Why is it not possible to play directly from my Android phone anymore

yes. THIS again. Because people are PISSED.

This drives me nuts! Why would I ever again buy Sonos products when they remove essential features like this? I don’t subscribe to a music streaming service, and the Sonos devices I have (Arc and Sonos Ones) don’t have bluetooth. The only solutions offered are to subscribe to streaming or invest in NAS - so spend more money to replace the storage my phone does just fine. Effectively Sonos has just decided to deny me access to my music. Thanks!

Support for playing from an Android phone and support for local network music libraries are completely different. The loss of one due to a change in the mobile’s operating system has absolutely zero bearing on the other.

It’s not “Excuses, excuses…”, it’s facts.  I respectfully request you attack the argument and not the person, @RJSUK.  Stop handwaving and make a cogent rebuttal.  Quit attacking people as “apologists” or “usual suspects” and instead, tell us how Sonos is supposed to get around Google’s rules?

Your government bans the use of diesel. Local gas stations stop carrying it. Is it correct to lay the blame on the local station? Or should you blame the government who banned the use? 

That’s exactly the same as what we’re experiencing here. The Android OS has banned the use of their devices as a local drive, affecting Sonos, among some others, and following in the footsteps of Apple, who banned the same thing a couple of years ago. And yet we seem to be blaming Sonos for this change.

I’m not sure this change would have been something Sonos was in favor of, I have heard rumors of them fighting with Apple about it (my ‘source’ is no longer valid, so I don’t know about discussions with the Android folks, but it seems likely). 

Is it frustrating? Sure. Can we all wish the OS makers didn’t have to make this choice, and force Sonos to alter their connection methods? Absolutely. 

I went through this issue a couple of years ago with iOS. Is it life changing? Not to me, it just required a relatively minor change in my habits. I still use Bluetooth to communicate with my Roam, and group it with my other Sonos speakers to play content from my iPad or iPhone. I’ve moved my library to other places (an NAS) for normal playback, especially when my mobile devices are not on the same LAN as the Sonos is. 

I’m afraid it isn’t Sonos who dictates the concentration on streaming services, it is the public. 

• Music streaming makes up 84% of music industry revenue
• The music streaming industry grew by over 10% over the last year
• Music streaming’s global revenue currently sits at $17.5 billion
• Paid music streaming makes up 23% of all music streaming
• 78% of people listen to music via a streaming service
• Over 600 million subscribe to a music streaming platform

https://explodingtopics.com/blog/music-streaming-stats

And at last count (and it was a while ago), 93% of content on Sonos is done via streaming.  7% is local libraries.

Right, but specific to what was of great utility for me and other users was the capability of playing our library from our phone. Desktop/laptop/NAS solutions don’t cover this unfortunately. 

It seems challenging to me to lay the responsibility for that removal of access on mobile devices that run mobile operating systems at the feet of Sonos. 

Perhaps, but their communication/clarity on this has been awful and judging from so many more complaints on the issue I think they could have done a far better job of informing their users. I started skimming through this forum to get more info on the actual root cause and that’s not completely clear either, just some . In any case, I came here to voice my displeasure, am happy to find I am by no means alone with this frustration, and now understand Sonos’s limitations to guide my next purchases.

The firmware on the devices is what has changed this - the app is just a remote to the devices.

So that would mean "nobody" said they aren't supporting local libraries.  Gotcha.

And if Google or Apple tell you you are in violation of their rules and must remove the functionality or be removed from their store, do you still maintain that functionality?  

Everyone is blaming SONOS because it is their fault.

SONOS could have made it work. But instead the company just puts a bot on here to automatically respond to every complaint about what SONOS has done by just blaming Google. I will happily accept that Google is much more evil than SONOS, but in this case  Google is just being used as a scapegoat. SONOS could and should make this work

I will never buy another sonos product. this makes ~$750.00 USD of equipment useless.

I do not think anybody has put a positive spin on the end tp playing music that's on your phone, be it from Android recently or from an iPhone years ago. For many users this has not been a good experience.  It's just that some believe that they are not being lied to when Sonos says it is unavoidable. Others keep going back to the past. 

I’d be surprised if the music library went away, there are enough customers that have content not available via streaming that would be quite unhappy.

Remain a very low priority, probably.

It used to be nice and simple to connect to a Sonos system and play music directly from my Samsung phone; being limited by the host’s music library or being forced to use another godforsaken streaming service is a big step backward.

Sad to see Sonos not adapting to Google’s changes and removing features and functionality. When my company’s software is broken by new iOS or Android requirements we patch and update the code to maintain functionality. Sonos is pitifully doing the opposite.

But why is everyone blaming Sonos when, by all accounts, it’s Google that has discontinued a feature that Sonos was making use of? Or are you agreeing you should/will/have complained to Google? 

And when Android updates their OS, even devices with older Sonos OS’s, this feature will stop working. It’s the Google/Android OS that is forcing this change. Just like when Apple changed iOS and broke ‘on this device’ playback from all iOS devices. 

You could, I suppose, never update either your old Sonos software and your Android software, and keep both of them unchanged in perpetuity.

Completely agree. Its 90% of my use of SONOS and why we bought it in the first place. I feel robbed.

Agreed, you should definitely complain to Google, who is forcing this alteration with the changes they’re making to the Android OS. 

It’s one option, not the only option.  Refer to the original announcement thread, linked in this thread, for other options.

Completely agree with the above angry comments.  The Sonos app has always been known as one of the biggest bag of b******* ever programmed and now they have tampered with it even further to make it impossible to play the songs I own from the phone that I own to the speakers that I own.  I have spent literally thousands on this piece of * over fifteen years and they cannot resist every opportunity to ruin people’s experiences with they system.

*Moderator Note: Modified in accordance with the Community Code of Conduct.*

I suspect Sonos are secretly happy about this. Another reason to drop support for personal libraries altogether and just focus on an app that supports streaming services. New search not showing results for personal libraries and their new range of speakers being Bluetooth enabled spell it out loud and clear.

Yes, we know your shtick.  Baseless FUD post after FUD post.  It's getting tired.  

And I'm not your daddy.