My understanding is that in the same manner as the Sonos ‘Move’, a playing ‘Roam’ will fall into sleep-mode after 30 minutes of inactivity, when off its charger.

If a user opens the Sonos app on the same network, the app sends a signal to the ‘Roam’ to wake it up, so that it's ready to play music, if music isn’t played to the Roam, it will simply go back to sleep after 5 minutes, to also help preserve its battery. 

Only if that was true for mine. When mine turns itself on it never turns back off and within 10 hours it’s dead. I can’t even leave it on the wireless charger because once it’s fully charged the charger turns off and 10 hour later the roam is dead again. The only way I have found to keep it charged is to keep it plugged in which isn’t what I’m looking for in a portable speaker

‘Roam’ should work that way, when it’s off its charger - maybe consider making a short (timed) edited video of your issue and take a diagnostic report and send those onto Sonos Support. Obviously the Roam should remain powered-on all the time when cabled to the correct adapter. I can’t account for your charger powering off, but assume that would mean the ‘Roam’ in that case reverts back to its ‘off-charger’ power-saving mode, but that will be catered for by your video and diagnostic report hopefully.

A few minutes ago, I made a quick ‘time-lapse’ animated gif from a video recording of the ‘Roam’. 

If I don’t play any audio to the ‘Roam’, after opening the Sonos App (at 22:08 hours) to wake-up the device, it’s goes straight back to sleep within 3 minutes (at 22:11 hours).

So it looks like it’s only awake for 3 minutes and not 5 minutes as previously stated, before it then falls back into sleep-mode. (See times shown on mobile device).

I’m just not sure if my time-lapse animated.gif will work when posted to this forum.

I guess mine is broken and needs to go back because it has never turned itself back off unless the battery is dead.

In that case, I would submit a diagnostic report and post it’s reference back here and then speak/chat with Sonos Support (during opening hours) to see if they can assist. You can contact them via this LINK. Hope you get it sorted soon.

The problem with the Roam is, when you’re home, you just want to use it as a traditional plugged in speaker for much of the time. But when you leave the Roam on a charging mat, it loses charge over time instead of gaining. Every time I leave it on the mat, it shows it charging, but by the next morning it’s dead. When it’s on the QI charging mat I just want it to stay close to 100% charge until I pick it up.

I gave up on using the wireless charger because I have pretty much the same problem as you. Mine charges to 100% using the wireless charger but then it shuts off and because the roam loves to turn itself on and stay on the battery is dead before you know it. Leaving the roam plugged in all the time sucks but I don’t have much of a choice if I want it to be fully charged and ready for use.

Exactly. The only solution is to leave the unit plugged in. It is my understanding it is not a good idea to leave rechargeable batteries plugged in all the time; shortens their life. Not good on a $170 speaker. Power Off should mean OFF, not standby. This is really frustrating SONOS because in all other respects I love the Roam. I really don’t want to return it.

This! I’ve switched back to a wire for the same reason - orange & white flashing lights after being left on a qi charging pad. Felt like a fault state so didn’t want to keep doing it. 

My two Roams seems to have discharged during a 5 day period where they were supposed to be turned off. Even in sleep mode they should have lasted. Roams should be able to auto switch off if not used. I don’t want to have them in a charger constantly. USB chargers are a common cause in fires. 

If your Roam turns on by itself or battery is draining without explanation, this my be the reason.   If you put roam to sleep (single short press of the power button) your Roam will turn itself back on when you open your Sonos app.  If you want to turn off your Roam hold the power button for 5 or 6 seconds.   Battery drainage problem solved!!!

Not true, mine and many other Roams turn themselves back on even after holding the button for 5-6 seconds. The only way I have found to keep the battery charged is to keep it hardwired to the charger. Even the wireless charging feature turns off once the battery is fully charged and then allows the battery to drain even though it’s on the charger. 

Hey 

I have to say that I'm also generally confused by how this roam should be used. Sound and design is great but it haven't really fit my expectations in term of mobility. 

The major issue I see with the off button, is that it is so easy to turn it back on in a bag. For exemples, you would like to charge it to 100% before a trip. Take it from charger and turn it off. Put into a bag and off we go. After a day in the bag, battery is down, system must have been turned on by touching the 1tap button in the bag. 

I would need a physical switch to turn it off. Then there's no question or hesitation, off is off. 

At home, I drained it down a couple of times in the first days by just not understanding how it worked. Now it's always on the wireless charger but that's somehow a bit weird to do. 

Not being able to quickly connect it to a different wifi (guest or friend's house) would be my second issue but that's another topic. 

I think that’s the wrong design decision. It’s first and foremost a portable speaker. The fact that it’s a Sonos speaker brings some great benefits including AirPlay and integration with other Sonos speakers for those who have them. But where there’s a decision to be made that is impacted by the fact that this is a portable speaker, the answer should prioritize portability and the expectations that come with being a portable first, and a portable Sonos speaker second. 

A prime example of that is the expectation that Off means Off. I should be able to charge it without it turning back on, so I can top it up and then ignore it until I’m ready to go somewhere. I don’t want to have to think about whether after charging it went into sleep mode or is truly turned off. That’s just extra friction. Based on my testing, when I charge it when it was Off, it wakes up while charging and then goes back to sleep. Likewise, I should know that if I turn it off, it stays off.

