understanding that the mics on the Sonos Ones are by default OFF, and that the Beam is the only one with mic input for Alexa. Is there a way to turn on the mics on the Ones? I ask because I'm usually closer to the Ones than the Beam when using Alexa, and Alexa on the Beam usually has trouble hearing me (I usually have to yell). Thanks!
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Best answer by Ryan S 21 July 2018, 00:48

As soon as you Enable the Sonos skill within Alexa then all Sonos Alexa devices have the capability to take voice commands. Can you please open the Sonos App>Settings>Room Settings>{Your Sonos One} and ensure that Voice Services are Enabled? If not please click Enabled and follow the prompts.
This would work for everything but with the Beam and Sonos Ones.

When bonded with a Beam, Sonos Ones will have Alexa disabled on them. We found during testing that the best experience was when the Sonos Ones microphones were turned off. CEC based Alexa commands don't work through the Sonos One, so if those were hearing your commands instead of the Beam, it wouldn't pass them to the TV. I'll pass the word along to the team that you'd like to be able to turn the microphones back on, and more importantly, that the Beam is having trouble hearing you. That shouldn't be the case.

You might want to give us a call on our support line and see if they can help get the setup cleaned up a bit and improve the Beam's listening.

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34 replies

UKMedia
Userlevel 7
Badge +20
As soon as you Enable the Sonos skill within Alexa then all Sonos Alexa devices have the capability to take voice commands. Can you please open the Sonos App>Settings>Room Settings>{Your Sonos One} and ensure that Voice Services are Enabled? If not please click Enabled and follow the prompts.
Remember: Sometimes Red Wine helps :) Sonos One (x1), Play 1 (x5 - 2 Stereo pair and 2 Surround for Playbar), Playbar (x1), Play 5 (x2), Connect (x1) Spotify, Amazon Prime, Echo Dot & Google Home.
Ryan S
Userlevel 7
Badge +25
As soon as you Enable the Sonos skill within Alexa then all Sonos Alexa devices have the capability to take voice commands. Can you please open the Sonos App>Settings>Room Settings>{Your Sonos One} and ensure that Voice Services are Enabled? If not please click Enabled and follow the prompts.
This would work for everything but with the Beam and Sonos Ones.

When bonded with a Beam, Sonos Ones will have Alexa disabled on them. We found during testing that the best experience was when the Sonos Ones microphones were turned off. CEC based Alexa commands don't work through the Sonos One, so if those were hearing your commands instead of the Beam, it wouldn't pass them to the TV. I'll pass the word along to the team that you'd like to be able to turn the microphones back on, and more importantly, that the Beam is having trouble hearing you. That shouldn't be the case.

You might want to give us a call on our support line and see if they can help get the setup cleaned up a bit and improve the Beam's listening.
Mark good posts by pressing the like button, and select the best answer on questions you've asked to help others find solutions.
S
I am having exactly the same problem too. Beam never hears me. Especially when playing music or tv. It should not be hard to have the ability to pass voice command from one to beam and beam to tv with a software update.
P
I have the same issue. Since I added my Play 1's as surrounds my Beam (which was very responsive) now doesnt hear me very well at all. I have to get up and go and speak to it close quarters !
dangodin
Badge +1
I was truly disappointed when, after spending nearly $1000 on Sonos gear, I found my Sonos Ones crippled once I added the Beam. I bought the Sonos Ones and a Beam specifically for full room coverage with Alexa. The One's are marketed as one of the best Alexa speakers on the market. There is no mention that Sonos would disable Alexa if you used them in a surround setup.

Sonos seemed to offer such a great, versatile system: you could use the Beam and Ones as a brilliant sounding 5.x surround setup; you could switch over to music and they would work together to fill your room; you would have three top-of-the-line smart speakers with sensitive microphones to pick up Alexa commands around your room. Except for the last part. We have to yell across the room to have the Beam pick up our voice when the One's are sitting 6" behind our head.

