Some of you might have questions when you have had a week to get to know the new Sonos App interface. Because of that, we want to give you all a chance to ask some of the people who were integral in its creation and design, the questions that have come to mind while you have used the app.
Diane Roberts, Senior Director of Software Development
Kate Wojogbe, Senior Director of User Experience
Tucker Severson, Director of Product Management
It will be hosted on the 14th of May from 11:00 until 14:00 GMT -07.
But instead of me telling you what they do and what their role with the app update has been, here are their own introductions:
Diane
Diane Roberts is the Senior Director of Software Engineering and Product Management at Sonos responsible for the Sonos Apps. Her group of cross-disciplinary teams build Configuration, Control, and Content experiences on a foundation of Core mobile application technologies. She received dual Bachelors’ of Science in Computer Science and Music from WPI. Diane holds 6 granted patents as a co-inventor.
Kate
As Senior Director of User Experience, Kate leads the UX team responsible for Sonos’ home audio hardware, software, and app user experiences. This includes user interfaces on speakers and soundbars, setup for hardware and services, first and third party content experiences, and a variety of methods of control of the Sonos system. Kate graduated from the University of California Los Angeles with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Design.
Tucker
Tucker Severson is the Director of Product Management and leads the PM team responsible for the Sonos Apps. Tucker received his BA from Bates College and his MBA from the University of Vermont.
We will do our best to answer as many of your questions as possible within the 3-hour window, but we can’t promise to answer every question, especially those you know we can’t discuss.
But if we see a question repeated or a reply getting a lot of likes, don’t worry. We will prioritize those to ensure that many people get the answers they seek.
Remember, we can’t talk about things on the roadmap - but if you have questions or feedback about the app redesign, want to know more about our panelists, like their background or favorite band, then the sky is the (cough cough.. NDA) limit!
Thank you, everyone, for participating. We covered as many of the most asked questions as possible. We know tracking the responses wasn't as easy as we had hoped. But we wanted to let the community air frustrations and have their questions answered.
I got a lot of DMs during the AMA, and I will be sure to answer them when I can. Thanks for reaching out!
Keith and I will work on recapping all the questions and feedback we have responded to, and we will update the post here when that is complete. If we didn't get to your question, don't worry. Keith and I are grabbing all the feedback from this thread, even the things we didn't respond to, and ensuring the right people will see the message. This was the first time we created a live AMA in the community, and we learned a lot for future AMAs.
We appreciate all the feedback and questions you gave through this AMA. It helps us understand your most significant feedback and your reasoning. We hear you, and we will ensure the right teams get your feedback. They are listening.
We look forward to seeing your reactions to our future app developments. We hope you all appreciate the work our developers are putting into making the app as fast and easy to use as possible for the general user.
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I noticed that the re-introduction of alarms actually required an update to Sonos devices as well as the app today. Does this mean that the new UI revamp was in fact much more than just a revamp to the UI? Are there currently bigger changes happening on the device side as well?
@Aleksander H
The app is definitely a revamp, but it’s not just the UI that changed! This new app is using new features on the speaker firmware and new cloud services as well. Let me share a bit more about what happened with alarm settings.
On the morning of the app launch, we discovered a data corruption error around the new Alarms APIs. The corruption could cause alarms to go off in the wrong room at the wrong volume with the wrong content! In order to save your alarms, we made the difficult decision to remotely disable the alarm settings feature and then completely lock it out. It allowed us to make sure your alarms stayed as they were - but at the steep cost of taking away your ability to change them yourself.
The team rallied to make sure we could turn this feature back on safely - and today we are so delighted to say that we have re-enabled alarm settings. To get this feature, you must do a full system update.
But that’s not how we expect to introduce features every time. We have built the new app to be able to update independently of the speaker firmware. As we go forward, you can expect us to bring out new features with smaller, less intrusive, updates.
I just want to say there has been allot of negativity surrounding the new app launch. I just want to say the app is fantastic. I've been using it everyday since it came out last week. I know there is some future additions coming in the next weeks and will just be patient with the future roll out. Thank you Diane, Kate, Tucker, and the rest of the Sonos development team for everything you do.
This is a joke - correct? We should be patient while we wait to get back to where we were?
I suppose if you have one speaker and use Sonos Radio alone, it’s probably a great release.
When you have 20 speakers, a NAS, and multiple streaming services, it is...not so much.
First off you obviously have no idea how to click on a persons profile to see how many Sonos products a user has or you would of not made such a ridiculous statement. Also if you had clicked on my profile you would known I DON'T use Sonos Radio. So next time do your homework.
