Sonos Voice Control: Your very own voice assistant for cloudless speakers

Along with Voice Control, Sonos has announced its own language assistant for Sonos loudspeakers, focused on controlling music across devices. Notably, it doesn’t plan to compete with or replace Amazon Alexa or Google Assistant. So Alexa can continue to be used in parallel.

Launched in June in the US

Specifically, Sonos Voice Control aims to be the easiest way to control music and the Sonos system with your voice while ensuring a high level of data security. Sonos Voice Control will initially be available in the US starting June 1, with France to follow later this year. However, there is still no launch date for the Sonos language assistant for Germany.

voice control without cloud

Sonos Voice Control is compatible with any Sonos speaker that has voice control and processes commands exclusively on the device. No sound recordings or copies are transmitted or stored in the cloud and cannot be heard or read by other people. In this way a faster response time should also be achieved. Sonos Voice Control will be available on all new voice-enabled products and will be offered as a free update to existing users.

Sonos, Apple, Amazon and Deezer, no Spotify

The voice assistant is compatible with Sonos Radio, Apple Music, Amazon Music, Deezer and Pandora. Other services will come later. Spotify in particular is missing in the beginning. Basic functions like pausing or adjusting the volume while playing Spotify should work even without explicit support for the language assistant, as these are controlled by the device. However, playing music by voice from Spotify doesn’t work with Voice Control.

Activation with “Hey Sonos”

After the current voice assistant, voice control is activated via the wake-up word “Hey Sonos”. After the first “Hey Sonos,” however, with no further activation words to be mentioned, subsequent commands should be processed the same way. In the US, Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul and The Mandalorian actor Giancarlo Esposito lent his voice to a language assistant.

new soundbar sonos ray

Along with the Sonos Ray, the company has also introduced the cheapest TV soundbar ever, which will be available in black and white in Germany starting June 7 for 299 euros.