As mentioned in another post. Sonos alarm never seems to be able to turn on the radio. Instead it goes for a chime. The suggestion in the post is super annoying. Try to wake the system up.
The problem isn’t that the radio is unavailable it is just not able to connect or something. But when I turn off the chime the radio always works! Like always. Why don’t Sonos wait 30 seconds for the radio to be switched to Chime. Because the chime noise is perhaps the most annoying thing ever to get awoken by.
This morning I also tried the idea of waking the network. So it has been super awake.It’s just Sonos which is slow. Please fix this.
Alarm is not working
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It doesn’t matter as I said. This is an engineer issue. It does not try before it gets connected. So I’m wondering why Sonos don’t fix it? Clearly others are annoyed by the same thing looking at all the posts about the exact same issue. This is bad engineering. Not to be fixed by changing the alarm time. Such solutions is just plain misunderstanding of the situation.
The players are impatient. If the station is slow to respond, the system will fall back to the chime.
You may be able to attract the station’s attention by setting a silent alarm a minute prior to the actual alarm.
With regard to a previous suggestion of adjusting the alarm time slightly. Some stations could be overwhelmed with users simultaneously attempting to connect on the hour in a particular time zone. This will slow the response — risking a SONOS timeout. Another detail is that stations will contract for a certain number of simultaneous streams from a server company. If the limit is reached, the station must either ignore the current request, dump a user that has been playing for hours (having left the building or is simply keeping the pet parrot company) or incur additional fees by the server company. The station must make a choice.
Early in the life of SONOS stations would not start immediately because data was fetched to fill a cache. This resulted in more stable play because the player had many seconds of music available, even if the Internet connection went down. There were complaints about slow startup. As system features have been added and Internet connectivity has become more robust, memory has been stolen from the cache to support features. Stations now start faster, but are more vulnerable to interruptions. Back in the day I could have only one player connected to the network and move the network connection to another player while music was playing. This was huge disruption of connectivity, but the system worked through the details without music interruption.
Thank you for the explanation. I see your point. But this is still an engineering problem. This is a wake up alarm. If it is not connecting to the radio I want a button saying on the alarm I can wait up to 5 minutes while the Sonos try to connect. I don’t want the option of chime unless there has gone some time. I’m awake to listen to radio not rush out of bed. So the chime is not doing its work. When you have a radio wake up, it’s not for jumping out of bed.
The same started to happen to me with Radioplayer and started a few weeks ago.
it used to work seamlessly for years.
There is clearly something that has changed in the software or the way Sonos handle things as I read a lot of posts concerning this for TuneIn and Radioplayer.
I will open a ticket for that at Sonos
I have the same problem. We used to connect sonos alarm to our music collection stored on a NAS. For the last 3 weeks all we get is Sonos chimes which is not a pleasant way to wake up. The alam does seem to work on Spotify. Definitely an engineering issue as it used to work fine.
We have the same problem. Radio alarm doesn’t work but we can turn it on manually, which is very annoying. We used to connect sonos alarm to our Radio, and it used to work great. obviously there is a problem for Sonos to prioritize. Thank you.
We have a similar issues but with Spotify. Three alarms are set on three different speakers:
- Speaker 1: TuneIn @ 05:30
- Speaker 2: Spotify playlist @ 06:00
- Speaker 3: Spotify playlist @ 06:00
We’ve had this setup for years and it’s been working, but for the last two-three weeks Speaker 2 and Speaker 3 only plays the Sonos chime.
Two days ago I changed the Spotify playlists the alarms were using, desperate trying anything to fix the issue, and the next day both Speaker 2 and Speaker 3 actually played music instead of the chime.
But this morning Speaker 3 played the chime again, while Speaker 2 still managed to play the configured playlist.
Odd thing here is that Speaker 3 always have a stable connection when using it while Speaker 2 have intermittent connection issue. So I’m surprised Speaker 3 was the one to revert back to the chime this morning.
Anyway, this was just a ”me too” post. The alarm feature appear to be broken.