Second over 20 speakers? Bro you don't have 20 speakers so stop over exaggerating your circumstance. You ain't Peter Pee.
Third, no this not a joke. I've have multiple Sonos products also multiple streaming services. Apple Music, Spotify, Amazon Music, YouTube Music, Sirius XM, Home Theater setup, etc. All of them are working great since the 80.0 update.
Fourth, people are complaining about the missing features like the alarms, personal playlists, etc on the Sonos app. Who uses Sonos speakers for an alarm when we all have cell phones where we can customize what we wake up to in 2024? Many streaming services have personal playlists that you can customize for yourself. Why the heck would anyone want to take up tons of memory on their phone with music when it's available on streaming music services? Also who the heck buys music anymore? This isn't 1994 anymore. These features that are missing are for people that don't know it's the 21st century.
Alarms isn't just about waking up; its the ability to set radio programmes to start automaticity - particularly repetative ones.
Well alarms are back so no more complaining about that useless feature.
If you think you’re gonna get a sweet care package for being a company shill on this thread you’re about to learn the lesson we’re all here trying to show you.
Greetings!
could you let us know if there are any plans for the app to be subscription based for any of the current existing features? Speculation about this came up due to your less than impressive update.
Another point, some users are expressing concern with the Web app access and lack of two factor authentication, and how that can pose a safety threat. Any plans to address that?
thanking you
The one thing I'm grateful for in this ama has been other users explaining how to roll back. The new app has completely kneecapped my system. Used to use alarms to queue my child that it was time to get ready for bed/nap... alarms are gone. Only used local music library... local music library is gone. My speakers only show up half the time... does the new app hate mesh networks as much as thw old one originally did? Maybe an update is coming... that will fix some of this... maybe... but it's a huge step backward. I don't think I'll be buying any more sonos products, but it certainly sucks knowing that something I own - something I bought - can be crippled simply because 'hey we redesigned lol'
Please upvote this post: Can you please provide an immediate easy way to rollback the mobile app to the prior version for those who can’t make the current version meet their needs.
Thanks @bkk. Also, @nelliott and others had similar questions.
Rolling back to the previous version of the Sonos app is likely to cause issues. As Sonos continues to advance forward with new updates to the firmware, the old apps will fall out of compatibility quickly. Our priority is to release improvements to the Sonos app rapidly to address your needs.
Well, I rolled back to the previous version a couple of hours after the upgrade, and I have had no issues at all.
Same here. I rolled back and will stay rolled back. The issue is that I will keep being told to upgrade. I would prefer to not have that constant niggle. However, I’m the same as you - rolled back and staying at 16.1.
This post is right on the money..but..pls just tell me..how did you roll back to the previous version? I am desperate to do that?
There’s a note in an earlier posting a few pages back on how to roll back to 16.1 - but it’s Android only.
Please upvote this post: Can you please provide an immediate easy way to rollback the mobile app to the prior version for those who can’t make the current version meet their needs.
Thanks @bkk. Also, @nelliott and others had similar questions.
Rolling back to the previous version of the Sonos app is likely to cause issues. As Sonos continues to advance forward with new updates to the firmware, the old apps will fall out of compatibility quickly. Our priority is to release improvements to the Sonos app rapidly to address your needs.
Well, you failed...
Probably this has already been asked, but just in case it hasn’t….
Why didn’t you inform users in advance of all the features that would be temporarily missing from the new app? Then they could have made an informed decision about whether to update their app or not.
The answer is, “Customers are not respected.”
thank you
Please describe what the thought processes was, going into the re-design. I understand the value of launching something new, but as a designer, I also understand that function always outweighs design.
@Bliss752 The refreshed UI design is rooted in the needs that we’ve been hearing from our listeners for years. We heard from users that the information architecture of the S2 app felt like work, particularly in navigating between multiple tabs to get core jobs done. The intent of the new app home feed is to put the most useful content and controls immediately within thumb’s reach, offering quick access to the content that means most to users, and enabling them to drive what is prioritized in their personal home experience.
I doubt that a single user used the phrase “information architecture.” And who cares if the “information architecture” was improved if the underlying functionality is removed. That is like saying: “Look at the new dashboard that we put into our car. Please ignore the fact that we removed all of the functions that allowed you to drive the car.”
Probably this has already been asked, but just in case it hasn’t….
