Party Mode is a problem. We need ability to create multiple groups of rooms!

as a new user who went from one Play1 to a Play3 and another Play1 in a matter of weeks... i TOO am AMAZED that the ability to have PERMANENT groups of rooms is not a feature! really? and its been how many years? SONOS come on!!!!! there is a perfect solution from THE MEKON right here.

i LOVE that you added PLEX (and the week after i bought my first speaker) as that was the ONLY reason i had held off and had finally just given in and then WHAT a treat to have PLEX added... but the multiple rooms...this cant be that difficult to add!

Thanks for all the feedback and suggestions guys. We've heard the request for more flexibility and expanded grouping controls in a number of ways in various threads, but we always like to hear your ideas. We don't publish any plans for the future of Sonos in terms of what's coming out, but thanks for sharing. We'll pass the word on for you.

If you have suggestions for how you'd like this sort of feature to work please feel free to share.

I started using Sonos 5 years ago and have grown my system to 8 ceiling speakers powered by Connect:Amp, Soundbar, and multiple Play:1's, a Play:3, and a Play:5. Having to re-group all these components all the time is the single most ANNOYING aspect of my system. Please, please, PLEASE!, add this feature!!!

May I suggest "Virtual Room" as the feature name. I can see the Mekon solution work by which the latest Virtual Room being activated (from Stop to Play) "wins" all the configured speakers automatically. Alternatively, I could also see a simple yes/no user prompt such as "Living Room and Dining Room are currently playing music from Virtual Room 'Downstairs', play music from this room instead?" Nothing wrong with letting the user decide to leave the conflicting speakers in the existing virtual room or have them taken over by the new virtual room.

In either case, PLEASE add this feature in one of the next releases, it really cannot be that difficult to implement compared to other challenges that have been solved.

in the meantime, give the Sonosequencr app a go (IOS only)

Wow, I'm greatly disappointed that this wasn't a basic feature right out of the gate. I just got my second Play1 and planned on getting a third to group them up in interesting ways, but I am rethinking this. This reeks of lack of competition that this hasn't been implemented.

Wow, I'm greatly disappointed that this wasn't a basic feature right out of the gate. I just got my second Play1 and planned on getting a third to group them up in interesting ways, but I am rethinking this. This reeks of lack of competition that this hasn't been implemented.

Hey ChewyWaffles (I love your username!)

Just to clarify, you can have as many groups of Sonos players are you'd like (your only limit is no more than 32 players in a household). The title of this thread is misleading as the subject is really about having quick access groups that are easier to make.

Currently, if you have 3 rooms, you can have 2 doing one thing and 1 doing another. Just as if you have 6 players, you could have three groups of 2, two groups of 3, two groups of 2 and two playing separately for what would look in the controller like 4 "groups".

Groups are temporary and can be changed around as much as you'd like, they'll show up in the controller as multiple room names with a box around them showing they're together. This is slightly different from how you'd "bond" players together, where they show up as one room name and reboots don't clear the settings.

I think the title should be "favourite groups". Or "favourite layouts"

Any player can only reside in one group at a time, but you should have the ability to select a particular layout at a time.

As a simple example

Four players. Bedroom, kitchen, lounge and outdoors.

Favourite layout 1 could be "all": all players in one group for when you may be cleaning the house and garden.

Favourite layout 2: "party" this could put the kitchen, lounge and garden in one group and the bedroom in another.

Favourite layout 3: "indoor party". This could put the kitchen and lounge in a group and leave the others alone. For when you aren't using the outdoors or don'the want to annoy neighbours with late music.


So each player is only ever in one group at a time, but you can select favourite layouts for groups. Its easy to see how this would be more beneficial the larger the number of players in a system.

I had the same idea. Could it be set up with logical groups for upstairs and downstairs. Also, the mute switch cancels the whole group, would it be better for this to ungroup that zone only? e.g. If the wife takes a call in the kitchen, and mutes the Sonos, the 'party mode' would continue to play in the rest of the house?

This is crazy. I was expecting this out of the gate as well.

What's crazier is this thread is 3 years old. This seems like a pretty easy addition guys, I can sketch the screens up for you if you'd like. Mobile apps are what my company does.

In for creating new groups. Just got my second Sonos speaker today and it was the first thing I tried to do.

Just got my Sonos gear (1 x connect, 2 x connect:amp).
This was the first feature I was looking for.
The control software looks well polished, so I would expect a feature like this out of the box.