Close to giving up on my Sonos system and looking elsewhere for a replacement. The App is just not for purpose!! Failure in connecting to speakers, failure to respond to commands once connection achieved. Ludicrous reconnection rigmarole required every time I want to listen to music. I’ve had enough.
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When your phone (the app is just a remote) cannot reach the system, it’s usually a network problem.
Close to giving up on my Sonos system and looking elsewhere for a replacement. The App is just not for purpose!! Failure in connecting to speakers, failure to respond to commands once connection achieved. Ludicrous reconnection rigmarole required every time I want to listen to music. I’ve had enough.
Are you asking for help, or just venting your frustration with your network setup,
A bit of both! I’ve noted my issue with the app is not unique. I’ve attempted to implement some of the suggested fixes on this platform…to little effect. Unless somebody has something new to suggest then take it as a rant!
A bit of both! I’ve noted my issue with the app is not unique. I’ve attempted to implement some of the suggested fixes on this platform…to little effect. Unless somebody has something new to suggest then take it as a rant!
Rant aside, the ‘discovery’ of the Sonos products by the Sonos controller App can sometimes be a slightly complex area to explore, but briefly…
SSDP (the UPnP simple service discovery protocol) is used to initially discover the Sonos players and is done via multicasting via UDP to 239.255.255.250:1900 and, for good measure, broadcasting to 255.255.255.255:1900.
Both the Sonos players and controllers must share the same network subnet. However if the Sonos devices are connecting to multiple access points, the recommendations (from myself) are that they be set to the same WiFi channel and channel-width. This is for optimum performance particularly in groups and for some reason with some (not all) mesh-based WiFi systems, it appears some will work okay with Sonos, but others may not, particularly if the satellites/AP’s are perhaps auto-selecting their own WiFi channels. I’ve seen some people report issues with Google ‘nest’ mesh WiFi, for example, although others will occasionally say it works for their ‘small’ Sonos setup.
What is certainly not supported though by Sonos, are wireless range extenders, as some can mangle device MAC addresses and EoP (powerline) adapters.. so if you are using those type of wireless access points, to extend the wireless network coverage, then that may cause such intermittent device discovery issues by the Sonos Controller App.
Reserving the IP addresses in the routers DHCP reservation table can often help with device discovery, so consider making your Sonos IP addresses static. The router user-manual will normally assist you to do that in most cases.
Just to add aswell, it can sometimes be Apps/software running on the mobile ‘controller’ device that interfere with ‘device discovery’ Examples to perhaps consider are…
- VPN Client
- Firewall software
- Antivirus software
- WiFi Calling/Dial assist
- Private network address (MAC address spoofing)
- Mobile data enabled for the Sonos App
So consider disabling these features, even temporarily, just to see if that may fix your device ‘discovery’ issue.
Thank you for taking the time to deliver this comprehensive response. However nothing you’ve detailed works. I’m done with Sonos. Fabulous speakers rendered utterly useless by a dreadful app.
Thank you for taking the time to deliver this comprehensive response. However nothing you’ve detailed works. I’m done with Sonos. Fabulous speakers rendered utterly useless by a dreadful app.
Shame for you, but I’m sure someone will benefit. What kit do you have and where are you selling it? I expect it’ll be priced quite low as it’s “utterly useless”?
3 x Sonos Play 1, with stands. Appearing at a nearby charity shop soon.
Thank you for taking the time to deliver this comprehensive response. However nothing you’ve detailed works. I’m done with Sonos. Fabulous speakers rendered utterly useless by a dreadful app.
It's not the app. It's your network.
I don’t accept the “it`s not the App, it`s your network” explanation… whilst I do accept that it`s important to set it up properly, there are still issues which are most certainly due to the App.
I have a network setup using UniFi kit and it has been solid for years. Sonos has also performed very well until recently.
Without any changes to my network configuration, my Sonos App on my iPhone mini 12 has become extremely unreliable and slow. But it’s perfectly fine, at least for now, on my wife`s App on her iPhone 12.
