Last week we started rolling out New Search, a new feature that will make it easier to find content in the Sonos app.
What’s New Search?
We’re introducing a new single search box that searches across all categories (Artists, Songs, Albums, Playlists etc), to improve your overall search experience. This means that you no longer need to select a category to search in ahead of time. Instead, the search results will be broken down by category, and aggregated across all your content services, which you can easily switch between at the top of the search menu.
When performing a search, you will be able to narrow your search results by content service, rather than by category.
New Search on Sonos
To try New Search, tap on “Try the New Search” in the search menu.
New Search will be rolling out to all users over the coming weeks, with all users receiving the feature by 25th April edited from 18th April].
This means that not all of you will have access to New Search right away, but you can expect it soon.
Will New Search look through all of my audio sources?
New Search does not currently support searching through personal music libraries, “On this Device” (Android) content, or music services with library functionalities.
Why is my specific music service not being searched?
While the vast majority of content services on Sonos are available in New Search, there are some that are not yet compatible. We’re working with our partners to add more music services to New Search and look forward to rolling these out over time. In the meantime, all music services continue to be compatible with classic search.
I liked the classic search option, can I use that instead?
You can switch between Classic Search and New Search by navigating to the search menu and tapping the buttons labeled “Switch to Classic Search” and “Try the New Search” respectively.
Is Classic Search going away? No, users will continue to have the option to use classic search .
Please note: We can’t grant you access to New Search prior to it being available to you.
In Classic Search you used to be able to search by Author and Title for Audible audiobooks, that seems to have disappeared. It also looks like Audible is not searchable with the New Search yet. It is a pain to have to scroll through my hundreds of audiobooks to find the book I have been listening to if I have changed temporarily to another selection. Right now, as far as I can tell, there is no way to search your Audible library from the Sonos app.
Yes - this has been flagged up here:-
New Search will be rolling out to all users over the coming weeks, with all users receiving the feature by 25th April ledited from 18th April].
This means that not all of you will have access to New Search right away, but you can expect it soon.
You say to ‘all users’, so does this apply to S1 as well as S2 software users? If so, does changing the search to the classic one stick, or is this something that has to be selected each time?
If mine is typical, then it comes up with the new search option automatically, with a Classic Search option available as one click away. But, I think on checking, that maybe it comes up first with the method last used. So whichever you prefer you can probably stick with.Good to have the choice!
New Search will be rolling out to all users over the coming weeks, with all users receiving the feature by 25th April ledited from 18th April].
This means that not all of you will have access to New Search right away, but you can expect it soon.
You say to ‘all users’, so does this apply to S1 as well as S2 software users? If so, does changing the search to the classic one stick, or is this something that has to be selected each time?
Not a problem to me, as it doesn’t handle local music libraries.
It‘s a s2 only feature…
So not all users, then…
Not a problem to me, as it doesn’t handle local music libraries.
S1 doesn’t get any new features, even simple ones, but especially complex ones like this.
It‘s a s2 only feature…
So not all users, then…
Not a problem to me, as it doesn’t handle local music libraries.
S1 doesn’t get any new features, even simple ones, but especially complex ones like this.
That’s fine - I wouldn’t have queried it had Ditte not said that it was being rolled out to all users...
“New Search” doesn’t seem to be materially superior to “Classic Search” in any way.
Quite the contrary, since it doesn’t support searching personal / local directories, it seems as if Sonos is sniffing the viability of dropping support entirely for that method of listening to music. Yes, the FAQ says users can still use classic search. I can’t help but think that ‘for now’ is the unwritten caveat. Otherwise, perhaps someone with more technical knowledge can explain to me why they wouldn’t add local file searching to the ‘new search’.
I’ve been so happy with Sonos’ sound quality and speaker tethering options, especially for the price point. I’d already essentially committed to the Sonos ecosystem, and was on the verge of plunking down for a minisub and a few more Ones to add to the other 5 Ones, and this new search feature has me admittedly spooked against furthering my investment/commitment. I have a very large digital library, which has weathered and will continue to weather whichever FOTM streaming service comes and goes.
I’d love to see a stated/firm commitment from Sonos on continued, indefinite support for local music libraries.
Well, personally I would be surprised if any company gave an unequivocal commitment to something for an indefinite period. Regarding this feature, I would suggest you look at the history of support Sonos has given since its inception for legacy items. I know some people have complained about, for example, support for controllers. But these are not passive speakers we are dealing with here, this is technology. It changes, it updates. It improves.
My advice would be to look at Sonos’ overall commitment, history of support, and make your decision.
