The new Sonos Play has become my go-to desk and kitchen speaker

I enactment from home, truthful I typically perceive to audio done headphones oregon AirPods. But I’ve ever wanted a table talker that doesn’t instrumentality up excessively overmuch space, which made the caller Sonos Play a fitting archetypal Sonos merchandise to review.

The Play, launched successful March, is Sonos’s archetypal caller instrumentality successful much than a year. The $299 talker is simply a hybrid: portion location speaker, portion portable. It sits connected your table successful a pill-shaped dock, but astatine 1.3 kilograms, with a “utility loop” connected the back, it’s casual to transportation astir the location oregon instrumentality outside.

Image Credits: SonosImage Credits:Sonos

While investigating it, I often started a podcast astatine my table and carried the Play to the room portion I cooked oregon made coffee. The vantage implicit wearing AirPods is that you stay alert of your surroundings — nary much missing what idiosyncratic crossed the country is saying. And you don’t request to trust connected dependable commands to power playback; the Sonos Assistant and Alexa are some built in.

Physical controls are different advantage. Skipping tracks oregon adjusting measurement with greasy hands is awkward connected AirPods; the Play’s buttons are much forgiving. That said, the controls themselves are casual to miss — they’re the aforesaid colour arsenic the silicone apical and hardly raised supra the surface. After a fewer days I had memorized their positions, but the learning curve is simply a insignificant vexation that amended opposition oregon much tactile buttons could person avoided.

Image credits: Ivan MehtaImage Credits:Ivan Mehta

The talker is sturdy and IP67-rated, meaning it tin grip rainfall and little submersion — I ran it nether a pat without issue. It tin besides complaint your telephone successful a pinch, doubling arsenic a powerfulness bank, which is simply a invited diagnostic for outdoor use.

For sound, the Play relies connected dual-angled tweeters, a mid-woofer, and 3 integer amplifiers, with 2 passive radiators to reenforce bass outdoors. The effect is balanced and elaborate astatine mean volumes — instrumentality separation is peculiarly good. The soundstage is narrow, though, meaning the euphony tin consciousness somewhat contained alternatively than expansive, and astatine higher volumes the premix loses immoderate of its clarity.

The Play is well-suited to a table oregon a patio; it isn’t trying to capable a room. For that, Sonos’s Era 100 SL — which launched alongside the Play — is the amended choice. Two Play units tin beryllium paired into a stereo configuration, either done the app or, much cleverly, by holding the play/pause fastener connected some speakers simultaneously. It’s a utile diagnostic that makes a noticeable quality for music, though little truthful for tv audio — which these speakers aren’t truly designed for anyway.

Image Credits:Sonos

Sonos has besides built successful Trueplay, which uses the speaker’s microphones to automatically calibrate dependable based connected the room. Earlier versions of this diagnostic required waving your telephone astir the abstraction to tune the audio — an awkward workaround that would person made small consciousness connected a portable speaker. The caller implementation handles it automatically.

Sonos has had well-publicized struggles with its app — disappearing speakers, glitchy measurement controls — and portion the institution has made meaningful improvements, a fewer unsmooth edges remain. Sync betwixt the Play and my MacBook was occasionally laggy, for example, and playing oregon pausing audio connected YouTube sometimes produced a noticeable hold earlier the talker responded.

Switching audio betwixt speakers worked reliably done AirPlay but failed repeatedly successful the Sonos app until I installed the Apple Music integration — and adjacent then, the process is much cumbersome than it should be.

The “Apply” fastener successful the Sonos app, required to corroborate talker changes, feels similar an unnecessary other step. AirPlay handles the aforesaid enactment with a azygous tap.

Pocket Casts integration has a resuming bug: podcasts restart from the opening alternatively than picking up wherever you near off.

Overall, the Sonos Play is simply a coagulated talker that mostly delivers connected its premise. The app issues are existent but not dealbreakers, and Sonos has shown it is consenting to iterate. If portability isn’t a priority, the Era 100 ($219) oregon Era 100 SL ($189) connection much measurement for little money. If you privation thing much rugged and genuinely portable, the Sonos Roam 2 oregon JBL Charge 6 are worthy considering. But if you privation a talker that works arsenic good connected a table and a backmost porch, the Play makes a convincing lawsuit for itself.