Hi.  You need to give more info, and more specific info, if the Community is going to be able to help.  Please tell us what Sonos speakers you have and give details of your network (especially if you have a mesh network, access points etc.

What content are you trying to play?

However, if you do need to talk to Sonos, you can call Sonos Support directly to discuss it. Posting here puts you in contact with the community.

I have had sonos for 12 years plus. 4 amps 2 arcs 2subs 12 in ceiling speakers record played. Been a big supported till now. I was always able to set up my system and friends system and now my system is down. Thought I would  reset all speakers and amps due to a lot problems  and now can't get it to work. Asking to set up manager. 1 hour hold time. Was great but worried system wont work again. I easy have $6000 invested. My system sounded just as good as friends that had spent $25000 and more. How can you screw up a system like this? See all the horror stories and worried! Going to keep trying because can't give up to much money spent. Call local entertainmt company to see if thay can help.

Oh dear…!

All you likely needed to do was follow the link below and speak to Sonos Customer Support. In fact Sonos do emphasise, if not selling on your Sonos products, to not reset them until you’ve spoken to their Support Staff, particularly if you do not know what you’re doing to get them back up and running again…

Anyhow here’s the link to contact the Staff…

https://support.sonos.com/s/contact

I will contact them. I never had a problem setting it up till new software update. If there are so many problems there should be better support. I don't mind spending 15 minutes or so but over an hour?

I don’t think there are (m)any problems with system setup - I did one for a friend last week, a Beam 2, Sonos Five, Era 300, Roam, Sub 4 and two old (used) Play:1’s and didn’t encounter a single issue.

I’ve not seen any complaints, other than your own over the Holiday period. Anyhow I hope that you find the answers you’re looking for via Sonos Support. 

Ok I was able to get in contact with support this morning. No hold time. Set up the whole system and works perfectly now. I think the first software was so easy to set up causes a lot of the frustration. Now you need support to do it correctly. If your system isn't working correctly you need to get support. For all you sonos lifers like me find a time when support is not so busy and call. We spent over a hour setting up my system. They are able to connect to your phone and help if there is any confusion. So all of you out there think you system is junk its now true you just have to put more effort into support. Hope this helps. Good luck

I’ve been a Sonos fan for ages, and even after the issues since the latest app was deployed, I’m still convinced that there’s nothing that beats Sonos.  But let’s not be disingenuous: the controller is an unmitigated catastrophe, and every new update brings a few improvements and opens new issues: just today one of my Sonos:3 randomly disconnects during playback, and some 5 to 20 seconds later reconnects by itself (I have multiple speakers in the ground floor, and can easily tell which one is temporarily going offline).  I’ve had the exact same set-up for a few years, nothing has changed at home...except the controller software update. 

What is a Sonos:3? Is it actually a Sonos PLAY:3? 

Networks are constantly changing on their own, as the environment they’re dealing with changes, which is their design. This applies to wired as well as wireless networks. They’re also impacted by outside influences, even if there has been no internal change made by you. I’d encourage you to at the least refer to the wifi interference FAQ.

I can’t see how the Sonos App would cause your Play:3 to disconnect for any period of time and not continue playing. The App is just for control, in fact once the selected music is started on the speaker, or group, the App itself can be fully closed and the mobile controller device powered off and the music should continue playing - so my thoughts are you ‘might’ have an LAN/WAN networking issue, or maybe a problem with that particular speaker - I’d certainly ignore it being related to the Sonos Controller App.

​@Airgetlam: yes, I meant PLAY:3, not SONOS:3.  While I’m not looking for help on today’s particular issue (the reason I came here was to see if anyone else was experiencing the exact same thing), I can add that I’ve had the exact same setup for around 7 years. I can’t rule that there’s no WiFi interference around this particular PLAY:3, but I can very confidently say that there’s no new WiFi interference, and today’s erratic speaker behaviour I have never seen. It must have dropped off around 10 times in under 1 hour.

​@Ken_Griffiths: I can’t see how the app could cause 1 speaker to randomly drop off either, but I don’t know what behaviour a controller update triggers behind the user interface (there certainly is a constant back-and-forth communication between the speakers and the app, as the app can “report” in real time speaker volume, song progress, etc). I’m sure nobody around here can see how the new app that’s been around since May still can’t smoothly control volume, how it can take as long as 30 seconds for the app to reconnect to the speakers after re-starting, how the Sonos engineering team still can’t restore playlist editing, and a long list of etcs.  But the fact that we can’t imagine how it’s possible doesn’t mean that it’s impossible. I can only see from my empirical standpoint that nothing on my end has changed except for this one factor, so it’s a fair assumption that it could have an effect. 

