Can you play music from your Sonos music library using Alexa?

Forum|Forum|3 years ago
January 12, 2023
23 replies
1187 views

Okay, it is now January 2023, and evidently you still cannot play music from your Sonos indexed music library using Alexa. I’ve wasted my time looking at numerous articles that seem to indicate you can play your music files in Sonos using Alexa, but there is always an issue. I have the Amazon music service setup in Sonos. I have the Sonos skill linked and ready in the Alexa app. Yet I still can’t play my own music in Sonos. I just followed one article to setup Alexa with Sonos and at the end the commands below were listed, nothing to do with playing your own music. Here are the commands in the Sonos app on my Android phone.

“Alexa, play music for meditation in the bedroom”

“Alexa, play top hits from the 70’s in the kitchen”

“Alexa, turn up the volume in the bathroom"

Unbelievable! So I’m guessing that the answer to my question is “NO”, you cannot play music from your Sonos music library using Alexa.

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Best answer by UKMedia

Just another thought. Although I haven’t tested this myself, I believe that Plex allows for the playing of locally stored music: You’ll need to install Plex, and then add that account as a Music Service within the Sonos App.

Mounting Network Resources | Plex Support

and supports Alexa voice Control

Getting Started with Alexa Voice Control | Plex Support

Show previous replies

Ken_Griffiths

I mentioned that I use Emby to play locally stored music using Alexa. My point being of Emby can do it, then why can’t Sonos?

Maybe Sonos prefer to not tread on the toes of their ‘partners’, who already provide this service and so don’t wish to compete in this area, but have chosen to leave the feature with Plex for example… just as one (plausible) reason for why it may not be a feature of SVC at the present time🤔?

melvimbe

I mentioned that I use Emby to play locally stored music using Alexa. My point being of Emby can do it, then why can’t Sonos?

Maybe Sonos prefer to not tread on the toes of their ‘partners’, who already provide this service and so don’t wish to compete in this area, but have chosen to leave the feature with Plex for example… just as one (plausible) reason for why it may not be a feature of SVC at the present time🤔?

SVC supports Amazon Music and Apple Music, which have competing voice assistants Alexa and Siri respectively. I wouldn’t imagine that SVC doesn’t support local libraries in order to avoid competing with the Plex Alexa skill.

However, it would make some sense (to me anyway) that instead of supporting local media directly, SVC will eventually support the Plex service to access your media. I can see that as a positive collaboration for both companies. That would save some development effort on Sonos part, since Plex would do a lot of the leg work. It could awesome be a possible exit strategy for Sonos to stop support of local libraries directly. And Plex is already active in the TV steaming apps development, which Sonos is rumored to want to get involved with. From the Plex point of view, they gain some potential customers in the greater tie to Sonos.

I’m not saying that Sonos is working with Plex, just that it would be a valid reason if they were working together or something.

Danny

Z

zBernie123Author

Chromatic Producer I

I mentioned that I use Emby to play locally stored music using Alexa. My point being of Emby can do it, then why can’t Sonos?

Maybe Sonos prefer to not tread on the toes of their ‘partners’, who already provide this service and so don’t wish to compete in this area, but have chosen to leave the feature with Plex for example… just as one (plausible) reason for why it may not be a feature of SVC at the present time🤔?

Yes, I suspect Amazon does not allow Sonos to stream local music as it would compete with them, considering how ubiquitous Sonos is. However, they do allow Emby to play local music albeit in a bastardized fashion. I can play a song or album with Emby via Alexa, but no other actions work such as next song, or rewind, etc. Alexa just replies that it cannot be done with this type of stream.

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