I just started using Sonos Voice Assistant and I’m loving the ability to group rooms by voice. I have Groups set up like ‘Upstairs’ and ‘Downstairs’ which include multiple rooms.
Can Sonos Voice Assistant recognize Group names? It doesn’t appear so, but I’m hoping others might confirm.
Hi
Yes this is possible, please see https://support.sonos.com/en-gb/article/list-of-voice-requests-for-sonos-voice-control
The user guide references grouping/ungrouping rooms, as well as adding a room to currently playing group. But what I don’t see is that we’re able to activate a group itself via voice. Where one command for a Group activates multiple rooms.
For example, when I say “add in DOWNSTAIRS” (which is a Group of rooms that I’ve created) I want it to activate the living room, kitchen, and sitting rooms all at once.
The user guide references grouping/ungrouping rooms, as well as adding a room to currently playing group. But what I don’t see is that we’re able to activate a group itself via voice. Where one command for a Group activates multiple rooms.
For example, when I say “add in DOWNSTAIRS” (which is a Group of rooms that I’ve created) I want it to activate the living room, kitchen, and sitting rooms all at once.
Please follow the link in my post and in the last row of the Playing Music table:
Play in another room or on a saved group
"Play some jazz in the kitchen"
"Play Tame Impala downstairs"
In your example asking “Play Jazz in downstairs” will play in all rooms added to that Group
Please also see:
Group products and Rooms together or move music from one place to another.
Action
Example requests with "Hey Sonos"
Group and ungroup products or Rooms
"Group the kitchen and living room"
“Group all of my downstairs speakers”
“Group everywhere”
“Ungroup all of my rooms”
Add or remove products or Rooms from a group
“Add this room to the group”
“Add the kitchen and the dining room to the living room group”
“Remove the office from the group”
“Play here too”
Move the music from one place to another
“Move the music from the living room to the kitchen”
“Move the music upstairs”
“Stop the music in the office and play it in the backyard”
I see that now, thanks very much for pointing that out!
"Play some jazz in the kitchen"
"Play Tame Impala downstairs"
In your example asking “Play Jazz in downstairs” will play in all rooms added to that Group
After spending some time with this, I unfortunately am having no luck getting the voice assistant to respond to Group names. I’ve tried various permutations of Upstairs or Downstairs. If the ecosystem is at rest, and I say “Hey Sonos, play music Downstairs” (or, ‘in the downstairs’), the assistant either asks me what timer I want, or tries to play a song with those two words (upstairs/downstairs)
Controlling Rooms by voice works well! Controlling Groups by voice only appears to work on paper; in practice I’m having no success.
Still very much open to advice/troubleshooting tips!
Are you creating the Group(s) in the Sonos app? There is a default one named Everywhere, but you can create your own groups in the Sonos app. Give them unique names that don’t conflict with Alexa group names or Sonos Room names.
Are you creating the Group(s) in the Sonos app? There is a default one named Everywhere, but you can create your own groups in the Sonos app. Give them unique names that don’t conflict with Alexa group names or Sonos Room names.
Are you creating the Group(s) in the Sonos app? There is a default one named Everywhere, but you can create your own groups in the Sonos app. Give them unique names that don’t conflict with Alexa group names or Sonos Room names.
My group names don’t conflict with any room/speaker names 
You can see where the assistant plays a song related to ‘downstairs’ lol
Can you confirm what voice command you are using? I have a group called ‘Living Area’ and I’ve just tested the command ‘Hey Sonos, play Adele in Living Area’ and it works straight away.
Can you confirm what voice command you are using? I have a group called ‘Living Area’ and I’ve just tested the command ‘Hey Sonos, play Adele in Living Area’ and it works straight away.
Seems to be working like a champ after a night of sleep. I’m having no issues starting or moving music to my Group names now. Since SVC is local to my devices, I can’t blame it on the cloud (unless it’s only speech itself that is local to the devices)…but I’m unsure why it took 12+ hours for SVC to recognize the Group names.
Appreciate the help y’all! I’ll revert if I get any more hiccups.
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