I don’t see any of the issues you mention - if I open the App (from a fully closed state), all Sonos rooms connect in a matter of a few seconds (or less). Volume controls have no issues on my network. I still think the issues you have are ‘likely’ something local, rather than Sonos-App related. 

I’ve attached a couple of screen-captures from my iPhone XR App, just ones I think may cover at least some the issues that you mention with your own Sonos App.

In my own case, the Sonos devices run on a WiFi-6AX mesh setup and where available, I utilise their faster 5Ghz WiFi connection to the LAN. I choose to not use the (now) much slower SonosNet signal.

In the Sonos App (where shown) the device SNR connection levels are at 45dB, or higher, as mentioned in this Sonos Support link:

https://support.sonos.com/en-us/article/understanding-the-network-details-section-in-the-sonos-app

I personally found, early on, that improving my own device SNR connection levels to the 5Ghz WiFi band (where practicable), noticeably reduced the type of latency issues that you mention.

I do a number of other things besides., but if not tried already, you could perhaps take a look at your devices connection type and signal level, just to see if it might improve what you’re seeing at the moment.

Your assumptions seem all spot-on, but I don’t think I am facing network challenges.  My router is, albeit not in line-of-sight, not even 4 meters/12 feet of the PLAY:3.  SNR is excellent, and I’m too using the 5 GhZ connection: 

Also, while my volume sliders move exactly like yours, the speakers just don’t react to them, at least not for a good 5 to 10 seconds. 

My whole point in this conversation is that the new application is mediocre, in its current 3-times patched, in the best case.  The undisputable, overwhelming reaction of the global community was clear, and Sonos acknowledged it...the current software has many issues, it’s not just lacking features.  The Sonos Chief Innovation Officer, in the 10th December update (2.5 weeks ago), wrote that “we have been beta testing several features and fixes, with a particular focus on improving system setup and the reliability of adding new products, volume control and responsiveness”.

Finally, the fact that you haven’t seen any complaints during the holidays other than the OP’s doesn’t mean that there aren’t issues. It could just mean that people don’t know of this website, can’t be bothered troubleshooting via the community or by themselves, are going to do it after the holidays, that they lost trust in Sonos already, or any other possible reasons.  I just wouldn’t be too dismissive of other people’s challenges with a software that everyone knows that is severely lacking.

​@Fernando_1,

I certainly wasn’t trying to be dismissive - I’m just suggesting some things that might perhaps help if you’re having volume-control issues, delay with the App finding your speakers and the sound dropping out from your Play:3 - which, in the latter case, I still don’t personally think is likely Sonos App related.

Your suggestion of the App communicating/polling the speaker, or vice versa, still does not explain why other users with Play:3s are not widely reporting the issue, or why your other speakers on your own network are not encountering the same issue.

FWIW I did record my iPad App opening from a fully closed state earlier today and display my Sonos rooms and again the connection to all is within a couple of seconds and not as long as you described earlier - So that still makes me think you may have network latency issues and that the mDNS/SSDP multicasting packets are perhaps encountering some latency issues too over your network - i guess that might even be something running on your controller device that’s causing that ‘discovery’ issue (not that it would be the cause of your Play:3 dropout, however). It could just be general ‘intermittent ’WiFi interference, perhaps, as suggested by ​@Airgetlam earlier - so it might be worth looking at the WiFi interference link he provided.

If after that the problems mentioned do persist it maybe best to reproduce the issue(s) seen and then immediately submit a Sonos system diagnostic report from within the Sonos App, note it’s reference and contact/chat with Sonos Support Staff via this LINK and see what the Staff can perhaps suggest to help you to resolve the matter.

I’m not worried about my PLAY:3 glitching. I’m dead certain it’s on SONOS’ end, not my network (I play online frequently, and in several of my games there’s a permanent on-screen ping clock): a very short WiFi dropoff would affect my gaming big time, it would be visible in the ping clock, and should not affect music playback in a single speaker (which is about 2 meters away from my computer in line-of-sight) which probabyl has a very decent buffer.  So I’m very confident it will be fixed with an upcoming update. I don’t feel very cynical when I say they will break something else, but I’m getting used to it.

I would like to stress my point once more:  I can imagine Excron’s issues setting up his sytem, as system setup is a known issue with Sonos’ current software, as pointed out by Sonos themselves in their official updates.