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BigAlNYC
BigAlNYC
Trending Lyricist II
April 5, 2025
Answered

1 Sonos speaker out of 6 keeps dropping out

My kitchen Sonos One SL which worked for 4 years mostly without issue, has just started losing connection to wifi while the other half of the stereo pair (another Sonos One SL) continues to play. Swapping places, changing rooms, even wired over LAN, the problem continues. At times it breaks the app and the entire room they’re in completely drops from the app. Sonos team on X (Twitter) are gracious, even DM me at all hours, but some of the call center techs are argumentative and give me bad troubleshooting advice about this issue.  BTW I also have a Sonos Ultimate immersive Set (Arc+Sub3+dual Era 300s) that play without issue on the same WiFi. Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated and welcomed. 
Thank you.

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BigAlNYC
BigAlNYCAnswer
Trending Lyricist II
April 6, 2025

iPad mini running iPadOS 13.3.1 does not see the Sonos One at all

iPad Air running iPadOS 18.4 not only sees the speaker it allows me to manipulate the audio through AirPlay 

last update for 4/5:  successfully got stereo pair with sub working. minor adjustments may have helped. Signs point to iOS or Sonos App. Maybe a combination of both. 
thanks to everyone for the help and input

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BigAlNYC
BigAlNYCAuthor
Trending Lyricist II
May 18, 2025

Thank you for your responses.  And if I use non technical terms as “feed” please excuse me for reasons of brevity. 
The Sonos app is the music source. I also use Airplay for Twitch and Mixcloud content. My point was to highlight the audio source (Sonos app) and the Sonos OneSL error, while the Sonos Arc in the same room played immediately. After several weekends of troubleshooting I’ve resigned myself to this being permanent. 

@BigAlNYC,

As @Stanley_4 mentions above, the Sonos App is not a music source…  The App is also not a music player, much in the same way that a hand held ‘TV remote’ control is not a video player. 

If a movie did not play/stream on your Living Room TV, but worked fine on your Bedroom TV, you would likely not blame the ‘TV remote’ for that playback problem. So you are likely looking in the wrong place if you are saying the Sonos App ‘remote’ controller is the cause of your issue… the answer to your problem ‘more likely’ lies elsewhere. 

I can only repeat what I said earlier… take a closer look at the network segment & connection for that non-playing speaker. Look at its connection signal level and its position in your Home for potential interference (wired, or wireless) interruption etc.

Sonos community users here can’t rule out a hardware issue with the speaker itself - only Sonos Staff will likely be able to do that with your diagnostic data, but my own thoughts are, that the answer most probably lies somewhere within your LAN subnet and local network hardware setup anyway. The simple fact another Sonos speaker plays/streams the same audio source ‘directly’, certainly does not  infer that the Sonos App is the likely culprit here.

Again, thank you for your quick responses  But let’s take a moment for 30,000 FT view on this,  a large part of Sonos’ popularity and success was due to its simplicity. I’ve recommended Sonos brand to numerous users and friends who asked for my advice regarding whole home wireless audio system products. LAN subnets and network channels are way above what the average user can comprehend. Sonos has lost their way. Numerous YouTube videos on this topic. 

“The App is also not a music player, much in the same way that a hand held ‘TV remote’ control is not a video player.”
 I’ve explained that Spatial Audio on a Sonos speaker is only available through the Sonos app, exclusive to the Sonos app. So this qualifies as more than just a remote.  Passive aggressive and defensive comments regarding a known buggy application aren’t helpful nor necessary.  

BigAlNYC
BigAlNYCAuthor
Trending Lyricist II
May 19, 2025

Cue Law & Order DUMDUM

Airplay from iPhone continues to play in stereo while I watch in realtime both Sonos Ones speakers drop off the Sonos app completely, Kitchen is also gone as a room system while the audio still plays. Then seconds/minutes later the problem Sonos OneSL loses sound. 
rinse repeat 

nik9669a
Senior Virtuoso
May 19, 2025

Cue Law & Order DUMDUM

Airplay from iPhone continues to play in stereo while I watch in realtime both Sonos Ones speakers drop off the Sonos app completely, Kitchen is also gone as a room system while the audio still plays. Then seconds/minutes later the problem Sonos OneSL loses sound. 
rinse repeat 

Then the app itself seems to be working. It’s giving a real-time report about your system. The question is “why are they dropping off your network?” 
 

I can’t remember if this has already been asked: what wifi system do you own - is it a mesh system? Is your network locked to a single channel - number 1, 6 or 11 is best - or is it set to Auto? If the troublesome speaker is faulty, there may be some indicator in a diagnostics report. Generate one and speak to Sonos support to see what they can identify in that report. 