We have a similar issues but with Spotify. Three alarms are set on three different speakers:
- Speaker 1: TuneIn @ 05:30
- Speaker 2: Spotify playlist @ 06:00
- Speaker 3: Spotify playlist @ 06:00
Anyway, this was just a ”me too” post. The alarm feature appear to be broken.
A possible workaround. Change your alarm times to 05:58, or 06:02, and see if that helps. You, along with thousands of other people will have an alarm set on their smart speakers for the o’clock times. The Music services will be getting these 1000’s of requests at exact same time due to the fact the smart speakers are all using time sync.
sigh…
Alarms still not working on Sonos app. First reported about 12 months ago. Can’t play alarm playlist via Spotify or Soundcloud. Once it’s ready to play it instead defaults to play the awful chime, even though this is not set.
Other issues:
Bbc radio no longer works in Sonos app - have to play it via bbc sounds app in Sonos.
Spotify also freezes using Sonos speakers only. Once advert/commercials comes on it stops playing. Have to click pause play to enable music again.
Can the developers please provide a timeline to fix these ongoing tech issues? Seems like they are all being ignored.
What did Sonos Support suggest, when you contacted them?
“Bbc radio no longer works in Sonos app - have to play it via bbc sounds app in Sonos. “
BBC made a change a while back, you have to use bbc sounds service in Sonos to access bbc content.
Having the same issue. I've used the Alarm feature for years now and having the alarm chime very rarely when there was a drop in connection. However the alarm chime is every morning and it won't cancel on Alexa, so it's frustrating as have to get my phone out, open the app to shut the noise off and it's an infuriating noise!
I listen to virgin radio so thought it was due to the new login via news broadcasting but thats all logged in and still getting the chime. My alarm is usually set 45 on the hour so assuming not in the same issue as on the hour.
Becoming increasingly annoyed with sonos in general, spent all this money across 4 speakers as also lost the functionality of playing tracks off my phone files. I listen to alot of independent bands whom arnt all on Spotify etc, so I purchase CDs/ digital downloads to support them and used to be able to play them from my phone library. Considering selling them all and investing in something that isn't giving me all this hassle!
Same problem. Never had any problem, now I have to wake to the Sonos chime :-(
Tried restarting, restarting router, different alarm settings, different speakers… all the same result. A fix is needed!
Same issue here. Tried resting everything but still the chime with the alarm. Was working until I update the app with the last update so perhaps it’s something that was done during the last update that has had a knock on effect to the alarm function. Invested in Sonos but now starting to consider as change to Bose as it works well with the alarm function. Not into a community “help page “ where customers are sharing problems rather than Sonos investing in a proper customer help system where we talk to Sonos and they advise how to solve their own problems. On further note, noticed all the various advice in rebooting routers, adjusting alarm times ?? Radio stations servers being busy all at the same time ( clutching straws with that one ) everything but any fault with Sonos’s own software being the issue. If so many customers have the same issue it can’t be all the other options, it’s logically got to be a software problem.
I've had Sonos for 10 years. And only in the last couple of weeks has it decided to not play the radio and play chime instead. Which is most unpleasant lol
I have read the previous comments and a little confused. So is Sonos saying it's not a Sonos problem but the radio stations problem?
I really don't understand how that could be the case but open for that to be explained further ;)
I just want it to work again. You really shouldn't have to change the alarm time... £1500 to £2000 spent on kit that doesn't work. I'm so done with Sonos tbh. Cannot wait till a new viable company comes along to replace it.
Writing this quickly on the way out to work....so not the most elequantly put. 😎
Same issue. Latest firmware and app version installed.
Alarm works only occasionally as set up but frequently does the following:
Radio station does not play but Sonos Chime does after about 30 seconds past alarm set time,(timeout?)
Radio station plays for maybe 2 minutes then stops and the Sonos Chime plays.
Station is BBC World News and is available.
Alarms were reliable without time out issues before the new app debacle.
SONOS can release new products and do jazz hands but can’t provide users with a reliable app.
Do better SONOS
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