Please Sonos, at least give us the option to turn Alexa on/off on the Ones in a surround setup. If the choice is to enable Alexa on the surrounds without the ability turn on/off my TV, or remove Alexa from the surrounds completely, I'll gladly choose the former. I use Alexa far, far more than I use Sonos to turn on/off my TV.

I hope you can fix this and bring out the full value in our Sonos systems.

Thanks!
P
I absolutely agree....
This is really poor that when using Sonos Ones as surround speakers, then Alexa is not an option to use on them.
T
Badge +1
The whole Sonos/Amazon Echo integration is a farce. It simple doesn't work in the way anyone would actually use it. When I bought my One the intention was to get Sonos around my entire house, complimenting my Alexa's. All it does though, is compete with it and bring everything to a grinding halt. The Speakers in the garden (connected to a Sonos Connect:Amp for not a small amount of money), which has no Alexa capability, dims the sound when my 7 year old daughter asks the Alexa in her bedroom 30 metres away and on a different floor of the house to play unicorn songs! It's a joke! There was no thought put into the implementation at all, and despite these well documented faults, they are continuing to integrate it into more devices.

I am looking to get rid of my Sonos completely. I have better things to do than constantly fiddle with it because their developers can't build a robust system.
Ryan S
Userlevel 7
Badge +25
Hi Tim, currently, there's no way for an Echo device to know which Sonos players are in the same room, so your whole system will drop in volume when you trigger Alexa. The Sonos One and Beam are different in that we know what room they're in, and so when you trigger Alexa, only that room will drop in volume so that the command can be heard. We're working on making improvements on this experience for the future as the beta for Alexa with Sonos develops.
Mark good posts by pressing the like button, and select the best answer on questions you've asked to help others find solutions.
Chris
Userlevel 7
Badge +22
Yes hopefully we get a fix for the ducking of other rooms soon - - well overdue fix.
Respect the Queue (1)SonosOne (1)Playbar (3)Play5 (4)Play1 (3)Play3 (3)Connect (1)Connect:Amp (1)Sub + (9) Echo + Smartthings
T
Badge +1
Hi Tim, currently, there's no way for an Echo device to know which Sonos players are in the same room, so your whole system will drop in volume when you trigger Alexa.

That may be the case, but even if my Connect Amp was sat right next to 100 Alexa devices it still couldn't respond to an instruction so what benefit is there in dipping the sound? It's not coming from Alexa as other devices don't do this My Harmon Kardon, for example.
dangodin
Badge +1
Has there been any movement with this? I'd sure like to use the microphones on my Ones so I don't have to scream across the room at the Beam. Why can't the One's simply relay the CEC command over to the Beam?
T
Badge +1
The reason is because as with most things Sonos, they don't care what you think. They have your money and so you are dead to them unless you want to give them more money.
Z
Please fix this! Please enable alexa mics on Play Ones surrounds
UKMedia
Userlevel 7
Badge +20
Please fix this! Please enable alexa mics on Play Ones surrounds

Just curious. As the only time the mics on the Sonos One's are disabled is when they are set-up as surround speakers with a Beam, why is this an issue? Is the mic on the Beam not sufficient?
Remember: Sometimes Red Wine helps :) Sonos One (x1), Play 1 (x5 - 2 Stereo pair and 2 Surround for Playbar), Playbar (x1), Play 5 (x2), Connect (x1) Spotify, Amazon Prime, Echo Dot & Google Home.
D
Badge +2
Im looking inte this too but with a Play bar. Is the Ones mics off using Ones as surrounds with a Play bar too? Or does Alexa work when paired with a Play bar since the Play bar doesn’t have Alexa?
melvimbe
Userlevel 7
Badge +21
The Ones will work as Alexa mics when bonded with the playbar, playbase, or Sonos Amp.
Danny
D
Badge +2
The Ones will work as Alexa mics when bonded with the playbar, playbase, or Sonos Amp.

