Hi @npreining 

Welcome to the Sonos Community!

The decision of where to allow Google Assistant on Sonos is not ours to make - Google Assistant belongs to Google, and we can only offer it in the locations that they permit. It is definitely a legal issue (in the sense that we can’t legally do it without permission).

If Google were to allow it, I’m sure we’d be happy to offer Google Assistant to you in Japan.

Note that when Sonos Voice Control was released earlier this year, it had no geo-restrictions at all - even though it only supported US-accented English (French has now been added, with more languages to come).

The Sonos Five has no microphone so it’s unable to run any assistant, but can be addressed (commands sent to it) by any supported assistant - Alexa, Google Assistant or Sonos Voice Control.

I hope this helps.

I am well aware that **including** voice assistant support in a sonos product is a different item. 

I just want to control the sonos speaker with a Google voice device. With Alexa, at the moment I can install the sonos skill and tell Alexa to play music on the Five.

But this does not work with Google Assistant, when trying to link it it tells me not available in your country.

How then, should I understand what you wrote:

The Sonos Five has no microphone so it’s unable to run any assistant, but can be addressed (commands sent to it) by any supported assistant - Alexa, Google Assistant or Sonos Voice Control.

This is not correct. I cannot use Google Assistant of the Google Device I have to address (send commands to) the Sonos Five.

Could you please clarify this?

Hi @npreining 

Apologies - I misunderstood your question, and also took the Sonos Five part of your question as a separate enquiry when in fact it wasn’t.

Alexa control of (voice-enabled or not) Sonos devices is supported anywhere you can run Alexa on a device: Control Sonos with Amazon Alexa

However, Google Assistant control of (voice-enabled or not) Sonos devices is only supported in regions permitted by Google: Set up a Google Assistant device to control Sonos

So my statement is correct, but incomplete: I should have specified that the feature is only available in supported regions - apologies again for any misunderstanding. Google Assistant is the only voice service to have this restriction in relation to controlling Sonos via non-Sonos devices.

Unfortunately, this is still out-with our control - I recommend you contact Google to let them know your interest, and to use Alexa in the meantime.

I hope this helps.

Thanks for the clarification. Now I understand, sad though it is.

Do you have a specific place/forum I mind where I can contact Google Japan?

In the meantime I will get a echo dot.

Thanks