Put another way, I don’t expect to have to keep a portable speaker plugged in or charging so that it will be charged when I decide I’m going to use it or take it somewhere. I should be able to charge it fully and know its charged when I need it.

I understand there is some battery drain that happens regardless -- I’m talking about the drain over time that comes with standby mode.

I definitely would want the basic behavior to be that if I fully charged it and it’s “off”, it’s going to have minimal drain. Having to think about whether it’s truly off or just in standby is a bad design decision for a portable speaker. 

Can this be addressed in an update?

Give people the ability to choose whether the bias is towards always on (in sleep/standby) mode or I-stay-off-if-you-switched-me-off mode. That way if I want it to be in standby so I can get my tunes quickly where there’s WiFi, great. And if not, great. 

(edit: clarity and to say I realize that most of what I’m talking about here is the behavior while charging. But it’s related to a larger issue, which is that when I switch something off —not standby, but off—it should stay off until I interact with the physical hardware to turn it back on.)

Also came here to voice some frustration re: the standby mode. Cory, thanks for engaging with us on this topic. Totally appreciate that standby mode is ultimately going to have some battery drain. My experience is that it’s down to less than 10% after 4 days.

I think Sonos could consider a few options here which might appease those of us that are using the Roam infrequently and are bad at keeping on top of charging devices :-)

1. Provide an option that after an extended period of inactivity (like 1hr), when not connected to charger, the speaker shuts down completely. For most of us this should kick in when we go to bed and preserve charge in the unit for when we next use it.
2. Allow us to shut the speaker down via the app rather than the 5 second long press on the unit itself (have seen this suggested elsewhere).
3. Don’t immediately wake the speaker every time the app is in the foreground, only when the player is selected on the System screen.

I think one or all of the above would be a big improvement for some of us.

Many Thanks!

One additional suggestion could be to have 2 modes we could toggle between:

- the classical current Sonos speaker behavior which can make sense for mobility inside the house.

- a portable mode, battery focused, with all the feature requested above i.e.auto turn off, no immediate wake up etc. This would be useful when going out, to use the roam in the same way as other pure portable speaker. 

Edit: realized this was somehow already mentioned above. That would be neat. 

ooomygoooood this is so, SO annoying!!

WHYYYYY would you design the product this way???

It would be SO not a big deal to turn the Roam on from inside the app right before you want to use it with your other speakers. The “delay” would be like two seconds. Instead, the Roam goes on when you don’t want it to, drains the entire battery, and then when you actually want to use it, it’s dead

Every other bluetooth speaker I’ve had will turn off automatically after you don’t use it for awhile. This. 

I’m super bummed out by the this. Is there any way to change this in the future via a software update????

This “off/sleep” distinction is non-obvious from a UX perspective.  When you press the on/off button everything appears “off”.  I’d advise having some LED that shows that it’s in a low-power sleep state vs off.  I’ve spent several days since getting this device trying to determine why every time I went to use it, the battery was significantly reduced.  

I’m in and out of the Sonos app regularly and didn’t realize that was triggering this to turn it back on.

For the Move this makes sense as it’s more of a hybrid device that is portable but not really a travel device.  It’s more likely you will be sitting in a room and want to push music to it (plus the bigger battery.

For the Roam, as someone else noted, I want this to replace my UE Boom, which means, I charge this, I turn it off, and I leave it in my backpack for when I’m out and about.  If I’m using it, my expectation is that I’d turn it on to make it available to use.

I had the same issue with the roam turning itself on whenever you opened the app. Solution…hold the on/off standby button down until the second set of tones. The first set is for standby and the second set actually turn it off. It takes a good 10 secs or more. Be patient for the second set. Solved my issue. 

I have to agree completely.  I would not have bought this Roam product if it constantly did this.  Why is there a “hard turn off” feature if you hold the button for 5 seconds, and then it turns on again?  Our household has over 10 Sonos speakers--they are not cheap.  A software upgrade to the Roam so it STAYS POWERED OFF after 5 seconds, and ensures it STAYS OFF until I want to use it again and it is at the relative same charge as when I powered it off is NOT TOO MUCH TO ASK.  

Morning, just chucking in my thoughts.

Roam was at 58% charge last night. Put it on the QI pad and switched it OFF (not sleep). It stayed off. Went to bed a couple of hours later and it was still off (QI pad showed it was charging).

Middle of the night I got called out by work - noticed the Roam was on - single white light, QI pad still flashing its charging. Took it off the pad and switched it OFF.

This morning I switched it back on and its at 46% charge.

Not very good is it?

This is so incredibly annoying. I don’t ever use the Sonos app and my roam continues to turn on by itself. I have to charge it every few days because it dies even though it’s not being used. Really a bummer of a “feature”. 

As a guess, you’re putting the Roam in ‘standby’ and not actually turning it off. 

The Roam does, and is designed to, power on when placed on a charger and can be used whilst charging.

If it’s losing the charge, then I suspect the charger is not providing a sufficient power-output, perhaps?