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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Ken_Griffiths

Just got this gem of an email (below). Seems like they just aren’t listenting and plan on pushing through irrespective of the customer’s very clear response.

Yes, I think anyone who has one of the (declared) sonos legacy devices can now get 30% off a new modern sonos product/speaker set. I assume that is now the Sonos ‘offer' for having to perhaps split your Sonos System, come June 2020, into what many are calling S1 and S2 Households… I guess the good bit is you can still apparently continue to use the old legacy products, rather than recycle them… so passing them onto friends and family is what I will be doing.

If you read the terms of service for their upgrade program it clearly states that the discount code is only applied to your account after you log in and “recycle” your perfectly good legacy device which will brick it in 21 days. So, no, you cannot accept the 30% discount and continue to use your legacy device or give it to a friend.

So is this (see below link) not true then?

https://www.engadget.com/2020-03-05-sonos-kills-its-device-bricking-recycle-mode.html

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Ken_Griffiths

Ah I see Danny has answered my question… thank-you.👍

So we can trade-up and pass-on the old legacy Sonos devices. My kids will be well-pleased to receive them, I’m sure.. 😄

I think a 30% discount offer is more than fair in that situation.

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melvimbe

Although it’s been a month, I can see where people may still be unaware of the change in the trade up program.

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Danny

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ASWilson

Lyricist III

Just got this gem of an email (below). Seems like they just aren’t listenting and plan on pushing through irrespective of the customer’s very clear response.

Yes, I think anyone who has one of the (declared) sonos legacy devices can now get 30% off a new modern sonos product/speaker set. I assume that is now the Sonos ‘offer' for having to perhaps split your Sonos System, come June 2020, into what many are calling S1 and S2 Households… I guess the good bit is you can still apparently continue to use the old legacy products, rather than recycle them… so passing them onto friends and family is what I will be doing.

If you read the terms of service for their upgrade program it clearly states that the discount code is only applied to your account after you log in and “recycle” your perfectly good legacy device which will brick it in 21 days. So, no, you cannot accept the 30% discount and continue to use your legacy device or give it to a friend.

Incorrect. Read the current terms and conditions, you no longer need to recycle your legacy product.

Follow the link you provided contains this text (in a seemingly duplicate section 2/3 down the page):

HOW IT WORKS

Visit https://www.sonos.com/tradeup to learn about the program.
Sign into your Sonos account on http://www.sonos.com.
View the devices registered to your account in the System tab. Qualifying Products that are eligible for the Trade Up Program will be clearly marked under your account. Navigate to the Trade Up tab within your account, and follow the recycling instruction steps for each Qualifying Product. You will be directed to initiate Recycle Mode from within My Account, and subsequently confirm within the Sonos App.
Following initiation of Recycle Mode within your account open the Sonos App, while at home on the WiFi network associated with your Sonos System, and follow the prompts to confirm Recycle Mode for the Qualifying Products you selected on sonos.com
Promptly following confirmation of the recycling process in the Sonos App, your Discount Credit will be reflected and available for use anytime your are logged into the “My Account” section of sonos.com.

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melvimbe

Follow the link you provided contains this text (in a seemingly duplicate section 2/3 down the page):

HOW IT WORKS

Visit https://www.sonos.com/tradeup to learn about the program.
Sign into your Sonos account on http://www.sonos.com.
View the devices registered to your account in the System tab. Qualifying Products that are eligible for the Trade Up Program will be clearly marked under your account. Navigate to the Trade Up tab within your account, and follow the recycling instruction steps for each Qualifying Product. You will be directed to initiate Recycle Mode from within My Account, and subsequently confirm within the Sonos App.
Following initiation of Recycle Mode within your account open the Sonos App, while at home on the WiFi network associated with your Sonos System, and follow the prompts to confirm Recycle Mode for the Qualifying Products you selected on sonos.com
Promptly following confirmation of the recycling process in the Sonos App, your Discount Credit will be reflected and available for use anytime your are logged into the “My Account” section of sonos.com.

And there is also this statement a few sections above it.

The Sonos Trade Up Program and Promotional Period, each as defined below, has ended as of 12:00 Pacific time, March 10, 2020, and the following Sonos Trade Up Program Terms and Conditions have been terminated as of that date and time.

Not a lawyer, but it appears to me that the section below is left in for those who already traded in prior to March 10.

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Danny

Ryan SAuthor

Retired Sonos Staff

Just got this gem of an email (below). Seems like they just aren’t listenting and plan on pushing through irrespective of the customer’s very clear response.

Yes, I think anyone who has one of the (declared) sonos legacy devices can now get 30% off a new modern sonos product/speaker set. I assume that is now the Sonos ‘offer' for having to perhaps split your Sonos System, come June 2020, into what many are calling S1 and S2 Households… I guess the good bit is you can still apparently continue to use the old legacy products, rather than recycle them… so passing them onto friends and family is what I will be doing.

