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Sonos Grouping with Alexa

  • 21 November 2017
  • 13 replies
  • 3084 views
S
I have two Play:1s (named Bedroom and Kitchen) and am now, thankfully, able to use Echo Dot (2nd Gen)/Alexa to play music and playlists with Spotify on the speakers.

I do have an issue and have read some posts about this but couldn't find a definitive answer so here goes...

I'd like to be able to play music on Bedroom or Kitchen or both of these at the same time via an Alexa voice command. I know that you can group Sonos devices in the Sonos app but I cannot give it a name of my choosing and saying "play..... on kitchen and bedroom" won't work.

In the Alexa App I can create a group of devices so have created one called "Both" comprising both the Bedroom and Kitchen devices, but when I command Alexa to play on "Both" the device or group cannot be found - I should stress that this this is definitely configured in the Alexa app. I've even tried changing the group names. Maybe this is a bug with Alexa.

Have I tried done this correctly? Is there a way of adding two devices to a group name of my choice in the Sonos app that can be used/detected by Echo Dot / Alexa?

Or do I only have one option - use the Echo Dot to play on Kitchen or Bedroom then group the two in the Sonos app after starting through Alexa?

* Please note that these are not Sonos One devices, they're Play:1s
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Best answer by jgatie 22 November 2017, 01:28

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13 replies

jgatie
Alexa groups do not work for 3rd party speakers at this time.
S
Thanks jgatie.

It's a bit of an oversight by the Alexa devs then isn't it. It allows you to set up the group of 3rd-party speakers, but won't work with the group, or even recognise the group name.
jgatie
Thanks jgatie.

It's a bit of an oversight by the Alexa devs then isn't it. It allows you to set up the group of 3rd-party speakers, but won't work with the group, or even recognise the group name.

Yes, it would seem allowing groups to be set up but not supported is not good practices. There is a new AVS Multi-Room Music SDK coming from Amazon early next year that is supposed to address this issue, but whether Sonos can (or will) use this SDK remains to be seen.
S
Thanks again.
I did read that the SDK was coming.

While you're here, can I pick your brains again.

I've heard lots of suggestions that the group has to be created in the Sonos app and then Alexa will recognise that group.
Unfortunately, I don't see a way of grouping my two Play:1s and give the group a unique name that will be recognised by Alexa. I know I can start something playing on one Sonos device then simply group them to play on both but this grouping (and ungrouping) is done on demand and the grouping will have a predefined "Kitchen + Bedroom" title. I want to save,as has been suggested, this group as "House", and then Alexa will recognise "House" as a device, albeit comprising Kitchen and Bedroom.

Because of this, do you see that my only option with Alexa would be to start playing on either Bedroom or Kitchen using "Alexa, play [name of track, album etc] in Kitchen" then use Sonos app on the phone to group playback by adding bedroom to the group?
Stuart_W
Userlevel 7
Badge +22
Thanks again.
I did read that the SDK was coming.

While you're here, can I pick your brains again.

I've heard lots of suggestions that the group has to be created in the Sonos app and then Alexa will recognise that group.
Unfortunately, I don't see a way of grouping my two Play:1s and give the group a unique name that will be recognised by Alexa. I know I can start something playing on one Sonos device then simply group them to play on both but this grouping (and ungrouping) is done on demand and the grouping will have a predefined "Kitchen + Bedroom" title. I want to save,as has been suggested, this group as "House", and then Alexa will recognise "House" as a device, albeit comprising Kitchen and Bedroom.

Because of this, do you see that my only option with Alexa would be to start playing on either Bedroom or Kitchen using "Alexa, play [name of track, album etc] in Kitchen" then use Sonos app on the phone to group playback by adding bedroom to the group?

Create the group in Sonos app/controller (You don't give it a name). Then ask Alexa to play in one of the rooms in the group and it will play in the whole group
Arc + Sub (Gen 1) + 2 x Play 1/ Stereo Play 3s/ Era 100 Stereo in Kitchen, One Stereo in Bedroom, SL One in Study, Play 1in Bathroom & Conservatory
jgatie
As Stuart says, just play to any one name in the group and it will play on all.
melvimbe
I wonder if Amazon allowed 3rd party speakers in thier groups because some functionality is available. For example, perhaps some speakers can be turned on/off, but it's not applicable to Sonos speakers. Just a thought. Otherwise, it just doesn't make sense.

As for the grouping, there really is no way to preset a named group of zones with Sonos currently. There are some things close to that. You can specify a group of zones to play when there is a line-in source that is activated...autoplay. That's not useful to you though since the Play:1s do not have line-in's. Also, there are some third party smart apps/hubs that can control Sonos. You can create preset routines to play a Sonos favorite in multiple zones and set volumes, initiated by command or by schedule. I actually have my bedroom, bathroom, and family rooom come on playing a Pandora station as a morning alarm.
Danny
S
It's as I thought then. I have to group/ungroup in the Sonos app.
TBH, this Aexa integration has been a bit messy. If they're going to do a job, do it properly. Adding voice control through Alexa but then still needing to use a device (phone with Sonos app) to manually choose multiple playback devices probably shows a lack of understanding of user needs - I bet there are plenty of people with more than one non-Alexa enabled Sonos speakers wanting to do what I do.
C
Userlevel 1
Badge
Also, there are some third party smart apps/hubs that can control Sonos. You can create preset routines to play a Sonos favorite in multiple zones and set volumes, initiated by command or by schedule. I actually have my bedroom, bathroom, and family rooom come on playing a Pandora station as a morning alarm.

Can you share which one(s) you're using? This sounds intriguing and very useful. Thanks in advance.
B
I know this is an old thread but anyways......they pull this crap in order to push their own speakers. They probably Never intended on giving it its full functionality.
Chris
Userlevel 7
Badge +22
Amazon doesn't allow 3rd party speakers grouped with their Alexa speakers. Its an amazon function not sure how you try to have some kind of Sonos conspiracy in this. I wouldn't think the sync would be real good even if they did allow it from the amazon servers.
Respect the Queue (1)Move (2)Beam (1)ARC (1)SonosOne (1)Playbar (4)Play5 (4)Play1 (3)Play3 (1)Port (2)Connect (1)Connect:Amp (3)Sonos Amp (1)Sub + (9) Echo + Smartthings
B
I didn’t mean Sonos was at fault. Amazon could allow the option to group Sonos only speakers, but they did not in order to sell more echo speakers, I would assume. They provide some functionality but they didn’t make it possible for me to say ‘ Alexa, play music in the bathroom and kitchen’ using only Sonos speakers. Unless I am not clear on how it works. It’s frustrating because I was about to purchase a kitchen set of Sonos speakers to go with our bathroom Sonos one speaker. But now as I understand, functionality is limited and will now allow for what I described above.

Edit: I may be way off on this and grouping as described in this thread is only related to Sonos with echo speakers. My conspiracy mind went into overdrive!
Chris
Userlevel 7
Badge +22
Grouping via voice is supposed to be coming
Respect the Queue (1)Move (2)Beam (1)ARC (1)SonosOne (1)Playbar (4)Play5 (4)Play1 (3)Play3 (1)Port (2)Connect (1)Connect:Amp (3)Sonos Amp (1)Sub + (9) Echo + Smartthings
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