Thanks for your answer. Been thinking about this for a while as I want surrounds and Alexa in the living room
E
I have exactly the same problem. Bought 2 Sonos Ones rather than the cheaper Play for my Beam thinking that I can have an easier time talking to Alexa but was disappointed.
Y
Hello, i have beam and i planed to buy two ones, not only for better soun but mainly because alexa has very hard time to hear me once music is playing. Now i read here, that its not possible to talk to ones microphone. Can you please sonos respond, if you plan to add this feature soon? If not, iam not buying another 2 speakers. But cmon, its pretty stupid not allow just pass voice from smaller ones to beam.
Chris
Userlevel 7
Badge +22
News to me - but appears Ryan said they did disable with the Beam. Shouldn't be a big deal though with the Beam as the Alexa.
Respect the Queue (1)SonosOne (1)Playbar (3)Play5 (4)Play1 (3)Play3 (3)Connect (1)Connect:Amp (1)Sub + (9) Echo + Smartthings
UKMedia
Userlevel 7
Badge +20
The Sonos One microphones work just fine when used as surrounds. I'm not sure what the other posters are talking about. Nothing is disabled in the Sonos Ones when they are surrounds paired with Beam.

Hi Chris. This has been confirmed by Ryan, unless it has changed.
Remember: Sometimes Red Wine helps :) Sonos One (x1), Play 1 (x5 - 2 Stereo pair and 2 Surround for Playbar), Playbar (x1), Play 5 (x2), Connect (x1) Spotify, Amazon Prime, Echo Dot & Google Home.
S
Bought Sonos beam and 2x sonos One with subwoofer combo. Alexa situation super disappointing. It is nonsensical to disable the one’s mics. Surround speakers are always closer to people. So not turning on the ones mics basically means yelling at the beam from all the way across the room next to your TV - any time you want to use Alexa - especially when music is coming out of the beam. Ones mics would have been an excellent solution. Figure it out Sonos. It’s just software.
S
Even if you let us choose only one of the One’s for the Alexa mic and disabled the beam mic that’d be better the clunky Alexa setup now.
C
Userlevel 1
I was truly disappointed when, after spending nearly $1000 on Sonos gear, I found my Sonos Ones crippled once I added the Beam. I bought the Sonos Ones and a Beam specifically for full room coverage with Alexa. The One's are marketed as one of the best Alexa speakers on the market. There is no mention that Sonos would disable Alexa if you used them in a surround setup.

Sonos seemed to offer such a great, versatile system: you could use the Beam and Ones as a brilliant sounding 5.x surround setup; you could switch over to music and they would work together to fill your room; you would have three top-of-the-line smart speakers with sensitive microphones to pick up Alexa commands around your room. Except for the last part. We have to yell across the room to have the Beam pick up our voice when the One's are sitting 6" behind our head.

Please Sonos, at least give us the option to turn Alexa on/off on the Ones in a surround setup. If the choice is to enable Alexa on the surrounds without the ability turn on/off my TV, or remove Alexa from the surrounds completely, I'll gladly choose the former. I use Alexa far, far more than I use Sonos to turn on/off my TV.

I hope you can fix this and bring out the full value in our Sonos systems.

Thanks!i also have to agree. I am very disappointed to find out that the microphone is turned off on the sonos ones. Sonos, are you planning on making a change to this?
C
Userlevel 1
Please fix this! Please enable alexa mics on Play Ones surrounds

Just curious. As the only time the mics on the Sonos One's are disabled is when they are set-up as surround speakers with a Beam, why is this an issue? Is the mic on the Beam not sufficient? correct. The mic on the beam is not sufficient. It’s preferable to have the mic’s on the “ones” enabled so you don’t have to shout. This could be for regular functionality and not CEC in the short term if it made some fix happen. At least make it an option for the consumer.

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