Retired Sonos Staff

End of Software Support - Clarifications

Dec 8, 2022 11:29 AM UTC
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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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Graham Price

Contributor II

I really wish I had never invested in a Sonos system. I bought my first products soon after they were available so have had the system for around 13 years and have gradually added to it, having bought a Move only a few months ago. What a mistake. Logging on the website I see I have 21 legacy products and 7 modern ones which puts things into perspective. I feel a real fool and should have learnt my lesson when they made my Controller 100’s redundant, although this wasn’t so bad with the advent of smartphones and tablets which provided a substitute without having to spend money on replacements. All well and good but then they made these useless when the old iPad we used as a main controller tried to update the App and it wouldn’t run on the older version of IOS - no way to go back to an old version of the APP, so that was that … bin the iPad. Every other App installed on the iPad works fine - it just won’t update the App if the new version isn’t compatible. Not the case with Sonos … the old working version is gone so not only are they building redundancy into products they produce themselves but also stopping you using older iPads and phones as well. I complained about this but they weren’t interested! OK for a moment lets forget about the Controllers and the Bridges (since replaced by Boosts) but I have 12 ZP100’s and one ZP80. To upgrade just these would cost £5,450 even with the 30% discount … totally ridiculous!

And that’s not to mention the issues regarding the useless software with the track limit for the Music Library, which doesn’t tell you it has an issue but just seems to index music randomly missing things as it sees fit and coming up with continual error messages. OK it’s a hardware issue in part but whey when they have known about the problem for many years, they haven’t addressed the issue in software I cannot grasp!

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Finn1000

Enthusiast I

These speakers should never be classified as disposable.

They should remain fully operational until they for example blow a speaker or a component malfunctions.

I have a play 5 ( 2nd generation) & a play 3.

So only interested in playing them one at a time ( separate rooms)

It’s an absolute insult to suggest on any level that these speakers are disposable.

Disposable suggests spending 50 - £100 max.

Speakers should last until they fail & not forced to fail by the manufacturer.

I would suggest Sonos sort this situation now, or fail, if they haven’t done already.

Back of the net springs to mind.

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Feettothefire

Lyricist I

Here in the UK we once had a high street jewellery shop chain known as ‘Ratners’.

Just like you guys at Sonos they did very well and were very popular with their customers.,until in April 1991 the owner of Ratners (Mr Gerald Ratner), in a foolish and arrogant way, took his customers for fools, and proudly explained that some of Ratner’s products were “total crap” (that is a quote).

This Legacy statement really amounts to much the same thing.

So Sonos are now ‘doing a Ratner’.

Nobody is going to be purchasing Sonos products from this day forth……...That’s a sure bet.

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Erik 74

Lyricist III

It is mind boggling really. Such a great product and ecosystem but all that trust evaporated in a few days...

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Sparkyboots

Enthusiast I

A massive price jump but I’m getting more and more impressed the more I read and watch about the bowers and Wilkins formation stuff coupled with Roon or even just through Bluetooth I’d hope they’d be more future proof

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Gillydior

Enthusiast I

I wouldn’t worry about new products, once people realise that any Sonos product will only have the “linked together” feature for a few years they’ll invest in a different company.

A household speaker system receives a radio signal then transmits it via sound waves, I’ve got an old radio with valves in it and it still works, (though not DAB of course) so unless the wifi system is about to change then the Sonos speakers should be able to do so for decades, well unless you bought a cheap one!

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HelterSkelter

Enthusiast II

For anyone who hasn’t come across this there is a relevant petition on change.org here : https://www.change.org/p/sonos-we-want-sonos-to-reverse-their-decision-to-stop-supporting-their-expensive-speakers

It probably won’t achieve anything but it also won’t take you very long to sign it so it can’t hurt...

Done

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DK_Madsen

Enthusiast II

Yeah I don't think there is any chance you would be able to put new models launched after may into your legacy setup.

Yeah and i doubt that you will even be allowed to incorporate other legacy devices into your legacy setup either.

Maybe, being a legacy only user, i would get a good deal on, say a play 5 1.gen, at a really low price second hand because the owner was changing to another brand, would i even be able to connect the “new” legacy device to my system.

And what about someone that has no speakers...if that person buys a used play 5, will he/she be able to use it at all...Can they register this speaker to a new account.

I mean, if sonos dont care about the current users and try to force them to upgrade, would it not be logical that they would also try to ruin the second hand market, to avoid people selling legacy devices.

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HelterSkelter

Enthusiast II

Yeah I don't think there is any chance you would be able to put new models launched after may into your legacy setup.

Yeah and i doubt that you will even be allowed to incorporate other legacy devices into your legacy setup either.

Maybe, being a legacy only user, i would get a good deal on, say a play 5 1.gen, at a really low price second hand because the owner was changing to another brand, would i even be able to connect the “new” legacy device to my system.

And what about someone that has no speakers...if that person buys a used play 5, will he/she be able to use it at all...Can they register this speaker to a new account.

I mean, if sonos dont care about the current users and try to force them to upgrade, would it not be logical that they would also try to ruin the second hand market, to avoid people selling legacy devices.

I’d like to think they wouldn’t stoop that low, but with the recent announcements, and Patricks ‘Sorry’ announcement, I no longer have any trust in what they might do (even if unethical to you and me).

For example, they are currently running advertising saying ‘add to your system at any time’, and ‘Build a system’.

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Ryan SAuthor

Retired Sonos Staff

not great. The wording of that clarification, whilst on the face of it seems to try and backtrack...they haven't stated specifically that the units will work fully for as long as you want them. Imagine spending 2k on a HiFi system only to have to replace it in 5 years because the manufacturer deliberately built it of parts that were non replaceable and would only last 5 years. really angry about this.

I was in the proces of acquiring a Sonos SUB for my Playbar + 2 Play 1 “sorround sound”

Come may, i wont even be ABLE to buy that one and incorporate it into my setup, because i will be in legacy mode to keep my Play 5 in the loop, and a new SUB will probably have new firmware out of the box, that can not be downgraded to run in legacy mode.

So they not only angered a lot of current costumers, making them not want to upgrade, they also prevented anyone with a legacy system from buying any new sonos products in the future because the new units can not be enrolled in a legacy system.

How’s that, for a poor “Lets trip ourselves up big time” decision

This isn’t accurate as to my understanding. One thing Sonos has stated is that it will be possible to add a newly purchased modern device to a legacy network. But quite honestly, financially, if you’re in legacy only, purchase Sonos sub from the used market instead.

The only time this would not be possible (in your instance particular) is if you’ve split the network into 1 for legacy devices and 1 for modern devices, your surround system is on legacy and you’re trying to add the sub to the modern system. (Clear as mud?)
Short answer - if you only run a legacy network to keep everything grouped and happy as it is today (which is what I’ll do), it will possible to add a new device to that environment, regardless of the firmware it ships with initially.

If I’ve missed some communication (entirely possible) that directly contradicts this please point to it.

Have they said you can add a New modern item to a legacy system? I had concluded from all the comms that you could not. If legacy and modern have to operate separately, as I think they are saying how would that work?

Any device being added to a network updates its firmware to match the environment its entering at that time. There should be no change to that. If you're adding a new/modern device to a legacy environment, this should still hold true. (I suspect you’ll be a choice as to which you’d like to do at that time.) That’s my understanding
@Ryan S , this would be one time, amidst the fray of this thread, it’d be nice for a quick pop-in.

If you bring modern devices along with legacy devices into a legacy build it’ll still be possible to add all Sonos products currently available for sale to a legacy system. They’ll all update to the correct legacy build.

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