As of today, Sonos is now a publicly traded company. However, most fans of the firm’s awesome multi-room speakers care less about the share prices and more about long-promised features making it out into the wild.
Today, in a round of interviews to commemorate the firm’s IPO, Sonos’ CEO confirmed the Google Assistant should finally make it to Sonos One speakers by the end of the year. “We’re working as hard as we can and so is Google to get it ready for that time,” Patrick Spence told The Verge.
That means the Google Assistant might join Alexa, on speakers like the smart Sonos One, with enough time to request the Christmas playlist. The integration has been teased since the Sonos One – the smart, voice-controlled version of the Sonos Play:1 – launched last October.
Related: Sonos Beam review
Whether that means the Sonos Beam soundbar will also receive the promised Google Assistant update by the end of 2018 remains to be seen. In his gushing review of the Beam, our own Ced Yeun wrote: “There’s no firm date on when Google Assistant support will go live, but I’m told it’s on track to be delivered some time in 2018.”
In the meantime Apple AirPlay 2 support rolled out to a wide range of newer Sonos speakers, such as the Beam soundbar, Sonos One and 2nd-gen Play:5. When asked about why the tech hasn’t arrived on some of the older devices in the range, Spence cited memory and computing power constraints.
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“We’re going to continue to try and support as far back as we can — it’s what we’re known for,” he added. “The further you can go back, and the longer you can make those products last, people will stick with you longer and people will buy more.”
Regardless of the smart updates to other speakers in the range, we’ll be sure to let you know when the Google Assistant arrives on the Sonos One.
Are you a One user keen for Assistant to arrive? Have you purchased the Beam hoping there’ll be more AI options beyond Alexa? Let us know @TrustedReviews on Twitter.
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Editorial independence
Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct.
Professional conduct
We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.