Why didn’t you inform users in advance of all the features that would be missing from the new app. Then they could have made an informed decision about whether to update their app or not.
This is a really good question. Sonos hyped the new app, said everything would work as before, but better, but obviously this isn’t the case. Why didn’t you warn us Sonos?
What good would a warning have done?
On iOS, at least, most people accept the default behavior of allowing apps to update automatically, so when a new version comes out, it just installs with no user intervention, and in fact you have to actively turn off automatic updates (for all apps, I think) to force an app to be held back.
So this would’t been a warning that a new version is coming, it’s going to break stuff, and the only way to avoid this would be to turn off automatic updates for all apps on your device.
This doesn’t seem much better than what we ended up with.
To me the better question is why the release was rushed out incomplete. Look, I work in software too, I get it, sometimes you need to get a new version out the door, and iterate on it later. But if the new version is this incomplete, then delaying the release until it’s closer to parity with the legacy version seems prudent, no?
There must have been some compelling reason to get something this broken shipped ASAP. For the sake of the future of the company and whatever fragile customer loyalty existed, I sure hope it was worth it.
Hi AMA team! I almost always use my Sonos devices in groups, and with the new app, handling of group volumes is worse. Not only does it not change in real-time
@mdpeterman
A key part of this new app was using the newer Sonos APIs, which means we did indeed rewrite the volume experience entirely. Until this new update, our app was using an older set of technology based on UPnP and SOAP.
Can you make those APIs available to the community?
Of course I don't know but I somehow feel like the answer is no and that will be the next step in the direction the company is going right now...
No apologies from SONOS ????????
I noticed that the re-introduction of alarms actually required an update to Sonos devices as well as the app today. Does this mean that the new UI revamp was in fact much more than just a revamp to the UI? Are there currently bigger changes happening on the device side as well?
@Aleksander H
The app is definitely a revamp, but it’s not just the UI that changed! This new app is using new features on the speaker firmware and new cloud services as well. Let me share a bit more about what happened with alarm settings.
On the morning of the app launch, we discovered a data corruption error around the new Alarms APIs. The corruption could cause alarms to go off in the wrong room at the wrong volume with the wrong content! In order to save your alarms, we made the difficult decision to remotely disable the alarm settings feature and then completely lock it out. It allowed us to make sure your alarms stayed as they were - but at the steep cost of taking away your ability to change them yourself.
The team rallied to make sure we could turn this feature back on safely - and today we are so delighted to say that we have re-enabled alarm settings. To get this feature, you must do a full system update.
But that’s not how we expect to introduce features every time. We have built the new app to be able to update independently of the speaker firmware. As we go forward, you can expect us to bring out new features with smaller, less intrusive, updates.
Thanks for the insight, @DianeRoberts.
Now, why wasn’t this explanation provided a week ago? It would’ve alleviated a fair amount of frustration/speculation.
We understand that things happen/break.
A little bit of communication would have reduced the amount of blowback.
Where can I find the link to this interview? Searching for it opens up a whole new experience for me....
What data did you draw on to justify this new design? Was there any information architecture analysis done? Was there any investigation at all, like user interviews, analytics, usage data, etc?
The marketing materials tout “no more tabs” as a selling point, but for me it’s one of the biggest UX regressions. The new home screen is worse than useless; it’s just a new barrier between me and the favorites screen, which is by far the most common place I’m trying to go in the app besides the now-playing screen.
Hello @f8dee28e-f9a0-4157-a141-ce8859
We did go through multiple phases of assessing the current S2 structure, modified versions of it, and the tabless version that we have today. Our work has engaged existing and new Sonos users throughout, and we have pursued the path that felt the most useful and intuitive to the largest number of users overall. We understand that every user is an individual with unique needs and circumstances. My hope is that your specific needs can be addressed by personalizing your home screen so your Sonos Favorites module shows up front and center on your home screen. Doing so should make this the first thing you see when launching the app. A single tap should take you to the full view of that collection.
I do appreciate being able to customize items on the home screen by rearranging them. Now I would also like:
to be able to rearrange the Favorites screen in the same manner
to be able to add Sonos playlists that we’ve created to the Home Screen for quick access
@Aleksander H
The app is definitely a revamp, but it’s not just the UI that changed! This new app is using new features on the speaker firmware and new cloud services as well. Let me share a bit more about what happened with alarm settings.
