Is the Sonos app ever going to be fixed?

FIX THE F"ING APP!!!!!  I only joined the sonos community to vent and find when they are fixing the app!  I have only posted to a “chat boards” 2-3 times in 20-25 years.  To learn it is going to be another month or so (I read the date is May 7th, 2025) is disheartening especially based on how long and painful the past year+_has been.  I have been a loyal SONOS customer and advocate for 15 years and have owned or own just about every product released.  My family and I have loved the product and platform...but this app situation is a slap in the face and absolute travesty.  What is sonos doing to make it right?  There is limited communication and disparate information.  Beyond the frustration about having a system that worked well, wasn't cheap, and that we are stuck with, the inability for Sonos to come up with a temporary fix for its dedicated users on top of the way the company is handling the situation feels like a slap in the face.  YOU NEED TO MAKE THIS RIGHT!

I took the decision today to abandon S1 and all my legacy speakers and my Connect.  My Arc Ultra and Subwoofer are working fine with my TV so I’ll keep them. For music, though, I’m cutting my losses and going to hardwired DAC and laptop for HiFi and AirPlay for wireless speakers. 
 

I’m just so tired of having a system that works for a month and then suddenly loses connection to devices (esp the Connect). I spent 2 hours yesterday yet again factory resetting, app resetting and starting from scratch. I do not want to do this every few weeks. BTW, my network is fine - I had the same devices working flawlessly for years on the same network but started having issues about a year ago. Goodbye to Play and Connect. 

I think it’s hopeless.  Sonos released consumer software:

• with no sign can’t testing
• apparently written by developers who don’t use the Sonos system to listen to music
• With no roll black plan

Fixes after almost a year?

ERJ wrote:

“I’ve officially given up on Sonos.  The software problems made my Sonos system (9 pieces) unusable, with unexplained dropouts persisting after looong calls with Sonos and various wired/wireless permutations.”

Well, add me to the list of lost customers. I bought (7 pieces) about 2 months before the new APP launch.  It worked so well before and I thought I would eventually figure it out.  I see now that it’s not just me.  The APP does not ever seem to work. I have spent hooouuurs on the phone as well.  I don't listen to music and just want it to work when watching TV.  My wife complained about the cost and now, I’m eating crow over an expensive system that never works.  I love driving expensive fast cars, but most of the time, I just need to get back and forth to work. 

I’ve found that I can use my Arc Ultra and Subwoofer without issues if they are basically just set as a dumb speaker system with sound coming via HDMI from an Apple TV. It means I don’t ever have to use the awful S1 or Sonos apps. I stream music from Apple Music via HDMI and never risk using the Sonos apps 

I'm just glad I stayed on S1 and haven't bought any S2 only speakers. 

My whole house system is access via Alexa using Spotify for music.

Can't really see for our usage case how Google speakers would be a downgrade ans when my Playbar 5.1 setup finally bites the dust it won't be Sonos replacing it.

Shame really as the hardware is excellent..

I'm with the others - officially given up on Sonos. Never again. My Sonos system is a few years old. Soundbar, a couple Play Ones and a Gen 3 Subwoofer. Still more than $2,500 in kit and the app just does my head in. The sound quality is very good, but if I log into the app one more time, only for it to tell me it can't find my system, I'll bin my phone!!!!

It's just not acceptable in this day and age. I'll replace this system one day and Sonos will not make the short list next time. I went back and forth trying to decide between Sonos and Bose when I bought it and I've kicked myself since the app went to crappola. 

The tedious thing about Sonos now is the regularity with which users report in on many, many minor, intermittent, or major, fatal errors in performance; and then somebody pops up with a recommendation that needs the original user to be an enthusiastic software engineer, not just somebody who bought a working version of Sonos and some expensive but really really good speakers.

Ususally, the OP tells us how everything else is working but not the Sonos system; but still the helpful response will be something like: 

my thoughts are that anyone with that type of issue ‘perhaps’ could have a multicast ‘device discovery’ issue across their network that’s preventing the controller device from communicating with their Sonos speakers. See attached re: SSDP/mDNS.

Such communication failure can occur across networks that use WiFi extenders, EoP adapters, or if managed switches are misconfigured. It can also happen if some settings on a local router are incorrect, or there’s software running on the mobile device that is getting in the way of the multicast communication, such as security software, VPN client, firewall, site blockers etc.

To which my reaction is unprintable. The guy just said - everything is working, and so was Sonos until they changed the software.

I have no desire to waste a week or so reading up on multicast device discovery to find out why Sonos have made my purchased devices unusable, or my own library no longer compatible, after 14 years of untroubled use. I used to be a bit of a geek myself, but the thrill is gone, and patronising wifi scholars with nothing better to do than spray their ‘perhaps it’s this, perhaps it’s not’ commentary around are not amusing any more.  And not usually very helpful - try all this over the next ten or fifteen hours over four days. If it doesn’t solve it, reboot everything and get on the phone to Sonos. Great! I’ll just get on the phone to Sonos, I don’t work for them.

It’s clear to me now that the whole Sonos disaster is some kind of marketing experiment to see how far you can upset your base before it disappears. They’ve shifted out the richest and least tech-savvy by now, and are working hard to dislodge the next cohort. Last to go will be the fellows re-writing the crumbling, malign software themselves and fighting grimly to believe that it’ll all OK if you just reboot the router on prime number intervals, and wear your lucky tshirt.  

You put it much more eloquently than I did 👌

I got a JBL soundbar to use as a speaker for another TV through points at work. Didn't have much choice as there were only a couple on offer, but I didn't care because it was free. I opened the box, unpacked it, plugged it in, paired it...and voila... It worked as advertised. The sound is rubbish in comparison to Sonos but it works...every time I turn on the TV it just works. I want to play music on it... That works too. If the Sonos kit didn't cost so much it would already be in the bin. 

Great post.
 

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