Feature Request: Export and Import Sonos Playlists

As per the posts by mintchop (26 Aug 16) and beynym's response on 28 Aug 16, I'd like to add myself to the request for a self-managing playlist in the Sonos app, whether it's a Windows or iOS version (both would be nice...)

There are several (dozens probably) other posts I found on the Sonos forum with clients asking for this particular feature, all of which are being ignored by Sonos, except for a few platitudes offered by Ryan S

I cannot begin to imagine why a senior Sonos employee hasn't been made aware of the level of dissatisfaction this software omission is making to their so called "valuable" customer. Come on Sonos, get your act together

Any news ...

Now that iTunes has wiped out the music in most of my playlists with their latest update, but it still shows up in my Sonos controller, I would love to be able to export those Sonos playlists to iTunes to correct the problem - but I can't. You have no way to export playlists from Sonos! How could this be? I thought Apple was bad about not wanting to share. Now I can't add any more music to my library because I don't want iTunes knocking all the music out of my Sonos playlists that should be in both of them. I'm stuck with the status quo in both my Sonos and my iPod, and nothing is usable from iTunes in my PC. The files for the missing songs are still there in my iTunes Music folder, but the songs are not in the playlists in iTunes. Sonos, please come to my rescue!

A solution to exporting your Sonos native playlists, but not for the faint hearted...

I am on a MAC, but PC process would only differ by installing python on the PC. Here goes:
My requirement was to get my Sonos playlists exported and then imported to iTunes to ensure I had a backup outside of Sonos in case of system reset. I organise my music in iTunes so it makes sense to do this for me.

First install pip. Go into the Terminal app and type: sudo easy_install pip
In Terminal now cd to a new folder under Documents called soco and type: "pip install soco -t .
finally get a copy of SPL.py from Github and put it in the same folder (https://github.com/stu247/spl)
in terminal you can now type python spl.py x PLAYLISTNAME -f
the last comment will create a file PLAYLISTNAME.xspf
Open this file in TextEdit and replace all "x-file-cifs://HOSTNAME/" with "file:///Volumes/"
Note: your HOSTNAME will be the server where you store music if a NAS
save the file, open in VLC player.
if the files play in VLC, go to file, save playlist and save the playlist as an M3U file
in iTunes, import playlist and after some time, the Sonos playlist will appear in iTunes.

I hope this helps some of you. it really irritated me a long time, but i feel quite accomplished have got this to to work. I know nothing about python and very little about MACS, much of this was trial and error, but in the end, it works perfectly.

Good luck all, James

The is a python Sonos Play Lists controller on GitHub. https://github.com/stu247/spl

Agree -- backing up playlists is an important missing feature. I've lost my playlists several times now. I can use playlists from the streaming services, but one of the reasons I bought Sonos was the integrated interface across all the services. Playlists I've built with music from several sources can't be backed up? That's nonsense!

+1
I have bad internet, so I'd purchase some stuff locally after finding it on deezer. It would be nice to be able to fix the playlist to point at new local and replace remote content ... Also I'd like to be able to down load the pl for song managemen

I have found theright function for getting functionality. I'm going to sell my Sonos. I'm going to buysome intelligent wireless speakers. And I'm shure those will have FMTuners to save bandwidth, Playlist Backup and export and aupport real HiFi Quality wbich I have never found with Sonos. I am done with waiting. If one needs some Play 1 or Play5 drop me an email. I send thoughout germany. CU

1) I need to export my playlist so I can import it on a second Sonos system at another location.
I can see that might be hard to implement, if the two music libraries at the two locations aren't the same.

2) I also want an export just for basic backup purposes. My playlist was put together over years and I need a text file in case I lose it.
I fully agree and would expext Sonos to make this possible. Rather sooner than later.

3) Also, a quick sort alphabetically feature would be appreciated. It's hard to scan for duplicates, or find a specific song on a long playlist.
Agreed.

4) A search Sonos playlist feature would be very helpful as well.
Agreed.

Aren't all of these things basic?
Yes, they are and in my humble opinion it's a shame Sonos hasn't shown any willingness to solve this problem.

Very true - only way to do it now is to take one of your home devices to the vacation home with you and re-setup network using its settings.

I hear you beynym! What I don't get is that Sonos can't grasp what they're actually stating on this subject. Something like: Welcome to Sonos, if you want to weed out doubles or backup your long playlists you can't do that with our system, use something else like Subsonic or some such.

If you think about it, it really is idiotic. Good luck with your new car mister, but in case you get a flat tyre our supplied jack won't work. You have to use another manufacturer's equipment for that.

Never mind, Sonos won't listen anyway. I only saw this conversation because it was in my favourites. I suppose I'd better take it out before I get worked up about this and other issues again.

Have fun all!

If it's really important to be able to modify your playlists, it's probably best to use iTunes playlists or playlists through a music service, such as Spotify or Google Play Music. Those options have a lot more functionality to them over Sonos Playlists which are just saved Sonos Queues.
If only someone warned me years ago about this lacking functionality (a Sonos rep? a user manual? a remark on the Sonos website?) before I started building Sonos playlists of over 500 items, which later proved to be uneditable, unbackuppable and unexportable.