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Ryan S
Ryan S
Retired Sonos Staff
October 3, 2017

Alexa + Sonos: How it Works

  • October 3, 2017
  • 179 replies
  • 100089 views
So you’ve read all about Amazon Alexa working with Sonos and you want to know more. Here’s a rundown of how the integration works.

Your Amazon Alexa devices are listening for you to say the wake word, “Alexa”. When they hear that word, the microphones record what you say and send the audio to the Amazon Alexa cloud to be translated.

That voice line turns into a string of text. The Amazon protocols determine if it’s meant for Amazon Alexa or for a Sonos player. If it’s for Sonos, that text is then sent directly, and securely, over to the Sonos cloud to be turned into a command using our own codes.

Finally, the Sonos intended command goes down to the system.

Want to try it out?

Here are some fun commands to try. I like starting with:

“Alexa, play some salsa in the kitchen.”
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    179 replies

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    michaelstano
    michaelstano
    Contributor III
    October 5, 2017
    I listen to music via RadioTunes, which is not a music service listed by Sonos as is Pandora, etc. My RadioTunes stations were added via the "Manage" + "Add radio station." These stations wind up in the "My Radio Stations" menu. Will the Dot be able to call up these added stations, or do commands work only with the built-in music sources provided by Sonos?
    Mike Stano [BOOST + PLAY:1 x 9 + PLAY:3 x 2 + PLAY:5 x 2 + MOVE + Beam]
    Airgetlam
    Airgetlam
    October 5, 2017
    Kumar, you're welcome :)

    And yes, I'd assume since it depends on the operation of the Amazon cloud to interpret the requests, it would be only working in the countries that have Alexa supported.
    Bruce
    jgatie
    jgatie
    October 5, 2017
    I listen to music via RadioTunes, which is not a music service listed by Sonos as is Pandora, etc. My RadioTunes stations were added via the "Manage" + "Add radio station." These stations wind up in the "My Radio Stations" menu. Will the Dot be able to call up these added stations, or do commands work only with the built-in music sources provided by Sonos?

    No, play cannot be initiated via voice control for unsupported services. However, once you initiate playback via the Sonos app, basic play/pause/skip/volume controls work via voice for any service and or source.
      Kumar
      October 5, 2017
      Kumar, you're welcome :)

      And yes, I'd assume since it depends on the operation of the Amazon cloud to interpret the requests, it would be only working in the countries that have Alexa supported.
      Amazon has just announced in India that echo and dot will be available in India starting October 31 on the Indian site.

      Hopefully Sonos will work with Alexa in India automatically then and I won't have to wait for 8.1.

      Ryan? Also your response to the question of sound quality. Is Sonos One identical to play 1 running on 8.0?
      pbromley
      Lyricist I
      October 5, 2017
      Alexa only seems to work with my Play 1’s and not Play 3 or Connects! It will play and pause but when I ask for specific music on those speakers it just plays whatever was last playing through the sonos app. I noted that only the Play 1 speakers are listed as devices under settings in the Alexa app
      DarkClown
      Lyricist III
      October 5, 2017
      What's really needed now more than ever is the ability to add Sonos speakers to more than one room, or create permanent addressable groups.

      For example I should be able to have a stereo pair in my Living Room, a single speaker in my kitchen and another in my bedroom. I should be able to say Alexa play music in entire house (or something similar) and have all 4 speakers play.
      jettermichael
      Lyricist I
      October 5, 2017
      When I ask Alexa to change the speakers volume it seems to be that the „steps“ are to large and the command „set to Volume x (1-10)“ doesn‘t work either.
      Cchris
      Enthusiast II
      October 5, 2017
      What's really needed now more than ever is the ability to add Sonos speakers to more than one room, or create permanent addressable groups.

      For example I should be able to have a stereo pair in my Living Room, a single speaker in my kitchen and another in my bedroom. I should be able to say Alexa play music in entire house (or something similar) and have all 4 speakers play.

      If you want to group ungroup rooms etc, then you will need to follow the guides that have been published in the past by these two people:
      https://github.com/rgraciano/echo-sonos
      https://github.com/jishi/node-sonos-http-api

      Requires some work to set up, but once done you will have all the functionality you want. Grouping, ungrouping, spotify etc.

      I am quite astounded that the multi million dollar companies Amazon and Sonos spent a year in development and announced with much fanfare, a system that has only half the functionality of the one above which was put together by amateur programmers and released over a year ago.

      This isnt some form of "entitlement" either, its just that with amateur programming able to deliver the functionality of grouping and ungrouping, accessing local music and spotify, I was obviously expecting the release from in house professionals to match the existing amateur functionality in a slicker more straight forward setup. How very wrong I was.

      Ill be back to setting up the systems above again, because they offer MUCH more functionality than this official release.

      Heck, Amazon and Sonos could have just bought this setup off the amateur programmer, wrapped it in their own systems to avoid the need for people to set it up themselves, delivered lots more functionality and released it six months ago. Did they even bother to look what people were currently doing?
        Brantome
        Lyricist I
        October 5, 2017
        With the new Sonos skill, can I include a Sonos speaker in an Alexa multi room group along with echo devices and play music across them all I.e. does the Sonos speaker appear as an emulated echo speaker? Thx
        matiase
        Trending Lyricist I
        October 5, 2017
        With the new Sonos skill, can I include a Sonos speaker in an Alexa multi room group along with echo devices and play music across them all I.e. does the Sonos speaker appear as an emulated echo speaker? Thx

        From what I saw from my alexa app, the Sonos doesn't appear on the Alexa multiroom group, though the Sonos system(room name), appeers on the Alexa Devices.
        So I assume initially, it cannot be group to an alexa multiroom group along side with the echo devices.

        hope this helps
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