Sonos Ace Ultra as a room in the S2 app

I was very excited when I saw the Ace Ultra announcement, as I assumed that I would finally be able to add headphones to my Sonos system as a full member. As I gradually came to understand the linking concept, however, I became increasingly disappointed.

I have plenty of Bluetooth devices that I use with my phone, but obviously this means using multiple apps. I actually really enjoy the Sonos app and would prefer to use it when playing music from Spotify, various radio stations and, most importantly, my extensive music library on my NAS.

I however find the Linking concept, where an existing speaker has to act as a proxy, rather clumsy and not a particularly good user experience. I don’t understand why Sonos has not added Ace Ultra as its own ‘limited’ zone in the Sonos app, allowing me to choose and play content from all available sources directly.

I can appreciate the challenges involved in making it a fully fledged, groupable Sonos zone, but I could easily live with the limitations that battery life, etc. would place on the Ace Ultra zone, as long as, from a UX perspective, I could treat it in the same way as my other speakers.

When this happens I will purchase them immediately. Until then, I will make do with what I have.

It was explained in the launch presentation that functioning as a full room without piggybacking on another device requires too much processor, too much battery, and too much weight/space to be practical for headphones.

I agree with the above from ​@jgatie - I think Sonos has a good compromise with this new Ace Ultra.

Also if a person has a 15% discount available from the Sonos site, then it makes the new headphones a good price IMO. I have mine on pre order for £339 here in the UK with the discount and I have sold my first gen Ace headphones on eBay for an OK price too.