Sonos app on Xperia Z1 issues

Welcome to the forums.

The Sonos app is a controller: it simply issues commands to the hardware Player. The Player is an independent unit which then streams the music directly from your chosen source.

Tell us a bit more. What Sonos units do you have? How do they connect together (wired or wireless, SonosNet or WiFi)? Which music source is giving the trouble?

Hi,

Thanks for the reply.

I have a single Sonos 1 player. The music is all stored on the phone itself and connects to the Sonos 1 via wifi. I don't see it as connectivity issue though as it doesn't happen using other apps on the phone or using my Nexus 10. The problem seems to be specifically using the Sonos apps (version 5.3.1). The phone itself is using Sony's version of Android 4.4.4.

Okay, well in that case the music stream has go from your phone to your router, and then from the router back out to the PLAY:1. If your WiFi is 'on the edge' it might be straining.

When you stream off the Internet using other apps there's a single stream from the router to your phone.

Where is the phone when the track skips occur? The human body is an excellent blocker of WiFi, being composed of mostly water. You might find that leaving the phone out in the open helps, as would being closer to your router.

All of this is not terribly helpful if you're carrying the phone around in a pocket, as most do.

To be honest, whilst streaming to Sonos off a phone is handy when guests visit and want to play their favourites, it's not a great way to do things in the home. You'd be better off playing from a copy of your music stored somewhere on your network, such as a computer or a small NAS. A basic NAS is not expensive, and is easy to set up.

If you want to stick with phone-based music an alternative approach would be wire a Sonos BRIDGE (or BOOST) to your router. Your PLAY:1 would then operate on its own wireless, SonosNet. Crucially, though, your Android phone could then be configured to attach directly to the PLAY:1's wireless signal. A stream of music could then pass directly from the phone to the PLAY:1, rather than via the router in some distant room.

The phone itself tends to be somewhere near me but not in my pocket when I'm at home. It's a small place so wifi coverage should be ok.

Any thoughts on why it works fine if I use the built in Walkman app or Google music?

Any thoughts on why it works fine if I use the built in Walkman app or Google music?
Only that, as I said, these apps just pull music straight from the Internet. There's therefore just the one stream traversing your WiFi.

For Sonos to fetch music from your phone via the router there have to be two wireless hops:
phone -> router
router -> PLAY:1

Have you tried setting your router onto a different WiFi channel? You may find one which is less congested by neighbours. You'd be advised to only pick channels 1, 6 or 11 so as to avoid overlaps, as each channel is in fact around 4.5 'channel-numbers' in width.

One further thought: I've occasionally seen a background Android service get stuck in some kind of loop, eating battery. If that were the case it could be tending to commandeer the phone's processor. A phone reboot should clear that.

Don't worry, your issue could be solve in very easy way by following:
From the Home screen, tap Apps.
Tap Settings.
Scroll down to Applications and tap "Application manager."
Tap Sonos App.
Tap Force Stop. If you see a message that says "If you force stop an app, it may cause errors," tap OK.
Return to the Home screen or your application list, and reopen Sonos App.
If the issues persist, clear the app cache.
You can also try more methods from Sony Xperia Z1 Manual such as Clear the app cache, Restart your phone etc.