Sonos support for Apple Music's Lossless Audio

It would be more likely, yes, since the connection between the Sonos and your system is already either Dolby Digital (Beam) or up to Dolby Atmos on the Arc. But it then depends on the output of the AppleTV, and of course how your TV passes the sound. And you’ll need to have your TV on, too. 

Thanks for the link. I’ve submitted feedback to Apple. 

Me as well. 

Somehow I doubt that this will come to Sonos in a hurry. I have Apple Music and Spotify, regular services, that serve me well enough with the HiFi listening experience at home through a combination of Sonos and third party kit. But I rarely use Apple Music because the native app still does not work with Sonos even after all these years. Spotify does; for that matter so does Amazon Music. I can use Apple Music via Amazon via voice control too, and thence to Sonos, but voice isn't always as convenient as using the native app on the phone.

I suspect that the reason for this lack is that Apple and Sonos don’t see eye to eye, which is ironic because both companies are much more like each other than different. The other ironic thing of course is that a lot of Sonos fans don’t like Apple because it is a closed universe...go figure 

I’m not sure what you are referring to. I do this (or something similar) all the time - I use Airplay to cast music from the Apple Music iOS  app to Sonos. Sometimes I listen to Apple Music this way, sometimes I use the iOS Sonos app instead.

Can you elaborate?

I do not have the latest Sonos kit that can do Airplay...in your case, this is therefore not an issue. With Airplay compatible Sonos kit, yes the native Apple Music app can be used.

But, a question: when using Airplay, is the phone still in the loop? If so, the disadvantage is that battery charge consumption on the phone will continue for music streaming, unlike in the case of true casting where the stream switches from the phone to the cloud when casting starts and the phone is out of the loop.

I don’t know - it’s an implementation detail I’m not conversant with.

I believe (but I’m not 100% sure) that if you Airplay video from an iOS device to an Apple TV, then it behaves as you suggest - the Apple TV takes over the stream - but that may or may not imply how Airplay audio streaming works.

I think it would be probably like TIDAL’s Dolby Atmos music? We can enjoy the Dolby Atmos music on TIDAL via the native TV app or the APPLE TV 4K, so maybe we can also enjoy the same from Apple Music via APPLE TV 4K.

But that is the point - you need to buy more Apple hardware to do this, in this instance, Apple TV.  Spotify, not being the business of selling hardware, makes no such imposition.

And if one is talking of using Airplay, why isn't the thread question moot anyway? If a airplay capable phone is playing Apple HD why can it not Airplay that music to Sonos even today, as long as Sonos in question is Airplay capable?

And Sonos can be disingenuous whenever it suits them; every time I have asked the question as to why Apple Music does not cast to Sonos as Spotify does, or Amazon Music does, the response has been that it is for Apple to get this done. In theory this may be correct, but if this feature was thought to be user priority for Sonos, I am sure they would not just sit back like this, but be more proactive. After all, they didn't just sit back waiting for Apple actions to bringing Airplay compatibility to the latest Sonos kit.

But I am pretty sure that the initial Sonos responses will be - this is an Apple issue.

Now I could be wrong where Apple Music HD is concerned, but history suggests that I am not. Those waiting may therefore have a long wait.

Or, they could trust their own ears to tell them that the regular Apple Music service is just as good. Or, they could switch for the price of the alternative monthly fee to another HD service.

This isn't therefore such a big deal. In my case, I get what I want - the native app based control - by using Spotify.