English

Sonos Voice Control: Your own voice assistant for speakers without a cloud

May 12, 2022

168

With Voice Control, Sonos has announced its own language assistant for the Sonos loudspeakers, which focuses on controlling the music on the devices. In particular, it is not planned to compete with or replace Amazon Alexa or Google Assistant. Alexa can therefore continue to be used in parallel.

Starting in June in the USA

Sonos Voice Control is specifically designed to be the easiest way to control music and the Sonos system with your voice while maintaining a high level of privacy. Sonos Voice Control will initially be available in the US starting June 1, with France also scheduled to follow later this year. However, there is still no date for the launch of 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 voice recordings or copies are transmitted or stored in the cloud and they cannot be overheard or read by other people. A faster response time should also be achieved in this way. 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 follow later. Spotify in particular is missing at the start. Basic functions such as pausing or adjusting the volume should also work without explicit support from the language assistant when playing Spotify, as these are controlled by the device. However, playing music by voice from Spotify does not work with Voice Control.

Activation with “Hey Sonos”

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

New Soundbar Sonos Ray

With the Sonos Ray, the company has also presented the cheapest TV soundbar to date, which will be available in Germany from June 7 for 299 euros in black and white.