On the morning of the app launch, we discovered a data corruption error around the new Alarms APIs. The corruption could cause alarms to go off in the wrong room at the wrong volume with the wrong content! In order to save your alarms, we made the difficult decision to remotely disable the alarm settings feature and then completely lock it out. It allowed us to make sure your alarms stayed as they were - but at the steep cost of taking
Oh wow, major breaking bug and they still released it. As I software engineer for 25 years, I’m pretty sure I would have been fired for this B.S.
Please upvote this post: Can you please provide an immediate easy way to rollback the mobile app to the prior version for those who can’t make the current version meet their needs.
Thanks @bkk. Also, @nelliott and others had similar questions.
Rolling back to the previous version of the Sonos app is likely to cause issues. As Sonos continues to advance forward with new updates to the firmware, the old apps will fall out of compatibility quickly. Our priority is to release improvements to the Sonos app rapidly to address your needs.
Well, I rolled back to the previous version a couple of hours after the upgrade, and I have had no issues at all.
Same here. I rolled back and will stay rolled back. The issue is that I will keep being told to upgrade. I would prefer to not have that constant niggle. However, I’m the same as you - rolled back and staying at 16.1.
This post is right on the money..but..pls just tell me..how did you roll back to the previous version? I am desperate to do that?
There’s a note in an earlier posting a few pages back on how to roll back to 16.1 - but it’s Android only.
Doesn't work on Chromebook Android unfortunately - and neither does the new app.
What was the thought process behind releasing the app update in an obviously unfinished state, instead of waiting for critical issues to be resolved?
I am stunned that Sonos released what appears to be an early Beta of the new app to such a big lead up with so many assumptions about what users were looking for.
This is Audio New Coke ! There was zero “courage” in releasing this new version…rather it was pure “ atrogance”. If you want to show genuine courage, allow users to roll back to the old version and see how many do it. You would overwhelmed.
It was extreme arrogance to spend so much on the online promotion of the new app…and barely a cent on a New Version User Guide.
I have been using Sonos since it launched. I am a very experienced user of apps, and previously used Sonos everyday. Five days on I still cannot work our how to do most of what I was able to do in the old version.
How did you test this? In a echo chamber, where the app designers were the testers.
So again, if you think this new version is so wonderful, allow users to roll back to the old version. That is courage. You’ll be stunner by the backlash.
btw clever to release this version when you’ve just announced strong quarterlies to the stock market. The bump in share price it caused will be nothing compared to the slump once investors realise the backlash coming from users because of the arrogant manner in which this new version has been released.
It reminds me of the Xbox game called Redfall which had awesome PR but failed to be a ‘good’ game.
Even worse. The game was $70. Most of us here have blown more on Sonos products.
Time for some serious questions, the type they seriously thought they were going to be asked...
Hey guys! Amazing new app! Who are your favourite bands?
Why was the upgrade released when it was clearly not ready, with so many features planned for later this month & June?
Will we see numbers re-added to the volume adjusters or is Sonos sticking with this UI decision?
@danull Yes - volume numbers will be returning to this UI. We are continuing to refine our volume UI based on user feedback and will soon be providing an update to these controls. Volume numbers should be visible now in the grouping menu.
Imagine that. One of the “improvements” coming soon to the new app is the ability to adjust the volume. Will the wonders of the new app never cease?
I noticed that the re-introduction of alarms actually required an update to Sonos devices as well as the app today. Does this mean that the new UI revamp was in fact much more than just a revamp to the UI? Are there currently bigger changes happening on the device side as well?
@Aleksander H
The app is definitely a revamp, but it’s not just the UI that changed! This new app is using new features on the speaker firmware and new cloud services as well. Let me share a bit more about what happened with alarm settings.
On the morning of the app launch, we discovered a data corruption error around the new Alarms APIs. The corruption could cause alarms to go off in the wrong room at the wrong volume with the wrong content! In order to save your alarms, we made the difficult decision to remotely disable the alarm settings feature and then completely lock it out. It allowed us to make sure your alarms stayed as they were - but at the steep cost of taking away your ability to change them yourself.
The team rallied to make sure we could turn this feature back on safely - and today we are so delighted to say that we have re-enabled alarm settings. To get this feature, you must do a full system update.
But that’s not how we expect to introduce features every time. We have built the new app to be able to update independently of the speaker firmware. As we go forward, you can expect us to bring out new features with smaller, less intrusive, updates.
The courageous thing to do would be to delay the app launch until the issue could really be fixed.
Sonos is mission-critical for us in many ways - that’s why you have so many angry customers here.
