Contributor II

When will Alexa "Routines" become available?

Forum|Forum|7 years ago
May 28, 2019
67 replies
12558 views

I love my Sonos Beam w/ Alexa, but it really sucks that a lot of baseline Alexa functionality doesn't work w/ Sonos. For example, I want to set a Routine that shuts off my TV, dims the lights, and plays Jazz music from Pandora at volume 10. I can easily setup this Routine on my iPhone, but Alexa on Sonos doesn't support it at all, which is incredibly annoying.

Does your engineering team have a roadmap or timeline to adopt more of the standard or baseline Alexa functionality, like Routines?

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K

Kumar

I expect that Sonos will always lag Amazon where Echo features are concerned - either because Amazon won't let Sonos have access to these right away or because Sonos isn't agile enough to keep up.

For instance Alexa will soon be able to listen to a child learning to read and correct/encourage. How long will Sonos units take to do this thereafter? None can say.

Sonos/Alexa is therefore essentially a voice control for music feature; if the full feature Echo suite is desired as soon as Amazon releases it, the Echo device itself also needs to be bought.

The question then arises whether it is simpler to use this device for music play on Sonos either via the integration in the cloud or via Sonos line in jacks, leaving the built in Sonos mics unused.

B

Blueandwhitehoops

Lyricist II

Wow...thanks for the headsup @danellisuk , I just upgraded and it works for me too!!

Thanks to the Sonos team for sorting that...very happy to have that functionality available.

K

Kumar

Sonos have finally implemented Alexa Routines in S2 version 12.1 which includes official support for Alexa Routines:

How many days after release by Amazon for Echo devices?

D

dappledawnfarm

Lyricist I

I just got used to ignoring the "not supported on this device" message... Imagine my shock and surprise when she responded back to my routine pleasantly with a "you have a good night also"!!! I didn't do anything differently I didn't update anything I think Sonos finally fixed the issue on their end 👍

J

John B

This is good news.

The issue that now really needs fixing is the perception of some users that an Alexa-enabled speaker should have all the same functionality as an Echo device.

K

Kirk33

Collaborator II

Sonos/Alexa is therefore essentially a voice control for music feature; if the full feature Echo suite is desired as soon as Amazon releases it, the Echo device itself also needs to be bought.

The question then arises whether it is simpler to use this device for music play on Sonos either via the integration in the cloud or via Sonos line in jacks, leaving the built in Sonos mics unused.

That feels like a wild exaggeration to me. I have 30-ish smart home devices controlled by Alexa and a few dozen Alexa routines, and all of them work perfectly on Sonos. I ask Sonos Alexa questions all the time and I almost always get a good answer.

For sure there are a few things that don’t work. But I wouldn’t, for a second, consider getting echo devices and disabling my Sonos mics.

D

dcorfan

Lyricist II

I’ve just come across this problem. I’ve got a routine to open my garage door, and the routines doesn’t work on the Sonos One or Move. However, it seems that if I upgrade all my legacy kit so I can use the S2 app, then it will work. Any way to make this work under S1, or am I doomed to remain stuck with missing functionality.

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