Photo Credit: Toa Heftiba
Sonos rushed out an app update ahead of its headphones product launch in May—severely breaking functionality for older devices. Sonos die-hards are up in arms about the changes, citing the borked app as a reason not to trust Sonos’ products ever again. Now the company says it’s putting the roadmap in Trello for all to see.
In April 2024, Sonos released what it called the “most extensive app redesign ever” for iOS and Android. The app reorganized everything into a single Home screen that is supposed to be faster and more customizable. But long-time users quickly noticed connection troubles and removed features were at the heart of the update. Perhaps the most egregious is the lack of accessibility features in the new version—limiting how visually impaired users can interact with the new app.
Podcast host Jonathan Mosen posted about his trouble with the new Sonos app on his blog and in an episode of “Living Blindfully”—his podcast about life with a visual impairment. “For starters, [the new update] is really, really clunky and inefficient. There are three or four swipes to get between each individual speaker, five depending on if it has a battery or not.”
“There’s a button in the main nav bar that says system, but that button goes nowhere from what I can determine. Swiping through lists is basically impossible. They don’t properly scroll, and will randomly just jump you to the top of the screen. You can’t explore the screen by dragging your finger around it—at all. This simply does not work. It acts as if the screen is blank. There’s no way to navigate to different subsections of the main screen, because of this and just because it’s just all in one huge linear sweep.”
Sonos’ response to user-feedback has been to say it “takes courage” to redesign an app, “knowing it may require taking a few steps back to ultimately leap into the future,” Sonos spokesperson Chris Welch told The Verge about the app update. But taking steps backward in usability is the last thing long-time customers want to hear. Sonos CEO Patrick Spence acknowledged that in an email sent to customers in July 2024.
“We developed the new app to create a better experience, with the ability to drive more innovation in the future, and with the knowledge that it would get better over time,” Spence begins the email. “However, since launch we have found a number of issues. Fixing these issues has delayed our prior plan to quickly incorporate missing features and functionality.”
Spence shared a brief timeline with users for when they can expect the old features to return to the ‘new’ Sonos app.
July & August
- Improving the app stability when adding new products
- Implementing ‘Music Library’ configuration, browse, search, and play
August & September
- Improving Volume responsiveness
- User interface improvements “based on customer feedback”
- Improving overall system stability and error handling
September
- Improving the reliability of Alarm consistency
September & October
- Restoring edit mode for Playlists & Queue
- Improving functionality in ‘Settings’
Sonos has now released a public Trello board to collect that customer feedback for its user interface improvements. You can see what the company considers a priority for its fixes, things that are coming soon, new additions, resolved problems, and a general feedback section. But despite this dedicated commitment to making it right, the botched app rollout has left some people feeling disgusted.
“I’ll never understand how they approved the new app,” reads one comment. “Did a human being actually use it and say ‘oh yeah it’s great lets roll it out’? I actually sat down and tracked every single Sonos purchase I have made over the years. It’s $11,000. It’s insane. No more. Plenty of competitors elsewhere. They can take their roadmap and shove it where the WiFi don’t shine.”
