So….…
Last Saturday(09/12/20), all of a sudden, I was able to control Sonos from the Lock Screen on my iPhone. It worked on mine and my wife’s phone. When we woke up Sunday morning, it was gone. Sonos. Make it work, we are tired of waiting.
*Moderator Note: Modified in accordance with the community guidelines.*
Best answer by Rowena B.
Hi
Thank you for reaching us and welcome to the Sonos Community and letting us know about your concern. Let me help you out with this.
We appreciate you for sharing your feedback on this. iOS does not natively provide a way to control devices on your home network from the lock screen in iOS, the controls are only available for audio being played on the device itself. The Sonos implementation of lock screen controls was built in a way that's no longer viable and with the launch of AirPlay 2 on Sonos, we made the decision to remove the functionality in households that use AirPlay. Disable the AirPlay feature on all non-Sonos AirPlay endpoints to allow lock screen controls is a limitation.
Use AirPlay on your iPhone, iPad, or Mac to stream your favorite music, movies, podcasts, and other audio directly to your Sonos products. Sonos is only compatible with AirPlay 2. Check if your Apple devices can play AirPlay 2 audio in Apple’s AirPlay article.
Please let me know if you have any further questions or concerns, we'll be glad to assist you.
+16Hi
Sonos supports the control of your system from the iOS lock screen under certain conditions. The Sonos app has a 5-minute window to reconnect and re-enable the lock screen. When the device leaves the WiFi range or disables the WiFi, the lock screen will restore itself if reconnection is made in that 5 minutes.
To confirm that the Lock Screen controls are enabled, you can check your iOS and Sonos app settings. You can also check this article Control Sonos from the iOS lock screen.
I'd appreciate it if you can submit a diagnostic report from your Sonos system to check what's going on.
If you need help with any other information, please be sure to let us know.
The Sonos Community is always here to help
I am having the same issue….no lock controls appear at all. I have it setup correctly in my ios settings and sonos app.
Please check diagnostics number: 181017153
+16Hi
Upon checking the diagnostic, I see that Sonos is active in the Control Center.
There are limitations in controlling Sonos on the lock screen of iOS devices.
Please try other iOS devices and let us know if you experience the same.
We'll wait for your reply.
I am experiencing the same issue with lock controls and I have followed the above instructions including restarting my phone and the Sonos app, disabling airplay, disconnecting any bluetooth devices, disabled voice over, and no headphones are connected.
Just sent over my Diagnostics # 774667709
Please let me know how to resolve this ASAP
+16Hi
The diagnostic shows that Sonos is active in the Control Center. Upon further checking on this, that the lock screen feature has been removed from iOS devices.
iOS does not natively provide a way to control devices on your home network from the lock screen in iOS, the controls are only available for audio being played on the device itself.
The lock screen feature was built in a way that's no longer viable and with the launch of AirPlay 2 on Sonos, the feature is no longer available in the households that use AirPlay.
If you need help with any other information, please be sure to let us know.
We're here to answer any further questions you have.
Is there a way to do the opposite? As in disable AirPlay on all my Sonos speakers? I AirPlay to my AppleTV, but I never AirPlay to my Sonos speaker (partly because that has never worked for me).
Rather than streaming via Sonos, my current workflow is to play on my phone, AirPlay to my AppleTV which has a PlayBar attached, then group all my speakers to the PlayBar input. This is a frustrating workaround just for lock screen control.
+16Hi
Thank you for reaching us and welcome to the Sonos Community and letting us know about your concern. Let me help you out with this.
We appreciate you for sharing your feedback on this. iOS does not natively provide a way to control devices on your home network from the lock screen in iOS, the controls are only available for audio being played on the device itself. The Sonos implementation of lock screen controls was built in a way that's no longer viable and with the launch of AirPlay 2 on Sonos, we made the decision to remove the functionality in households that use AirPlay. Disable the AirPlay feature on all non-Sonos AirPlay endpoints to allow lock screen controls is a limitation.
Use AirPlay on your iPhone, iPad, or Mac to stream your favorite music, movies, podcasts, and other audio directly to your Sonos products. Sonos is only compatible with AirPlay 2. Check if your Apple devices can play AirPlay 2 audio in Apple’s AirPlay article.
Please let me know if you have any further questions or concerns, we'll be glad to assist you.
Another furstrated customer here. I have read through everything and can’t seem to get this working again. I just started a brand new iPhone, disabled bluetooth, disabled AirPlay and Voice Over and everything else on the phone… and am still not seeing controls on the lock screen. I have also switched on and off lock screen controls in the App. What else can I do?
+21If you have ANY other Airplay devices on your network then the Lock Screen controls will not show.
The irony is that I can disable Airplay on Apple devices but not Sonos, I have no need to Airplay to my Sonos devices.
+21I actually have a working lockscreen widget that works without disabling Airplay on other devices… but it’s for my Bluesound players 
So the question begs why can’t Sonos make their work?
I turned Airplay off for my Apple TV (my only other AirPlay endpoint in the home), then reset the app, and now it’s working for me.
Hi All
Longtime lurker, first time poster.
i have to say that, for me, this is the single most frustrating issue with Sonos. It has worked on and off for months. Initially it never worked so I followed the various “fixes”, including disabling WiFi on every device I have, which was SO many lol. That didn’t help. So I reenabled the ones I use and just gave up. Then it started working a couple weeks later. Worked for a few days then gone. So I figured there was an update and maybe NOW I should disable air play again, so I did that and it didn’t come back. I waited a week then reenabled airplay.
then for the last couple weeks it has been on and off every few days.
the information in these threads seems very contradictory at times so at this point I’m so confused. Lol.
anyone have an update?
cheers
Jamie
Came here because for about an hour I had lock controls and it was glorious. Now it is gone.
I’m sorry but there is zero chance I am going through all of my billion devices to shut off airplay. This whole “workaround” from Sonos is ridiculous.
just create a widget and push it out. This is a basic BASIC feature in 2021 and if Sonos is a serious company interested in staying a serious company it will get this fixed asap. Because I’ve now seen people complaining about this for MONTHS with nothing being done about it at all. I mean there are widgets for the dumbest apps and yet a company like Sonos can’t bootstrap one together to allow users to use the ONLY DEVICE THAT CONTROLS THEIR SYSTEM in an accessible way.
it is beyond frustrating.
Very annoying. I also own Bose smart speakers and they’ve offered a simple widget for years that is reliable enough and offers playback and volume controls, plus album artworks and quick access to your favorite presets.
Since iOS 14 and its Home Screen widgets appeared, older widgets have been forced to the bottom of the Lock Screen control center, but it is still way better than having to unlock the iPhone, switch apps, and wait for the Sonos app to become responsive.
Please fix this.
I was reading about this in another topic but that’s closed for comments, so I’ll share my workaround here.
If you have trouble using Lock Screen controls for your Sonos system, simply stop using the Sonos app. I’m using Spotify and set the music to play over my Sonos speakers. Because Spotify does offer Lock Screen controls, I can now change songs and volume on my Sonos system while my phone is locked.
Hope this helps.
The other problem with this is if you have a HomePod mini, and don’t use it for music (just Siri), there is no way to get Lock Screen Controls to work (because there is no way to disable AirPlay on a HomePod).
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