Retired Community Manager

Introducing Sonos Voice Control

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Hi Sonos Community members!

Today, we introduce the first voice experience created purely for listening on Sonos. Designed with privacy at its core, Sonos Voice Control is the simplest way to control your music, offering complete command of your Sonos system using only your voice.

Sonos Voice Control works on every voice-capable Sonos speaker, processing requests entirely on the device.

No audio or transcript is sent to the cloud, stored, listened to or read by anyone.

Available on new voice capable products and as a free update for existing customers, Sonos Voice Control is compatible with Sonos Radio, Apple Music, Amazon Music, Deezer, and Pandora at launch. More services and markets will follow.

Fast, accurate control of your music and your Sonos System

Sonos Voice Control finds the music you want to listen to, processing requests entirely on the device. Local processing delivers faster response times, and effortless follow-ups.

All you need is one “Hey Sonos” and you can follow up without the need for additional wake-words.

Just like the Sonos app, you can control music and speakers in any room, easily move music around the home, save and like your favorite songs to your personal music library and more.

Natural conversation with Giancarlo Esposito

Sonos Voice Control understands the nuance of human communication and will respond to natural commands like “turn it up!”. After a careful search, Sonos chose award-winning actor Giancarlo Esposito - best known for his roles in Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul and The Mandalorian - to deliver a familiar voice for US customers. With careful recording, advanced processing and mastering, the voice is natural, unobtrusive, yet confident and engaging.

Sonos’ first voice will be joined by others over time as Sonos continues to expand the experience to new people and places.

Sonos Voice Control is available in the US starting June 1 and in France later this year, with additional markets to follow.

Read the full press release on Sonos Voice Control here.

Sonos Voice Control

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K

Kumar

SVC however does not understand us very well and either we get total silence after the acknowledgment tone or the incorrect artist playing. Probably about 70% success rate at the moment and then asking Alexa to play artists rather than preserving with SVC.

Interesting; I use Alexa in India with the English Indian option selected and at times I still have to do the Englishman abroad thing in the hope of being understood - speak loudly and slowly in English:-).

But I also find Alexa to be temperamental; there are somedays she just chooses to be difficult. Or so it seems to me.

Ken_Griffiths

SVC is only just starting out and I perhaps expect some teething issues, but I must say I do like it’s room grouping/ungrouping features. I’m finding it works really well for ‘a new born baby’.

I like being able to shuffle a queue and love the fact, I can switch on/off TV speech enhancement, night mode and switch easily between TV & music audio on HT products.

It has certainly come quickly out of its starting blocks and is off to a very good start from the things I’ve been using here so far …and I love the fact it works side-by-side with Amazon Alexa. It’s a good partnership.

It’s just a pity that Google VA does not sit alongside too.

Mr. T

Just tried it also in my lounge which has the Beam home theatre plus a pair of Fives attached to my turntable. Made a group called Lounge, and asked SVC (via the Beam) to play music in the lounge and my Fives started playing their queued music so that is good to know.

I don’t need to re-name my actual ‘room’, just create these groups lol

I’ve got a pair of Fives/sub in the same room as the Arc HT. I’ve found that I can ask SVC, via the Arc, to “play music on my Five” and it will correctly play on the Five stereo pair. However, saying “play music on my Fives” more often than not, starts playing music on the Arc HT (with Play:3 surrounds).

If I say “play music on my One”, SVC will ask if I want to play in the Kitchen or Master Bedroom, as both have One stereo pairs, so SVC recognises Sonos Product Names and matches them with Room names.

Mr. T

Regarding SVC understanding UK persons… Myself and family are from the London Shires so very typical of the London area, no slang and where we currently live speak (so we have been told) speak very nicely and clear.

SVC however does not understand us very well and either we get total silence after the acknowledgment tone or the incorrect artist playing. Probably about 70% success rate at the moment and then asking Alexa to play artists rather than preserving with SVC.

For the life of me I cannot get Agnes Obel to play or Birdy, which results in Noel Gallagher’s band playing.

When I’ve had difficulty getting SVC to play a particular artist, I’ve started the music manually in the app, then asked SVC what’s playing. The pronunciation can differ from Alexa, so having to copy the SVC pronunciation instead. Just tried it with Agnes Obel and got it to work. Not so great with Birdy as Birthday by Anne-Marie started to play instead. I’m Scottish! 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

Belly M

Regarding SVC understanding UK persons… Myself and family are from the London Shires so very typical of the London area, no slang and where we currently live speak (so we have been told) speak very nicely and clear.

SVC however does not understand us very well and either we get total silence after the acknowledgment tone or the incorrect artist playing. Probably about 70% success rate at the moment and then asking Alexa to play artists rather than preserving with SVC.

For the life of me I cannot get Agnes Obel to play or Birdy, which results in Noel Gallagher’s band playing.

Where I’ve had difficulty getting SVC to play a particular artist, I’ve started the music manually in the app, then asked SVC what’s playing. The pronunciation can differ from Alexa, so having to copy the SVC pronunciation instead. Just tried it with Agnes Obel and got it to work. Not so great with Birdy as Birthday by Anne-Marie started to play instead. I’m Scottish! 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

That’s a great idea, play using the app and then ask to get the pronunciation for next time. Of course this then goes out the window when Sonos adds English-British to SVC and I have to relearn, probably better to wait for Sonos. Good to hear that it’s working for you and your Scottish accent, must admit I have friends in Shetland and I can understand them yet cannot work out what the Sousers are saying in Liverpool and been here four years now.

skullc

Prodigy III

I can attest that svc is working with my hybrid scouse / Wigan accent 😜

Network= livewire cpe pro 3 +eero 6 pro wireless

Jeffrey_35

Headliner III

Is this an issue or am I being picky? Whenever I call out a station through Hey Sonos, an image of the station is not there, just a grey box even for Sonos Radio HD station.

“The true sign of intelligence is not knowledge but imagination.”

Airgetlam

Perhaps a better place to troubleshoot would be the discussion area, and not the announcements thread?

https://en.community.sonos.com/sonos-voice-control-229127

Bruce

K

Kumar

Any comment on the statement below from a user in Scandinavia?

Talked with Sonos support, they verified that it’s only users with a US account that has the SVC as an option, but didn’t know about roll out dates for other regions

For example, there are users in the UK that have SVC - via US accounts? And if so, is it just a casual thing to switch to a US account in Sonos with no other consequences?

SarahN

Local Superstar

@Kumar - I’m in the UK and didn’t change my account from UK to US - I have SVC

Can you have too many Sonos speakers? 🤔 😆

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