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Ryan S
Ryan S
Retired Sonos Staff
October 2, 2017

Now Available, the New Sonos App

Related content:Software



Sonos version 8.0 is introducing a brand new controller for iOS and Android. The new Sonos app makes it even easier to navigate, access, and control your music throughout your home. This new app comes side by side with voice control through Alexa devices, more about that here.

Check out our blog for the Remastered Sonos App. Full details on the new apps can be found here on their respective product guide pages. Let’s take a look at the new app:



Introducing Navigation with Tabs:


The Sonos app now has five tabs visible at the bottom when not in the full playing screen. The tabs are My Sonos, Browse, Rooms, Search, and More. See here:



Now your most used options are available with just one click, and Now Playing is always just one tap away.

My Sonos
We’ve consolidated all your personally curated Sonos Playlists, music service playlists, and Sonos Favorites into one, easy to use page on the Sonos app. You can edit fields to move around the order, or delete them entirely. You can now have up to 40 favorites total, up from 32.

Browse
Browsing your music is even easier as it no longer hides your other options. You can browse and move to different rooms all while keeping your place in the browsing menu. There’s also a dock on the bottom of the app that gives you easy access to the navigation tabs. You can swipe it up to reveal it at any time, then back down. We’ve separated browsing your music and the menu for Settings, so it’s even easier to find what you’re looking for.

Rooms
The menu starts highlighted on the active room, featured right on the app so that it’s even easier to see what’s playing in each room. There’s now an icon on that screen to show you where the music is coming from too. That includes if it was started by Alexa. The active room has a Group button to have it add others to the party.

Search
It hasn’t changed, just moved to an easy to find spot.

More...
All the settings and options are in here. You can add services, make alarms, get some help, and access all your settings. We think this will make it a lot easier to find what you’re looking for. And speaking of settings…


Explicit Language Filtering


Within Settings > Parental Controls, you can set a system-wide setting to filter songs with explicit content. Right now, this is working for Apple Music, and we’re hoping to add it for more services soon. Once the setting is on, Apple Music songs with the explicit tag will no longer play on your system.

Long Press to Group


Making it even easier to play music. With 8.0, you can press and hold the Play/Pause button (or mute on older players) to have your player join the most recently active player as a group. First, you have to start playing music on a player, (it can be from an alarm or any other source), and then just hold the button for a few seconds on another player. That second player will join the first one’s group and start playing the same music in sync.

There's another function of the long press, and that's being able to move recently stopped music to another room. First, stop playing music in any of your rooms. Then, press and hold the play/pause on another player for a few seconds. (Make sure that you don't start playing music anywhere else.) The queue or source will move to the unit you held the button for and start playing. The players won't group together and any existing queue will get whiped out in place of the new one.

iOS 11 and Android O Support


Lastly, version 8.0 has support for the latest operating systems from Android and iOS. This includes iOS 11 support for Trueplay on Sonos. Trueplay isn’t available on Android at this time.
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    527 replies

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    latenightbluesdj
    Lyricist I
    October 7, 2017
    I agree this app update is horrible. Navigating it is a pain a frustrating. Clearly didn't beta test it.

    Two thumbs down on the new app. I've got a large multipurpose room with 5 sonos devices, and it's a nightmare trying to make adjustments. I can get all of the speakers to play the same song, but can't get them all in the same group. So I'm having to manually select each speaker, adjust volume, manually select next speaker, adjust volume. Then when I change the song, it's only changed on one of the speakers with the other 4 all playing a different song. So I have to tell all the other 4 speakers to play the new song too. Such a pain.

    With the old app, I'd group all the speakers, make sure the volume levels looked good throughout the group, then just play songs. Setup took 8 seconds.

    Granted, a lot of my problems with the new app is I don't know where to click to make things happen, but it seems very glitchy in that when I do click something, nothing happens. I'm not sure how this thing passed quality control. The old app was fine --- wish we could go back to that while they beta test this new interface.

    Grouping is one of the things that I think is a LOT easier with the new GUI.
    At the bottom of the "now playing" screen (that shows the album art), in red, you have the room name you are watching. If you click that, it pops up a box where you can group any speakers, or a slider switch to choose "Everywhere".
      garrett5688
      October 7, 2017
      Also disappointed as a user with 6 zones. More clicks than previous layout to group, ungroup, switch rooms. Too much white. Extra click required now to see all my favorite stations.

      I left the beta programs a while back because feedback was typically ignored. Seems others have had the same experience. I'll get used to the new app because I'm forced to, as usual.
        Tim_69
        Contributor I
        October 7, 2017
        Sorry Sonos, give me the old app back, don’t like this one at all, it’s all over the place, when I have to waste time searching for stuff I had all on 1 page before this will certainly put me off a product.
          Paulw123
          Paulw123
          Virtuoso
          October 7, 2017
          I was actually forced to update last night, no choice, sonos would not do anything apart from update to v8.
          Now sonophone app does not see GPM home page, but the favorites still work for GPM albums and radio stations I have set.
            SteveM
            Renowned Enthusiast I
            October 7, 2017
            Plus one for being able to order lists, especially Stations. I have a lot of stations which I then have to press See All, then scroll down to find my favourite Radio Paradise. I'd like to be able it move it up so I can see it on the My Sonos screen in Stations without further multiple key presses.
              BoredofBalham
              Prodigy II
              October 7, 2017
              Rather than flying into full whine mode, I found everything I wanted to know by looking at the screen and tapping everything in sight to see what it does, just as I do when using any new app.
              I think it is generally a step in the right direction. New things need getting used to and the decluttering of screens does that.
              Some things need improvement...but then again lots of these seem bad until you use them and realise that this way is actually better.
              A few weeks use will reveal the true irritations rather than being annoyed at your own.
                Ken_Griffiths
                Ken_Griffiths
                October 7, 2017
                Plus one for being able to order lists, especially Stations. I have a lot of stations which I then have to press See All, then scroll down to find my favourite Radio Paradise. I'd like to be able it move it up so I can see it on the My Sonos screen in Stations without further multiple key presses.
                SteveM,
                Me too, re-ordering of all icons within each one of the 'My Sonos' sections would be good, plus make the icons a lot smaller so that more of them fit into the controller device window display... a touch of colour, to dull down the white background areas and I’d be happy.
                  Tim_69
                  Contributor I
                  October 7, 2017
                  Rather than flying into full whine mode, I found everything I wanted to know by looking at the screen and tapping everything in sight to see what it does, just as I do when using any new app.
                  I think it is generally a step in the right direction. New things need getting used to and the decluttering of screens does that.
                  Some things need improvement...but then again lots of these seem bad until you use them and realise that this way is actually better.
                  A few weeks use will reveal the true irritations rather than being annoyed at your own.

                  I have used them and they are not better, and having to use multiple screens to find what you had on 1 is not an improvement, in fact completely the opposite, fortunately I did not update my PC
                    Bartender
                    Avid Contributor I
                    October 7, 2017
                    Really like the new look. The app is far more intuitive now and looks current. The old app was definitely dated. Best of all my wife will find this a lot more user friendly. Good work Sonos!
                    Tyman
                    Trending Lyricist I
                    October 7, 2017
                    Sorry this app isn't great. Actually it sucks. There's no way to access My Library remotely, only from the computer app. What's up with that!? Plus the controls are way more confusing than before. PLUS the damn white background is blindingly atrocious!
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