Retired Sonos Staff

End of Software Support - Clarifications

December 8, 2022 at 11:29 AM
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We announced yesterday that some of our oldest Sonos products will be moving into a legacy mode in May of 2020. Our commitment is to support products with regular software updates for a minimum of five years after we stop selling them, and we have a track record of supporting products far longer.

Here is some public information we’ve shared, gathered into one place to respond to some of your questions in one easy thread, so that people can find the correct information easily.

Beginning in May, software updates and new features from Sonos will only be delivered to systems with only modern products.

After May, systems that include legacy products will continue to work as before - but they will no longer receive software updates or new features.

Sonos will work to maintain the existing experience and conduct bug fixes, but our efforts will ultimately be limited by the lack of memory and processing power of these legacy products.

We don’t expect any immediate impact to your experience, but access to services and overall functionality will eventually be disrupted, particularly as partners evolve their own services and features.

Customers with both legacy and modern products have time to decide what option is best for them. You can continue to use your whole system in legacy mode - in this case, it will stop receiving updates and new features.

You will also be able to separate your legacy products from your modern products, so that the modern products can still receive updates and new features, and legacy products can still be used separately. We’ll have more information on how to do this in May when you can take that action.

Another option available to all customers with legacy products is to take advantage of the Trade Up program, which allows you to upgrade older Sonos products to modern ones with a 30% discount. Trade Up will be open to customers at any time should they decide to upgrade.

We recognize this is new for Sonos owners, just as it is for Sonos. We are committed to help you by making options available to you to support the best decision for your home.

If you have any further questions, please don’t hesitate with asking.

Update 2/22: A message from our CEO

We heard you. We did not get this right from the start. My apologies for that and I wanted to personally assure you of the path forward:

First, rest assured that come May, when we end new software updates for our legacy products, they will continue to work as they do today. We are not bricking them, we are not forcing them into obsolescence, and we are not taking anything away. Many of you have invested heavily in your Sonos systems, and we intend to honor that investment for as long as possible. While legacy Sonos products won’t get new software features, we pledge to keep them updated with bug fixes and security patches for as long as possible. If we run into something core to the experience that can’t be addressed, we’ll work to offer an alternative solution and let you know about any changes you’ll see in your experience.

Secondly, we heard you on the issue of legacy products and modern products not being able to coexist in your home. We are working on a way to split your system so that modern products work together and get the latest features, while legacy products work together and remain in their current state. We’re finalizing details on this plan and will share more in the coming weeks.

While we have a lot of great products and features in the pipeline, we want our customers to upgrade to our latest and greatest products when they’re excited by what the new products offer, not because they feel forced to do so. That’s the intent of the trade up program we launched for our loyal customers.

Thank you for being a Sonos customer. Thank you for taking the time to give us your feedback. I hope that you’ll forgive our misstep, and let us earn back your trust. Without you, Sonos wouldn’t exist and we’ll work harder than ever to earn your loyalty every single day.

If you have any further questions please don’t hesitate to contact us.

Patrick Spence
CEO, Sonos

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W

Witthaus

Trending Lyricist I

If history holds true, only 12 more pages on this thread till they lock it down. Still no word from the slimy Sonos CEO. It’s painfully obvious that this is really going to happen. I’m still in denial.

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bpwest

Lyricist I

‪ I have 6 Sonos products, two are considered legacy. I have preached the gospel of Sonos to my friends and family producing at least 14+ direct purchases.‬

‪Discontinuing support for some of your “legacy” products goes against the one of the main selling point for your products. ‬You need to be aware that your products are significantly more expensive than many of your competitors. The increased cost in my mind was worth it for the system integration and the previously promised longevity of the products.

Just know that know that as airplay and other music streaming protocols become more more ubiquitous; your products will become less and less the main supplier for whole home audio. Additionally, since you appear to no longer be honoring your legacy products with updates the argument for longevity falls flat with me.

I am not saying I will never purchase one of your products again but your decision has made the field more even for your competitors and quite frankly the premium price for your products does not seem to be worth it.

You have successfully made me feel like a fool for spending the amount of money that I have, when I could get the same functionality out of a set of speakers/stereo paired with an airplay adapter or amazon dot; achieving the exact same functionality for a fraction of the price with a set of speakers that wont die off in the never ending upgrade cycle that you are attempting to lock your customers into.

