Contributor I

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Can't get Alexa to play on multiple Sonos speakers

Forum|Forum|3 years ago
August 6, 2023
13 replies
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I have enabled Alexa on my Sonos One and Roam speakers. One is in the master bedroom the other is in the master bath. I created a group for bedroom and I e doe bathroom. I then combine them into a group call upstairs. Both rooms and both speakers show up in the new combined group. But when I say Alexa play <Spotify playlist> on Upstairs" it only plays on the bedroom Sonos. I have deleted the group and recreates it but nothing I do seems to get music on both speakers. No idea what is going wrong here.

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Best answer by Ken_Griffiths

Goto the two speakers in the Upstairs group and scroll down past your devices to ‘playback options’ (see screenshot attached) and set that to ‘ALWAYS’ then say to the Alexa assistant on either speaker - ‘Alexa play some music’ —→ the two speakers should automatically Group and begin playback.

A

AatencioAuthor

Contributor I

I just wanted to add that I have read multiple threads on here and on the Amazon Alexa community and nothing I have read in either place seems to address or fix this issue. It seems simple enough from what every conversation says, but I have yet to get this to work in any fashion.

106rallye

Do you group the speakers in the Alexa app or the Sonos app?

Ken_Griffiths

I have enabled Alexa on my Sonos One and Roam speakers. One is in the master bedroom the other is in the master bath. I created a group for bedroom and I e doe bathroom. I then combine them into a group call upstairs. Both rooms and both speakers show up in the new combined group. But when I say Alexa play <Spotify playlist> on Upstairs" it only plays on the bedroom Sonos. I have deleted the group and recreates it but nothing I do seems to get music on both speakers. No idea what is going wrong here.

Try this… you need to set the Roam and Sonos One as the controlling/enabling devices in the first section of the Amazon Alexa Group called ‘Upstairs’, as well as adding them both to the third ‘speaker section of that group.

Note: A controlling/enabling device can be used in an Alexa group once only, so you need to remove the Sonos One from the first section of the Bedroom group and the Roam also needs removing from the first section of the Bathroom group, but you can leave them in the third ‘speaker’ section of their respective Alexa groups.

Hope those steps are clear for you to follow.

A

AatencioAuthor

Contributor I

Do you group the speakers in the Alexa app or the Sonos app?

They are grouped in the Alexa app. Group called "Upstairs" was created the two speakers are added to the group.

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AatencioAuthor

Contributor I

Try this… you need to set the Roam and Sonos One as the controlling/enabling devices in the first section of the Amazon Alexa Group called ‘Upstairs’, as well as adding them both to the third ‘speaker section of that group.

Thank you for the response. So, gave this a try, but still now joy.

Ken_GriffithsAnswer

Goto the two speakers in the Upstairs group and scroll down past your devices to ‘playback options’ (see screenshot attached) and set that to ‘ALWAYS’ then say to the Alexa assistant on either speaker - ‘Alexa play some music’ —→ the two speakers should automatically Group and begin playback.

A

AatencioAuthor

Contributor I

Goto the two speakers in the Upstairs group and scroll down past your devices to ‘playback options’ (see screenshot attached) and set that to ‘ALWAYS’ then say to the Alexa assistant on either speaker - ‘Alexa play some music’ —→ the two speakers should automatically Group and begin playback.

Thanks, I will give that a try!

I really wish they would make this integration more clean!

Ken_Griffiths

Goto the two speakers in the Upstairs group and scroll down past your devices to ‘playback options’ (see screenshot attached) and set that to ‘ALWAYS’ then say to the Alexa assistant on either speaker - ‘Alexa play some music’ —→ the two speakers should automatically Group and begin playback.

Thanks, I will give that a try!

I really wish they would make this integration more clean!

You could always use SVC instead of, or aswell as, Alexa. SVC has syntax that allows you to group/ungroup Speakers. I use both, as Alexa will auto-group/ungroup for playback, but SVC has some more specific instructions that can be used.

A

AatencioAuthor

Contributor I

You could always use SVC instead of, or aswell as, Alexa. SVC has syntax that allows you to group/ungroup Speakers. I use both, as Alexa will auto-group/ungroup for playback, but SVC has some more specific instructions that can be used.

I have thought about that, but having two different voice controls just seems clunky to me…

Everything seems to be a work around rather than true integration. I already had to bail on Google Assistant, because that integration is even worse. Really trying to make Alexa work, but limitations are getting frustrating.

Ken_Griffiths

You could always use SVC instead of, or aswell as, Alexa. SVC has syntax that allows you to group/ungroup Speakers. I use both, as Alexa will auto-group/ungroup for playback, but SVC has some more specific instructions that can be used.

I have thought about that, but having two different voice controls just seems clunky to me…

Everything seems to be a work around rather than true integration. I already had to bail on Google Assistant, because that integration is even worse. Really trying to make Alexa work, but limitations are getting frustrating.

As another Sonos user, like yourself, I initially had some frustrations, but have used Alexa with Sonos for some years now (and of course SVC in more recent times) and now have no issues with it - it’s fairly straightforward once you get your head around how things work. I also use Google too at a holiday home mostly, but I’m not so keen on that assistant as it’s quite limited when it comes to controlling Sonos. It’s a pity that Google do not allow their assistant to work alongside other assistants, as I would add SVC and Alexa and then use all the available assistants on my devices.

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