Ken_Griffiths
Ken_Griffiths
May 19, 2025

Cue Law & Order DUMDUM

Airplay from iPhone continues to play in stereo while I watch in realtime both Sonos Ones speakers drop off the Sonos app completely, Kitchen is also gone as a room system while the audio still plays. Then seconds/minutes later the problem Sonos OneSL loses sound. 
rinse repeat 

Sonos uses a combination of mDNS and SSDP protocols for their App to discover the speakers on your local network - see the document attached. This can fail if either the router or local network AP’s/Switches are configured incorrectly or there is something else running on the controller device that interrupts the ‘multicast’ packet communication between devices… so you may well have such a multicast device discovery issue or of course it could just be a fault with your speaker or other local hardware. Either way I would go back to Sonos Support and see what they might be able to do to help you resolve the issue. Gather/Include any diagnostic report data and detail your home network setup before you speak to the Staff as that may help speed things along for you too.

    BigAlNYC
    BigAlNYCAuthor
    Trending Lyricist II
    May 20, 2025

    Cue Law & Order DUMDUM

    Airplay from iPhone continues to play in stereo while I watch in realtime both Sonos Ones speakers drop off the Sonos app completely, Kitchen is also gone as a room system while the audio still plays. Then seconds/minutes later the problem Sonos OneSL loses sound. 
    rinse repeat 

    Sonos uses a combination of mDNS and SSDP protocols for their App to discover the speakers on your local network - see the document attached. This can fail if either the router or local network AP’s/Switches are configured incorrectly or there is something else running on the controller device that interrupts the ‘multicast’ packet communication between devices… so you may well have such a multicast device discovery issue or of course it could just be a fault with your speaker or other local hardware. Either way I would go back to Sonos Support and see what they might be able to do to help you resolve the issue. Gather/Include any diagnostic report data and detail your home network setup before you speak to the Staff as that may help speed things along for you too.

    Thank you for the attachment, super informative. That explained a lot, but the differences between the two identical Sonos OneSL is still a mystery. It’s also a mystery to the Sonos staff as well. 

    BigAlNYC
    BigAlNYCAuthor
    Trending Lyricist II
    May 21, 2025

    Cue Law & Order DUMDUM

    Airplay from iPhone continues to play in stereo while I watch in realtime both Sonos Ones speakers drop off the Sonos app completely, Kitchen is also gone as a room system while the audio still plays. Then seconds/minutes later the problem Sonos OneSL loses sound. 
    rinse repeat 

    Then the app itself seems to be working. It’s giving a real-time report about your system. The question is “why are they dropping off your network?” 
     

    I can’t remember if this has already been asked: what wifi system do you own - is it a mesh system? Is your network locked to a single channel - number 1, 6 or 11 is best - or is it set to Auto? If the troublesome speaker is faulty, there may be some indicator in a diagnostics report. Generate one and speak to Sonos support to see what they can identify in that report. 

    Not a mesh system, using a Verizon CR1000A 6E WiFi. Entire Sonos system works fine except this one Sonos OneSL and it worked fine after the router upgrade for months, and years before that. Numerous diagnostics data shared with Sonos technicians hasn’t resolved the issue. 

    nik9669a
    Senior Virtuoso
    May 21, 2025

    Have you tried it Ethernet-wired rather than wireless? Have you tried it in a different location temporarily, to see whether interference might be the issue? Or even swap over two speakers to see where the problem then appears?

    BigAlNYC
    BigAlNYCAuthor
    Trending Lyricist II
    May 22, 2025

    Have you tried it Ethernet-wired rather than wireless? Have you tried it in a different location temporarily, to see whether interference might be the issue? Or even swap over two speakers to see where the problem then appears?

    Yes, yes and yes. The wired connection was my idea, the others were Sonos technicians. Diagnostics were ran and shared with Sonos as well. Tested with pair not in stereo as well. 

    BigAlNYC
    BigAlNYCAuthor
    Trending Lyricist II
    June 5, 2025

    I wanted to wait a week or so before posting this. But the problem has ‘magically’ resolved itself!! No drops, stereo pair is stable without any issues. The problem speaker is back to working like before. As if by wizardry everything is working as expected! Thank you for the support and my sanity thanks you all as well. 🙏🏽

    BigAlNYC
    BigAlNYCAuthor
    Trending Lyricist II
    June 7, 2025

    I wanted to wait a week or so before posting this. But the problem has ‘magically’ resolved itself!! No drops, stereo pair is stable without any issues. The problem speaker is back to working like before. As if by wizardry everything is working as expected! Thank you for the support and my sanity thanks you all as well. 🙏🏽

    That didn’t last long lol. But finally I think I’ve isolated the problem. Verizon 6 GHZ router and its SON enabled are most likely/definitely the culprits. Unfortunately, turning it off breaks my Roku TV, MacBook, GFs work laptop. Verizon help desk weekend call is next….🙏🏽

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