Ben

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jdale

I think there are better solutions to the technological limitations. Put the legacy devices into a legacy mode where all they do is receive and play audio from non-legacy devices in the same network. Old device doesn’t know how to contact a streaming service? No problem, the newer device does. There’s no device that doesn’t have the computational power to simply receive and play audio, that’s what they’ve all done since day one.

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jharuni

Lyricist I

Your products are outrageously overpriced. I bought a few of them because I thought they would be a good investment. No cables, easy to use, some nice features …. I decided to blow a ton of money on this. But if I knew this would be like buying another car, that needs to be dumped and replaced whever it’s worn out …. I would never have chosen Sonos. And I certainly wont’ now. $500 for a mediocre monophonic room speaker that gets bricked after 7 years? That’s totally insane. Goodbye Sonos.

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Mrm

Contributor I

I am another who has “invested” in a Sonos system. Compared to others I have a small system comprising of 2 x Play 5, 2 x Play 3 and 2 x 1s. My 5s were only bought in 2015. I wouldn't have paid £900 for them if I had thought there was a chance of them being bricked by the maker in 5 years. My main use is Spotify so we’ll see how bad things are in May, the last Controller update was a pigs ear so I’m not hopeful.

I get that computers and phones age but my old iPhone 3 is still in use with a relative. My speakers are not computers.

I’m in the market for a sound bar. I can't justify any further Sonos products now though. Premium price for a 5 year life, no thanks, not even with 30% off.

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G

Goodbye Sonos

Enthusiast II

I think there are better solutions to the technological limitations. Put the legacy devices into a legacy mode where all they do is receive and play audio from non-legacy devices in the same network. Old device doesn’t know how to contact a streaming service? No problem, the newer device does. There’s no device that doesn’t have the computational power to simply receive and play audio, that’s what they’ve all done since day one.

Thing is you have to want to do that, and Sonos doesn’t want to.

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John Bradon

Lyricist I

It seems to me that Sonos have not thought out how this will work. I use Spotify and think there is a risk that (“legacy”) Sonos won’t work with that anymore.

Ryan, Can you say what Sonos are doing with Spotify to keep legacy products working? Are you talking to them about this?

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peterbr

Avid Contributor I

Why why why???

I am unable to understand why sonos cannot freeze code bases at the moment something drastic changes in their product line. This started at the time the CR100 was dropped from the software.

Why not have major releases and with every new main feature and hardware generation introduced the current release is frozen and a new software release is started. Similar as for windows and MAC OS software. Older generation apple PC’s and laptop still function happily with the MacOS latest release that was supported for that PC/Laptop. Only security updates will be issued for those releases and new features will only be available on the current code base.

So could we please get 3 release version;

classic sonos equipment including CR100 support

classic sonos equipment

current sonos hardware family support

It goes without saying that each release version should come with it own user interface app for IOS, MacOS and Android.

I’ll leave it up to Sonos marketing to come up with glossy names for each release ;-)

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UKUser

Enthusiast I

Ability to sell additional products to existing customers.

As our customers add Sonos to their homes and listen to more audio content, they typically increase the number of our products in their homes. In fiscal 2019, follow-on purchases represented approximately 37% of new product registrations. As we execute on our product roadmap to address evolving consumer preferences, we believe we can expand the number of products in our customers’ homes. Our ability to sell additional products to existing customers is a key part of our business model, as follow-on purchases indicate high customer engagement and satisfaction, decrease the likelihood of competitive substitution and result in higher customer lifetime value. We will continue to innovate and invest in product development in order to enhance customer experience and drive sales of additional products to existing customers.

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IJN

Renowned Enthusiast I

WOW! Sonos what a big fail

I own 3 devices that are now going to be bricks, thank you so much!

I have a Sub I just purchased after Christmas and thankfully I have until the end of the month to return it (thanks amazon) grabbing the box out the garage after this rant.

I have close to 20 Sonos products in my house from over the years, now I see that this adding ever year was me just being stupid.

Side note if you still own Sonos stock SELL IT before it is a $5 stock, Hopefully apple will buy this company and straighten things out.

SONOS reverse this stupid move

#sellsonos,#boycottsonos

FFS - sincerely hope that Apple don’t buy Sonos; even greater premium pricing and even less continued support! I’ve been there, done that and finally just about extricated myself from that ecosystem (says he from the keyboard of his MAC)… but I’m no longer buying new products from them either.

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