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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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    testcard
    testcard
    Prodigy I
    October 10, 2017
    A foundation. 8.0, not 8.1, or 8.2, or 8.3.

    As has been previously discussed, there were similar cries of rage with the last major change of the controller app. My guess is they're collating the feedback for this one, through the multiple threads, and prioritizing how to change the app for future releases. As Ryan suggests, they're already doing so, it appears.

    This isn't by any stretch the end of the world. It's just modifying the thought process by which you deal with the app. Muscle memory, too. But I've not found anything that you can't do in the new app that you could do in the old one.
    And so the defence rests its case.
    johncanter
    Enthusiast II
    October 10, 2017
    But I've not found anything that you can't do in the new app that you could do in the old one.

    ... with additional clicks or swipes.
      Ryan S
      Ryan SAuthor
      Retired Sonos Staff
      October 10, 2017
      Now I am confused. When I press the room name in red text that appears on the Now Playing Screen, I can tick both rooms available and that “groups” them. If however I tap the Rooms icon on the menu bar, I can see both available rooms, plus a Group icon. If I tap that, I can then tick both available rooms and also create a group. So what’s the difference?

      The red text menu is basically a short cut. It's a quick way to group other players with the active room you're controlling.

      Sliding the page down, clicking Rooms, gives you access to all of your players, you can also make groups there.
      Mark good posts by pressing the like button, and select the best answer on questions you've asked to help others find solutions.
      Guy_19
      Guy_19
      Enthusiast II
      October 10, 2017
      A foundation. 8.0, not 8.1, or 8.2, or 8.3.

      As has been previously discussed, there were similar cries of rage with the last major change of the controller app. My guess is they're collating the feedback for this one, through the multiple threads, and prioritizing how to change the app for future releases. As Ryan suggests, they're already doing so, it appears.

      This isn't by any stretch the end of the world. It's just modifying the thought process by which you deal with the app. Muscle memory, too. But I've not found anything that you can't do in the new app that you could do in the old one.

      I mean you no ill, but can you please tell me how you have enabled a dark background?
      Meanwhile I have downgraded (upgraded?) to v7.4 and am much happier.
      I am using one of the more interesting app icons.

      The current one is so boring.
      7 rooms: One SL Stereo Pair, One SL x 2, Move, Play:5 Gen2 & Port into Arcam AVR with AE floorstanders, Port into Denon microsystem.
        Darrel
        Enthusiast II
        October 10, 2017
        I am very disappointed with the new app. The colour scheme is much too bright and makes the thing completely unusable in the dark. I hate to think what it does for battery consumption too. Did anyone actually test this before releasing it?

        Also I notice a bug/feature in that if I navigate to a music library folder, then select a file and start playing it, if I then swipe down the play screen instead of getting back to the same place in the music library I find myself back on the home screen. And if from there I select the music library I have to navigate back through all the folders again. Very, very tedious.

        I would like the previous version of the app back as this new one offers me nothing I want. 😞
          Darrel
          Enthusiast II
          October 10, 2017
          Meanwhile I have downgraded (upgraded?) to v7.4 and am much happier.

          Is that possible?
          Airgetlam
          Airgetlam
          October 10, 2017
          [
          I mean you no ill, but can you please tell me how you have enabled a dark background?
          Meanwhile I have downgraded (upgraded?) to v7.4 and am much happier.
          I am using one of the more interesting app icons.

          The current one is so boring.

          I haven't found any such option. There wasn't an option in the old version of the app, either, to my recollection. There have been many past requests for setting it up as such, though.

          I was talking about the functionality comparisons. There's no functionality that was extant in the old version that isn't in the new version.

          Note: I thought I'd replied earlier, but it appears to have disappeared in the ether.
          Bruce
          RAmmann
          Lyricist III
          October 11, 2017
          I'm firmly in the 'hate the new app' camp. Why did you move everything around and rename items?? I could go on and on about what I don't like about it, but, besides the glaring white look, the aspect I'm most upset with is the way the name of various rooms are displayed. They're much too hard to pick out from the other info on that screen. I'd be hard pressed to come up with a less user-friendly UI if I tried. Please give us our old app back!
            geoffking65
            geoffking65
            Lyricist III
            October 11, 2017
            Hi RAmmann,

            Agreed. General consensus is that SONOS have got it wrong with what they "thought" was a good version upgrade. Fail.....

            What were you guys thinking with the white screen? Please revert back to the old UI. For Android users, there is an easy mechanism to download a previous version APK. For my iPad, it appears to be near impossible.
            Regards,
            Geoff
              cwessner
              Lyricist III
              October 11, 2017
              I see alot of positive reviews and I am shocked. I loved the previous app. Easy to use, no instructions needed. This new one completely sucks. I was forced to update it today, no options given as I could not see my favorites I had set up. Now I can't select a room, as when I try to it sends me back to the same room I had playing. How do I get the old one back, this is really a sad day as everything you released in the past was solid, this is NOT.
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