Yes Spotify Connect has been broken since it launched, and it has never gotten any better.

Using Spotify within the Sonos app is more reliable, but I wouldn’t call it reliable. It’s also extremely out of date with Spotify features and user interface.

A plain old Sony amp with Spotify Connect I’m sure works well. Heck, I remember using a normal amp with Airport Express and an aux cable 15 years ago worked better than Sonos ever has.

I regret buying into this system so bad.

Works fine for me - I use the native Spotify app all the time and move the music to a Sonos unit which is seen by its name in the list of players in the Spotify app. I am on S1, but that should not be relevant. Why can you not use it in this manner?

There are occasional reports on here of users not being able to see all Sonos devices, but on past experience a bug affecting even a tiny proportion of users results in an avalanche of posts.  I don’t believe there is any evidence of a general problem in the implementation of Spotify Connect on Sonos speakers.  I no longer use Spotify but when I did, I occasionally used Spotify Connect with no issues.

Edit: thinking back over the occasional threads that there have been on the issue of Spotify not finding any or some Sonos speakers, I seem to recall some weird and implausible ‘solutions’ claimed in individual cases, including enabling mobile data, turning off Bluetooth and shutting down an Apple watch.

Lol.

After posting, I thought on a re read that OP is trying to do more than just listen to music when he refers to “exercising Spotify API” and “automation platforms”, so perhaps my use case that works fine for just simple music play is not relevant to him.

On a re-read I think you are right Kumar.  I suspect the vast majority of potential Sonos customers are happy to understand ‘Spotify Connect compliant’ to mean you can play from the Spotify app.  In fact, this information sheet talks only of being able to control Sonos from the Spotify app, the expression ‘Spotify Connect compliant’ is not used here.  Perhaps it is used elsewhere…..?

https://support.sonos.com/s/article/1153?language=en_US

Maybe the OP could point us to where Sonos make the clam he refers to?

Or perhaps he can explain what else does Spotify connect compliant achieve in addition to music play from the Spotify app.

@Kumar It can’t be working fine if you use the Spotify API - not the app, the programatic interface Spotify expose to the world. The Sonos players are not exposed by Spotify on the API and thus can’t be controlled properly from say home automation platforms.

It is a major problem.

For instance, I am using Home Assistant to integrate and automate the "things" I have in my home.

As I have had massive problems controlling the Sonos / Spotify combo in a deterministic manner I wanted to get to the bottom of these problems.

As an experiment I therefore just installed Moode Audio (an open source Linux based audio product) on an old Raspberry PI 1 I had lying around and it showed up as a Spotify Connect renderer immediately.

I can control the Moode Audio player just fine from both Spotify and HA so this surely is a Sonos induced problem as they don't expose the speakers to Spotify as Spotify Connect renderers. This is also evident if I query Spotify via their API - the Sonos devices are not shown as devices.

Why that is - and how the Spotify apps can connect to them anyway is a mystery.

I'm guessing Spotify has decided to be the better sport and use Sonos UPnP protocol to enable Sonos speakers as Spotify endpoints and that Sonos support therefore is somewhat hardcoded in Spotify as it is certainly not a Spotify Connect compliant implementation.

If you start a Spotify playlist from Sonos' app, Spotify won't even know about it for 30 odd seconds and you can therefore end up in a situation where you have two players (or more?) devices playing different things at the same time for at little while. In that situation I think one of the two platforms is infringing artist rights.

I fail to understand why Sonos can't get their act together and be a team player in the same way as just about everyone else is and just expose their speakers to whoever want to play on the Sonos speakers. 

The end of the matter will be that I'm thinking about selling the Sonos Port I just bought to get the S2 platform (have 4 One 2. gen too) and go with a RPI + a good Spotity Connect compliant audio software instead (will try 3-4 different products to pick one that suits my needs best).

And on top of all that I’ll add some HiFi hardware add-on to the RPI to make it a high-end’ish renderer - the only thing missing is that Spotify will start to deliver proper lossless CD quality...

Anyway, going this route, I'll loose Sonos multi room - but Spotify can do that for me and either way I don't use that feature a lot. For live radio station playback I’ll figure something out using Home Assistant or voice control. Sonos’ UI is a mess anyway.

I'll be damned if Sonos is going to be the judge of how I use my gear. They are going to loose that battle and I will find other solutions to my problems.

@John B 

Look, I’m not after a war of words. In my book they claim to be Spotify Connect capable. This would mean one would be able to use the Spotify API to control the Sonos devices. This is not the case and they fail to meet a simple 2021 requirement: Interoperability.

I’m simply after getting Sonos to play ball and let the user decide how the gear he owns and paid good money for should be used in his own settings.

The best way to do that is to let the system be open and transparent and it is neither.

I’ve been digging a little deeper into these musings.

From the Spotify side of things:

When I pick a Sonos device from the Spotify app as a playback target Spotify interacts with Sonos using the Sonos API endpoint, similar to this sequence:

1. Spotify queries the Sonos device it’s “info” using a seemingly undocumented /spotifyzc API endpoint
2. Spotify makes a http POST request to Sonos with a so-called “HTML Form URL Encoded” Form containing the information Sonos should use to log into my Spotify account.
   The important part of the FORM is encrypted seemingly using a certificate. This means that Sonos and Spotify dev teams must have agreed on what the encrypted information contains and how it must be interpreted, i.e. the contract between the two of them. And they have exchanged their public keys. Either will use the counterparts public key + their own private key to encrypt messages and the counterpart will do the opposite to decrypt the information. This is considered a safe method of exchanging information over an insecure network. But it depends (on the encryptions strength) and further, in this case, we’ll have to assume that the private keys are present in both the Sonos devices and possibly bundled with the apps (Sonos, Spotify, ...).
3. From there on, Sonos seems to take over the control and apparently logs into my Spotify account - possibly to use the encrypted information to get a hold of the byte stream and to setup the playback control stuff.
4. Sonos starts streaming and notifies the UPnP network of this.

I don’t know enough about the possible security implications to know if it’s ok that Sonos impersonate me and use my Spotify account in this way.

I’m sure I’ve accepted it in the EULA at some point though ;-)

I have also just found a possible workaround to have e.g. Home Assistant see the Sonos devices as Spotify renderers - it’s just a lot of yak shaving, when Sonos might as well just play nice - after all, I do pay them quite a bit of money to solve and not make problems for me...

Please find below an email exchange with Sonos. A bit strange that Home Assistant was unknown! Hopefully something will come out of it! It’s in reverse order so start reading at the bottom

Hi Jos,

Thank you for your reply regarding 02721051.

Thanks very much for the clarification, I have not come across this type of home automation before. I have also shared knowledge about Home Assistant with my colleagues in case they were not aware. 

We do work closely with Spotify and are always happy to receive improvement suggestions like this. Because of this, I have taken your valuable feedback about improving how Spotify Connect and Sonos operate with a view towards interoperability with Home Assistant and have passed it on internally to the relevant team. 

Thanks again for your clarification and bringing this to our attention. If you have any further suggestions or queries to raise to us, don't hesitate to contact us. 

With best regards,

Lauri G.
Sonos | Customer Care | Contact Us
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Sent: 3/24/2021 3:29 PM
To: support@sonos.com
Subject: Re: Spotify
 

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