After A Bruising Year, Sonos Readies Its Next Big Thing: A Streaming Box

After nan astir tumultuous 9 months successful Sonos’ history, nan marque is trying to find its footing again. Even arsenic activity continues to rehabilitate nan company’s beleaguered mobile app, Sonos is readying to return a ample plaything successful a caller merchandise category: it’s getting into video for nan first time. In nan coming months, Sonos will merchandise a streaming subordinate that sources show maine could costs betwixt $200 and $400 — a genuinely staggering worth for its category.

I’ve seen images of nan upcoming product, which is dense into development, and it’s astir arsenic nondescript arsenic streaming hardware gets. Viewed from nan top, nan instrumentality is simply a flattened achromatic quadrate and somewhat thicker than a level of trading cards.

But nan streamer, codenamed Pinewood, is designed to beryllium overmuch than conscionable different competitor to nan Apple TV 4K, Nvidia Shield, aliases Roku Ultra. Don’t get maine wrong: streaming is simply a immense attraction for nan product. Sources acquainted pinch Pinewood show maine it has a “beautiful” interface, contempt nan package being developed successful business pinch a integer ads firm.

Sonos plans to harvester contented from galore platforms including Netflix, Max, and Disney Plus nether a single, unified package experience. Universal hunt crossed streaming accounts will beryllium supported. We’ve seen akin efforts to disguise nan fragmented value of modern intermezo from Sonos’ soon-to-be rivals. But I’m told this is simply a cornerstone of Pinewood’s appeal. Sonos Voice Control will beryllium integrated, and Pinewood will too alloy pinch a beingness distant powerfulness that includes shortcuts for celebrated streaming apps. I spot this arsenic a invited replacement to utilizing your telephone (or voice) to navigate astir nan software, which could move tiring.

The hardware’s imaginable extends bully beyond these features. According to group acquainted pinch its development, Pinewood serves arsenic an HDMI move and has respective HDMI ports pinch passthrough functionality. You’ll beryllium tin to plug outer devices for illustration gaming consoles aliases 4K Blu-ray players into it. Sonos engineers personification been disappointment complete nan years by unpredictable issues betwixt its soundbars and definite TVs. These tin spot audio sync delays, small awesome dropouts, and different bugs that tin beryllium challenging to reproduce, fto unsocial fix. With Pinewood, Sonos intends to return greater powerfulness of nan I/O stack. The instrumentality will beryllium tin to wirelessly transmit lag-free TV audio to nan company’s soundbars and different Sonos products.

Pinewood too unlocks a capacity that Sonos customers personification been requesting for years: you’ll beryllium tin to configure a genuine business sound strategy utilizing nan company’s different speakers. Instead of relying truthful dense connected a soundbar, you tin create dedicated beforehand adjacent and correct channels with, say, 2 Era 300s. This will fto for acold overmuch precocious Dolby Atmos setups, but Sonos is still finalizing precisely which speaker arrangements will beryllium supported.

In different firsts for nan company, Pinewood will spot gigabit ethernet and Wi-Fi 7 for nan astir robust connectivity possible. The Pinewood codename was first reported by Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman.

I don’t petition to support reminding you of really unspeakable 2024 was for Sonos — each acknowledgment to mediocre decisions made by its executive activity team. But now nan institution has a caller interim CEO, Tom Conrad, who will large his first nett telephone arsenic Sonos’ leader connected Thursday. He’ll undoubtedly accent that improving nan company’s oft-criticized mobile app remains privilege number one. But I’ll beryllium listening to comprehend what Conrad has to opportunity astir nan future.

Through that lens, Pinewood will beryllium Sonos’ astir important merchandise preamble of fiscal 2025 and could extremity up being nan company’s only caller hardware owed anytime soon. After nan Sonos Ace headphones — an awesome first effort — were swallowed up by nan app controversy, this is different effort to break into a caller merchandise category. Sales of nan Ace enactment disappointing, according to sources. This has led Sonos to deprioritize planned features for illustration TrueCinema, which was expected to make nan Ace’s business sound moreover overmuch convincing by taking nan acoustics of your room into account. Sonos has too put different in-the-works hardware connected nan backburner truthful arsenic not to dispersed itself excessively thin.

Inside Sonos, immoderate labour enactment pessimistic astir Pinewood’s chances of becoming point overmuch than a niche instrumentality successful a crowded, competitory space. The Nvidia Shield TV Pro, among nan astir costly streaming devices, costs $200. The Sonos Ace headphones faced likewise daunting likelihood and personification fallen bully short of nan company’s targets. To beryllium fair, those were arsenic doomed by nan app situation.

I’m told nan streaming instrumentality is mostly nan pet task of main invention serviceman Nick Millington, who architected Sonos’ halfway networking exemplary decades ago. Pinewood’s early betterment began nether Studio 110, an precocious group incorrect Sonos that was helmed by Millington for a time. More recently, Millington has been overseeing improvements to nan mobile app and regularly engages pinch Sonos’ Reddit community.

Pinewood was greenlit by erstwhile CEO Patrick Spence and remains successful beta testing, truthful immoderate features I’ve mentioned could beryllium changed aliases dropped from nan instrumentality by nan clip it ships. If nan rumored premium worth is meticulous — respective sources reiterated that Pinewood won’t beryllium inexpensive — Sonos has to nail nan device’s preamble and make a beardown suit for why it’s a must-own summation to nan company’s ecosystem.

Positive reviews of nan caller Arc Ultra personification been a much-needed morale boost astatine nan institution and beryllium that Sonos still knows really to make a masterful soundbar. But labour are wary of overmuch business cuts successful nan adjacent future. Some personification expressed uncertainty arsenic to whether nan caller shakeup successful Sonos activity will yet nutrient meaningful change.