Sonos units all have their IP`s set to static and there are no conflicts.
All Sonos units are on same Wi-Fi SSID.
Wi-Fi channels are clear and show very little interference.
Sonos controller on Mac mini which is wired in, has no issues nor lag whatsoever.
The network configuration has remained unchanged for two years now… the only thing which has changed is updates to the Sonos S2 App on my phone, and it`s gone downhill from there.
Couldn’t agree more. I’ve been operating my Sonos system for years, and throughout the App’s performance has been adequate. However of late the it’s been a barrier to listening to music! Definitely not my network. And any exploration of this platform and Apple’s Sonos App Review history makes that abundantly clear!
If using Unifi then see the below link…
Also see this manufacturers official link:
Yupp! All set up just like those links suggest. No joy..
The network has had that configuration for years, but problems have started recently with Sonos App updates.
Just went through troubleshooting with Sonos themselves and they ran out of ideas.
My Sonos controller on my Mac mini has no issues whatsoever… only the Sonos App on my phone. My phone has no other issues with connectivity.
Ditto.
Yupp! All set up just like those links suggest. No joy..
The network has had that configuration for years, but problems have started recently with Sonos App updates.
Just went through troubleshooting with Sonos themselves and they ran out of ideas.
Sounds like you’re out of luck then. The Wife and I use a different type of wired/wireless mesh network, which works great with Sonos & their App, so sorry I can’t assist you further.
Appreciate your help and efforts, I really do!
Out of luck indeed… can`t do much about fixing the App.
Has been running perfectly fine for years (and still does via the computer)… when I first set up UniFi 5 years ago, it quickly became apparent that Sonos didn`t like RSTP, so that got sorted fairly quickly.
Sonos App updates come out all the time with “Bug fixes and performance improvements”… can only keep fingers crossed!
Sometimes I find that Ubiquiti updates break things. I do not automatically update Ubiquiti. As a test power down PLAY:3.
I have indeed rebooted everything… the network, the APs, Sonos… everything.
Sonos works great from the Mac mini controller.
Just not from the App (which got even worse after rebooting the Sonos units.
Certainly not convinced that Ubiquiti is to blame there. Everything else works great.
One should never assume that the problem must be […] or cannot be e…], however, you should play the percentages. I don’t put Ubiquiti at the top of my list, but it is not buried deep in the list.
No, that`s true…
But when the App constantly fails to connect to my Sonos units and the desktop does not… and everything on the matrix table of the Sonos system shows green, then the Sonos App places very (!) high, if not at the top of the list of suspects.
No other issues other than the App.
What if communication between the 2.4 and 5GHz segments is blocked?
No reason why it should be blocked...
No reason why it should be blocked...
My thoughts are it’s either something running on your mobile device, or an issue within your local network - as mentioned earlier.
It is quite difficult for anyone ‘external’, without access to things on the LAN, to precisely know why the SSDP multicast ‘discovery’ (part of the UPnP protocol) packets are not transversing between your Sonos controller App and your Sonos speakers, but that’s where you likely need to concentrate the troubleshooting.
I’m a little surprised that the Sonos Support Staff were unable to pinpoint to you where the issues may lie with your diagnostic submission reports etc. It might be best to go back to Support and perhaps get a Level-2 engineer involved and (if necessary) provide them with temporary LAN access to troubleshoot the issue under your supervision and hopefully get the issue resolved that way.
I did get a call-back from Sonos and went through screensharing with them as well… nothing.
At the moment I`m testing it with 5Ghz disabled all together on the Wi-Fi, but it`s still lagging a lot and slow to populate the list of devices.
I`ll just use the controller on the desktop and see how things perhaps change in the future. Like I mentioned… everything works perfectly from my desktop, so i highly doubt that the issue is the network. But I have looked into every suggestion on that front still and found nothing wrong.
Starting to see the same behaviour again with only 3 of 7 devices appearing in the Sonos App when the Wi-Fi has 5Ghz disabled. App very laggy. All still perfect from the desktop.
Fingers crossed that they can figure out why, one day...
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