If you read the terms of service for their upgrade program it clearly states that the discount code is only applied to your account after you log in and “recycle” your perfectly good legacy device which will brick it in 21 days. So, no, you cannot accept the 30% discount and continue to use your legacy device or give it to a friend.

Incorrect. Read the current terms and conditions, you no longer need to recycle your legacy product.

Follow the link you provided contains this text (in a seemingly duplicate section 2/3 down the page):

HOW IT WORKS

Visit https://www.sonos.com/tradeup to learn about the program.
Sign into your Sonos account on http://www.sonos.com.
View the devices registered to your account in the System tab. Qualifying Products that are eligible for the Trade Up Program will be clearly marked under your account. Navigate to the Trade Up tab within your account, and follow the recycling instruction steps for each Qualifying Product. You will be directed to initiate Recycle Mode from within My Account, and subsequently confirm within the Sonos App.
Following initiation of Recycle Mode within your account open the Sonos App, while at home on the WiFi network associated with your Sonos System, and follow the prompts to confirm Recycle Mode for the Qualifying Products you selected on sonos.com
Promptly following confirmation of the recycling process in the Sonos App, your Discount Credit will be reflected and available for use anytime your are logged into the “My Account” section of sonos.com.

Hi ASWilson, that’s the old Trade Up Terms, if you look a little higher up on that same page you got that from, there’s an update:

HOW IT WORKS

Visit https://www.sonos.com/tradeup to learn about the program.
Sign into your Sonos account (“Your Account”) on http://www.sonos.com.
View the products registered to your account in the System tab. Qualifying Products that are eligible for the Trade Up Upgrade Program will be clearly marked under Your Account. Navigate to the Trade Up tab within Your Account, and follow the instruction steps for each Qualifying Product. You will be directed to accept these terms & conditions in order to receive your Discount Credit.
Your Discount Credit will be reflected and available for use anytime you are logged into the “My Account” section of sonos.com.

The old terms are still listed for now, but the update is for any new people using Trade Up on eligible legacy products.

Edit: melvimbe beat me to it.

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Mark good posts by pressing the like button, and select the best answer on questions you've asked to help others find solutions.

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ASWilson

Lyricist III

Thanks for clarifying for me, folks. I’m not a lawyer and found the duplicate sections confusing.

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Ken_Griffiths

Yes, thank-you for clarifying things Danny (and Ryan S)… I was sure I had read that was now the case.

It is an extremely good offer, a 30% discount voucher for each one of my older Sonos legacy products and the old devices will still continue to work… that’s excellent.👍

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K

Kumar

I had actually forgotten how furious I was with Sonos for the whole modern vs legacy issue. Their pushing it out as a “hey look at this great program we’ve got going in the middle of a GD pandemic” really drives it back home for me.

Perhaps they’re just preparing everyone for the rage they will feel come June, when they’ll have a bunch of locked-in consumers with nothing else to do with their time but shop for alternative speaker solutions.

When did May morph into June?

Sonos can be incredibly stupid, way beyond what I thought they were in January. It isn't just locked in consumers having time or even the ability to shop for alternatives, but having to deal with the turbulence that Sonos will cause in a few households when they find that things with existing systems break and Sonos resources to support these issues are themselves locked down.

At a time when most of us are dealing with all sort of things coming down the pipe, I would dearly love to have what Spence and his team seem to be smoking, that permits them to not announce that this May event is now on ice. This is now way beyond ostriches with their heads buried in the sand and rear ends flapping in the breeze.

I honestly don't care though; all I hope is that my workarounds for dealing with any Sonos stupidity in May or beyond still work in a way that my legacy kit remains functional in dumb speaker mode. There is no counting on anything useful coming from Sonos Support in the days to come, with EU support in particular plumbing new depths of incompetence even before the lockdowns started.

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User228754

Avid Contributor III

Having had a few trade up emails over the past few months and originally complaining to CEO, P Spence, and now seeing the latest change in policy from Sonos, I thought I would follow the trade up links.

However, the fear aspect of the bricking resides, (web site looks so similar), and now the “Bridge trade up (30% off) to boost emails” from Dec no longer works !! (I have two)

Now looking through 160 pages of this thread I am totally confused as to whether to jump and trade up, cause I want to use my redundant play 5 in a separate household with a new sonos one.

like many I’ve spent a lot of money on products over 10 years, and to be fair to Sonos they did replace a three year old Play3 over Christmas FOC after complaining and not accepting support response.

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IAS, (arc/Beam)with 2x PLAY3s, 2x PLAY1s, 2x Sonos One!

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HOW IT WORKS

HOW IT WORKS

The Sonos Trade Up Program and Promotional Period, each as defined below, has ended as of 12:00 Pacific time, March 10, 2020, and the following Sonos Trade Up Program Terms and Conditions have been terminated as of that date and time.

HOW IT WORKS

HOW IT WORKS

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