@jhduckw.  That is at least an articulate and calm explanation of your dissatisfaction, and that is to be welcomed.  Where i think you are mistaken (and I respect your right to think that it is I who am mistaken), is in believing the alternatives to be anything other than simple.  There is a bit of up front hassle in setting up a NAS or a Google Play Music account, but thereafter these approaches are very straightforward.

I can still play from my phone, as it is an Android device.  I never do.  Playing from my Sonos Music Library, maintained on a NAS, could not possibly be simpler, and has other advantages over playing from a device.  I still sync any music I wish to take with me to my phone.  (Sonos was rightly claiming simple set up before it even added playing from the device as an option.)

We are all different, but I am not sure how you can complain of the complexity of something you haven’t tried.

You are right that you will not change my mind, and i don’t suppose I shall change yours.  I could try to debate whether you have been ‘betrayed’ but there is little point for either of us.  At least we have remained polite and i wish you well in whatever solution you adopt - even if that is to sell your Sonos.

Didn’t know that because somehow I didn’t get them… not at all sure why now. So I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt that they at least tried on that front.

But it still doesn’t change the fact that they made a conscious choice to not to develop functionally equivalent alternatives for customers with older products. And many of us will now consider products from competitors and not recommend Sonos anymore.

At the risk of inviting ridicule, I guess I don’t understand the issue with the Sonos app not being allowed access to the music library on iOS phones. I have music player apps (ie Ecoute) that work just fine with my locally stored music files. 

Without looking at Ecoute (I’m assuming this is a French app?), I’m willing to bet that the difference is that the Ecoute app is a player app, i.e. the music is being played on the iPhone. In the Sonos system (and Bluesound, who also had to discontinue this feature), the app is a remote control, that contacts the software running on the speaker, which is the actual player.

So in this case, Ecoute is playing directly on the phone, and grabbing the data inside the system. Sonos is playing on the speaker, so it’s reaching out to get the data from the phone, as if the phone was an NAS or HD. Apple changed it so that outside requests of this type could no longer stay connected, so while the Sonos would connect for a minute or two, as soon as the phone “locked” or “slept”, the connection would be cut.

That’s my interpretation of the way that this changed. I’m not a programmer, so I could be slightly wrong in some specifics, but I’m willing to bet that I’m correct in the generalities.

It’s in this thread already several times, but Sonos was aware of the issue in the Summer of ‘18, and spent a year trying to resolve the issue.  I think it’s pretty safe to assume they looked at fixing the issue and what alternative functionality was possible.  Like @Airgetlam stated already, it’s my understanding that the issue was tied to the fact that iOS would not allowed the Sonos speakers to access a stream of data off the iOS in order to play music consistently.  I don’t think an alternative could get around that roadblock.  Besides that, airplay already exists as does many other alternatives you’re already aware of.

Sonos tried hard, I believe, to accommodate the change in iOS that triggered the problem.  (FWIW I don’t think it was Apple’s ‘fault’ any more than it was Sonos’ ‘fault’ - just accidental collateral damage.)  If Sonos had succeeded, who is to say the next change in iOS wouldn’t have broken it again?

Given the simple alternatives available, it was a reasonable decision to stop wasting resource on a probably futile exercise over which Sonos had incomplete control, and devote that resource to improving the system in other ways.

I respect your right to see things differently, but I don’t think the facts support your extremely low opinion of the company.

Thanks all for the thoughtful replies. It’s a breath of fresh air to have a discussion on a public forum that is polite and engaging.

I actually had considered the NAS solution, and it looked like a good option, but it is not so simple to set up with my router (or at least for me to understand how to do it). So again - more work for me to make something work that was working fine before.

However, I also think there is a catch here. Won’t this only work with non-DRM music files? I have a mix of my own ripped MP3s and quite a lot of M4A music purchased from iTunes. The iTunes files played fine when streamed from my phone, but I don’t believe they will play directly on Sonos. Or am I missing something? I definitely don’t want to waste the effort if it can play only half my music collection.