"Try the New Search' where you won't be able to search your music library or the music on you device. A great backwards innovation. How long until the existing search option is removed?
I know it’s been said already, but… local library search!?!? This is a must have.
Well, personally I would be surprised if any company gave an unequivocal commitment to something for an indefinite period. Regarding this feature, I would suggest you look at the history of support Sonos has given since its inception for legacy items. I know some people have complained about, for example, support for controllers. But these are not passive speakers we are dealing with here, this is technology. It changes, it updates. It improves.
My advice would be to look at Sonos’ overall commitment, history of support, and make your decision.
To be clear, I wouldn't expect it. But I've only been on Sonos for a little over a year, so my frame of reference has been what they've done in that time. The initially stated concerns hold: they've unnecessarily dropped support for a fundamental feature that ought to have been easy to keep, and have yet to improve on the ability to organize local files.
Technology improves, but this release doesn't appear to be an improvement.
But these are not passive speakers we are dealing with here, this is technology. It changes, it updates. It improves.
Having a library of digital music is not an outdated method of accessing your music. I currently do not subscribe to any streaming services but I do have my Amazon Music (Autorip), Spotify (podcasts) and Qobuz (purchases) accounts linked to Sonos.
By way of comparison, I own the three albums in Light in the Attic's Pacific Breeze collection, all ripped from CD to FLAC and stored on a HDD plugged into my router and linked to my Sonos speakers. If I search for 'Pacific Breeze' under albums in Classic Search I get this and I can just tap on the volume I want to listen to:
In New Search I get this:
It's a mess, showing me a confusing array of results for services I don't subscribe to and if the albums were there (There are EP editions - the full albums are not available on streaming platforms) I wouldn't be able to play them.
Yes, I can manually access the albums by a sequence of taps - Music Icon-Music Library-Albums-Various Artists-Pacific Breeze - but it's a faff especially when you have 3,000+ albums in your music library and the list starts bouncing up and down as Sonos plays catch up trying to populate the screen as you scroll down.
It's not progress and the fact that Sonos have released New Search minus the ability to search your personal library suggests that this capability has been kicked into touch. Classic Search isn't going to be around forever.
It is in no way an improvement.
Having invstigated this further, the future for music libraries is not looking very promising at all.
There's no mention of New Search not currently supporting library, just a statement that it does not support it. If Sonos is not supporting search in music libraries you do wonder if there will be ongoing support for music libraries at all. Given Sonos' committment to Bluetooth and line-in connection for its new range of speakers, I'm fearful that the next "innovation" will along the lines of "We no longer support music libraries but you can instead use Bluetooth to play the music in your library on your Sonos speakers using your device's native music player" and this years old technology will be sold as giant leap forward. I was hoping to invest in a couple of Era 300 speakers but that has definitely been put on hold given, what I see, Sonos' lack of commitment to music libraries. Not everyone wants to be hamstrung with an annual/monthly streaming subscription when they have a vast amount of "owned" much of which, in my case, cannot be found on streaming services.
I have the new search working at our cabin but when I go home the new search option goes away. Shutting down the app and reloading it temporarily shows “switch to new search” and when pressed it’ll go to the new view but it come up unable to browse music, press the back button and it switches back to the old search with no option to select new search.
I guess I’ll just wait till the 25th and see if it sorts itself out.
Having invstigated this further, the future for music libraries is not looking very promising at all
Seems unlikely they drop local library support. But very likely they continue to treat it like abandonware imo
New Search doesn't give any results from your own music library (on a NAS). Therefore it is a ueseless product.
Having invstigated this further, the future for music libraries is not looking very promising at all.
No, but then it has languished for many years now. I bought into Sonos about 12 years ago, and (purely from my point of view) nothing has improved much. I prefer the older interfaces, the True Play facility is not available to android users, control has been removed from the desktop and the capabilities re local music haven’t improved.
I think that we just have to accept that we are no longer the target market for Sonos, and make sure that we have alternatives for when either the hardware fails or the software is changed unacceptably. The benefit of the S1/S2 split is that they are unlikely to mess around with S1 users - which is fine with me. Not so good for S2 users, as Sonos can change or drop features any time that they like and they don’t offer software regression.
Sonos does some things very well, and if you’re content to settle for streaming services then it’s a good multi-room system - I’m not sure that it has any real competitors.
New Search doesn't give any results from your own music library (on a NAS). Therefore it is a ueseless product.
This. If Sonos is ditching support for (or refuses to develop tools that also support) local libraries then that’s not a great sign.
Am I missing something? The new search doesn't search my local library? Or doesn't find songs (unless there isn't a band if the same name) ? It seems an extra step to find songs?