You need to treat your product the way NASA treats launching astronauts to space: if anything is known to be incomplete, you delay the launch to fix it; you don’t waive requirements in order to launch on time.
On the morning of the app launch, we discovered a data corruption error around the new Alarms APIs. The corruption could cause alarms to go off in the wrong room at the wrong volume with the wrong content! In order to save your alarms, we made the difficult decision to remotely disable the alarm settings feature and then completely lock it out. It allowed us to make sure your alarms stayed as they were - but at the steep cost of taking away your ability to change them yourself.
Why did you release it anyway that day?
I just want to say there has been allot of negativity surrounding the new app launch. I just want to say the app is fantastic. I've been using it everyday since it came out last week. I know there is some future additions coming in the next weeks and will just be patient with the future roll out. Thank you Diane, Kate, Tucker, and the rest of the Sonos development team for everything you do.
This is a joke - correct? We should be patient while we wait to get back to where we were?
I suppose if you have one speaker and use Sonos Radio alone, it’s probably a great release.
When you have 20 speakers, a NAS, and multiple streaming services, it is...not so much.
First off you obviously have no idea how to click on a persons profile to see how many Sonos products a user has or you would of not made such a ridiculous statement. Also if you had clicked on my profile you would known I DON'T use Sonos Radio. So next time do your homework.
Second over 20 speakers? Bro you don't have 20 speakers so stop over exaggerating your circumstance. You ain't Peter Pee.
Third, no this not a joke. I've have multiple Sonos products also multiple streaming services. Apple Music, Spotify, Amazon Music, YouTube Music, Sirius XM, Home Theater setup, etc. All of them are working great since the 80.0 update.
Fourth, people are complaining about the missing features like the alarms, personal playlists, etc on the Sonos app. Who uses Sonos speakers for an alarm when we all have cell phones where we can customize what we wake up to in 2024? Many streaming services have personal playlists that you can customize for yourself. Why the heck would anyone want to take up tons of memory on their phone with music when it's available on streaming music services? Also who the heck buys music anymore? This isn't 1994 anymore. These features that are missing are for people that don't know it's the 21st century.
Not that I NEED to prove anything to you, @SonosSpotifyLover, I’m going to choose to because you’re being a dick. Some people DO use their systems different than you do and you saying “It’s 2024 and use your watch and quit complaining about your systems doing less than they did yesterday if they work at all”. That’s 28 if you don’t want to do the math. Okay, okay, TWO are Boosts, but some of us can back up what we say in public. So, maybe STFU.
Prove anything? Come on bro you came at me with saying I only had one speaker. Next time look at yourself before attacking people online.
Lastly look who couldn't contain themselves without using explicit language. Have fun with your comment's being deleted.
I noticed that the re-introduction of alarms actually required an update to Sonos devices as well as the app today. Does this mean that the new UI revamp was in fact much more than just a revamp to the UI? Are there currently bigger changes happening on the device side as well?
@Aleksander H
The app is definitely a revamp, but it’s not just the UI that changed! This new app is using new features on the speaker firmware and new cloud services as well. Let me share a bit more about what happened with alarm settings.
On the morning of the app launch, we discovered a data corruption error around the new Alarms APIs. The corruption could cause alarms to go off in the wrong room at the wrong volume with the wrong content! In order to save your alarms, we made the difficult decision to remotely disable the alarm settings feature and then completely lock it out. It allowed us to make sure your alarms stayed as they were - but at the steep cost of taking away your ability to change them yourself.
The team rallied to make sure we could turn this feature back on safely - and today we are so delighted to say that we have re-enabled alarm settings. To get this feature, you must do a full system update.
But that’s not how we expect to introduce features every time. We have built the new app to be able to update independently of the speaker firmware. As we go forward, you can expect us to bring out new features with smaller, less intrusive, updates.
We made the ***wrong*** decision to remotely disable the alarm settings feature and then completely lock it out ………
The right decision was to delay the app launch...nobody needed the new app so desperately you needed to make any kind of “difficult” decision to push forward with it.
That’s the biggest problem here, no acknowledgement from Sonos that they messed up. Doubling down on everything that’s happened. How are you going to prevent this from happening again? It sounds like Sonos is perfectly willing to go through this again in the future, which is very disturbing.
The new app left me without my carefully curated URL-based internet radio favorites. How is this supposed to be accomplished in the new app?
To add radio stations via a custom url, you will need to add the station in the Tune-In app first. Then you can add this station as a favorite from the Tune-In app in Sonos. I hope that helps!