While there are some DRM files that still exist from iTunes, the great majority of them are no longer DRM encoded….unless you’ve got an Apple subscription, and haven’t purchased the files themselves. I’ve got dozens of files that I’ve purchased from Apple over the years that are stored on my NAS, and while at one point, when Apple decided to drop the DRM encoding feature, I needed to delete the copy I had, and download a fresh copy, everything I’ve purchased since then has not had DRM in them.

I would be willing to bet that if you do have a file that has DRM, if you delete your local copy, and re-download it from iTunes, you’d get a non-DRM copy downloaded.

It’s a pain in the neck for about 15 minutes, but once it’s done, it’s done, and you never have to worry about it again. And that’s only if the files actually have DRM in them. 90% of my purchased files didn’t, since I’d bought them after Apple stopped using DRM.

For what it’s worth, it looks like Apple dropped DRM in January of 2009.

I think DRM files are M4P. M4A should be OK. I am not 100% sure on that but a quick Google should settle it.

There is no question that this is hassle that you could have done without. No reasonable person could deny that. But it is worth doing, in my view.. 

I am an idiot. If your files were DRM protected you would not have been able to play them on Sonos using 'on this iPhone'. it's where the music is played that counts, not where  it's stored. 

If I understand the system properly, it’s the player that counts. If whatever player is playing the music is set up to reach out and authorize with the Apple servers, then it would play any iTunes purchased music. I don’t think Apple allowed any non-Apple players to do that. I also don’t think Sonos did that for “on this device” playback, but does when playing from Apple Music directly, which of course is directly from Apple’s servers anyway.

Hello,

I just updated my Solons app on my iphone and now in “Browse” it no longer gives me the option of playing songs on my phone. Pandora works fine though.

Help!

I’m not sure what help you want. It appears, from what you’ve said, that your system is working with the features available to you when using an iPhone. 

Perhaps just use the Apple iPhone Airplay feature to play your locally stored music to your Sonos One speaker. There’s plenty of information both on the Apple website and many other online resources of how to do that.

I was going to suggest that… eventually!

The real problem here is the Sonos’ lack of fortitude in dealing with Apple. Always takes two to tango.

FYI Sonos. I’m tired of coming back to my Sonos system having to do updates nearly every time and then finding some thing no longer works. I’m over it, so regrettably I will flog off my entire system at my first opportunity and move to a more stable platform.  Oh did i mention I have been a dealer for Sonos since 2004.

So you removed the functionality that is the primary use of your product? You couldn’t possibly foresee the need for backwards compatibility with your devices that don’t have AirPlay and figure out a solution for it? Are you working on a solution or are you just going to hang us out to dry? -___- 

I can understand you miss this function, but, as has been said in this thread before, it was only the primary use of the product for a small part of Sonos users. Free fall back options are available though. 

I’m done with this company’s products.   I really disliked this decision and how it was handled.

what a disappointment that Sonos ditched the feature whereby I used to be able to play my music from my iPhone to my Sonos system. This was the main selling point when I bought the system four years ago. This sucks, what’s your problem Sonos? this is ridiculous!!!

You still can, your profile says you have a Sonos One so you can use Apple AirPlay to play your iPhone music to ALL your Sonos devices. 

Nope, I have a playbar, a sub and two play 1s and according to the app none of them are on AirPlay 

djouret,
 

Then you need to correct your community public profile as shown below…

Ok it’s updated, now what?...

Buy a Sonos One, perhaps?

...or you could implement one of the other alternative options mentioned in this thread, such as uploading your tracks to the ‘free’ Google Play service and install that same music service in the Sonos App and play them from there. It’s also handy in that it creates a backup of your tracks in case you misplace your phone.

So that’s something to consider, or you may wish to consider one of the other options mentioned.