Rumours of Sonos entering the video streamer market have been circling for over a year now, with speculations over everything from specs and features to pricing and release dates having been reported in recent months.
The crux of these rumours so far: multi-room specialist (and part-time customer enrager) Sonos is working on a video streaming box to rival the likes of the Apple TV 4K, Google TV Streamer and Amazon Fire TV Stick. The reported price is much higher than that of those rivals, however, and the latest suggestion around a launch time isn't good news.
So what can we expect from a Sonos streamer? Who will it partner with? And will it offer anything unique to help it stand out from what else is available? We'll run you through everything we know, and expect from, a Sonos streaming box.
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Sonos streaming box: release date rumours
The original Bloomberg report said that Sonos' streaming box would launch around the end of 2024 or the beginning of 2025. It was widely reported that Sonos delayed the launch of two products (including the streaming box) in order to focus on fixing its mobile app following its disastrous update last year. Given that 2024 is now long gone and The Verge claims to have seen images of the device, early 2025 sounded realistic. Bloomberg's Mark Gurman previously said March, too.
But just as we were gearing up for a possible springtime release very soon, a new The Verge report has arrived stating that Sonos’s highly anticipated Apple TV rival is reportedly off the cards “for now”, with no future timeframe being offered. Apparently, despite the product being deep into development and having gone through months of beta testing, the company's interim CEO has told employees it is being shelved.
Bummer (if that is indeed true).
Sonos streaming box: price prediction
If the rumours are true, Sonos' streaming box could be quite expensive, whenever it does show up.
Chris Welch (author of the earlier-cited reports from The Verge) claims that sources have told him that the streamer – codenamed Pinewood – could cost between £200 / $200 (around AU$300) and £400 / $400 (around AU$600). Which is much pricier than the Amazon Fire TV Stick 4K (£60 / $50 / AU$79), Google TV Streamer (£99 / $99 / AU$160) and even the Apple TV 4K (£149 / $129 / AU$219, or £169 / $149 / AU$249 for the ethernet model with more storage).
Sonos operates at the upper end of the market with every device it makes, but even so, a streaming box at this price will have to do a lot to justify the extra cost.
An earlier Bloomberg report cited the price at between $150 and $200 (around £150, AU$270), which seems much more reasonable. Though with no track record in video streaming, Sonos has a big task on its hands competing with Apple.
Recent evidence isn't too promising. The last time Sonos entered a new market was with its Ace wireless headphones, which are priced at £449 / $449 / AU$699 – that's more expensive than the market-leading Sony WH-1000XM5. But as our Sonos Ace review found, the wait for certain features and iffy sound quality make that price hard to justify. Since launch, numerous reports have said the headphones are selling poorly, though we have no official data to confirm this.
Sonos streaming box: design speculation
While we've heard that the device is codenamed Pinewood (presumably after the British film studio), there's not much information on how the rumoured video streamer will look. According to The Verge report, "viewed from the top, the device is a flattened black square and slightly thicker than a deck of trading cards." Which sounds a lot like an Apple TV to us. Expect Sonos' trademark rounded corners, minimalist embellishments and white and black finishes to make an appearance. The Move 2 and Roam 2 come in a wider range of colours, but we can't see Sonos introducing that to a home product.
The same report also mentions a remote control with shortcuts for popular streaming apps. And it says that Sonos Voice Control is integrated, alongside a physical remote offering.
Sonos specialises in sleek, minimalist devices, and we're not expecting a break from the norm. The Sonos Era speakers introduced a new control panel, including a recessed volume trough and capacitive touch-sensitive buttons. We could see a version of this on the streaming device for consistency.
The Sonos Ace headphones brought back push buttons, and are all the better for it. So there's a chance Sonos will continue its function-over-form approach and go for what works over what looks most modern.
Like the Apple TV 4K, we would imagine the Sonos streamer will be a box to place alongside your TV, rather than a streaming stick to plug into the back of it (the recent Google TV Streamer takes the same tack). Sonos will want the device to be seen, after all.
Sonos streaming box: features forecast
If Sonos wants to compete at the top end of the streaming box market, it'll have to pack its device to the rafters with features.
The Verge reports that Pinewood is supposed to serve “as an HDMI switch and has several HDMI ports with passthrough functionality.” You will be able to plug external devices such as gaming consoles or 4K Blu-ray players into it, apparently – and that would be something that no other video streaming device offers.
The streaming box is said to run the Android operating system, which is more common on TVs than streaming devices. Sonos is rumoured to be in talks with Netflix about developing an app for the device – we would also expect all the usual suspects, such as Amazon Prime Video, Disney+ and Apple TV to come as standard. According to the recent report from The Verge, Pinewood will bring together various streaming apps in a “single, unified software experience”. Which doesn't sound like anything different to what's already available.
What will be more interesting is what audio/visual formats Sonos supports.
It's no stranger to Dolby Atmos – the Era 300 was built with spatial audio at its core, after all – so we would expect that to feature. But in the video arena, the picture is less clear. Could it bring Dolby Vision to its first ever video device? Would it go all in with 4K/120 for gamers, or stick to the 60Hz refresh rate? And is HDR a given, as you would expect from a video streamer costing this much?
One thing we can be sure of is that it will work seamlessly with Sonos' other devices. Interoperability is a big plank of the firm's offering, with all its speakers (including soundbars, portables and bookshelf speakers) working together seamlessly. So expect the streaming box to slot right into your Sonos setup.
In fact, we would expect Sonos to leverage its streaming smarts in such a way as to make the streamer the heart of a surround system. The Apple TV 4K can send audio wirelessly to two HomePods, which then create a Dolby Atmos presentation to go with the on-screen video. We imagine the Sonos streamer will do a similar thing only more so, with the streamer acting as the source for up to four of Sonos's wireless speakers. If those speakers were all Era 300s, that could be a formidable Dolby Atmos setup. This is the kind of thing that would help to justify the anticipated higher price and it would also make sense given Sonos's history and recent approach to home cinema.
However, it's not guaranteed. The Sonos Ace headphones were widely rumoured to feature wi-fi to work with Sonos' wireless speakers, but at launch they only worked with the Sonos Arc soundbar (and now Sonos Ray and Sonos Beam as well thanks to a recent update). Let's hope the firm has learned its lesson.
Sonos streaming box: early verdict
We hope the Sonos streaming box marks a return to form for troubled company. The fallout from its app debacle continues, recently claiming the scalp of the firm's CEO, though the company did finish 2024 on a high with the launch of the excellent Sonos Arc Ultra soundbar.
Sonos has a lot to lose, which could be why it is supposedly stalling the development and launch of its debut video streamer. It has built a strong reputation thanks to well-designed and thought-out products that deliver excellent build quality, (mostly) superb sound quality and great ease of use. But branching out into new markets isn't easy, as the firm recently learned with its Ace headphones – especially when that market features no shortage of popular and established rivals from some of the world's biggest tech companies – Apple, Amazon and Google. It has customers to win back after the great app disaster of last year, too.
A video device will be an even bigger risk for the firm. It will be fascinating to see if it can nail all of the fiddly video-processing details (frame rate-matching, HDR switching, upscaling etc) on the first attempt, or offer a more sophisticated and less fragmented streaming app experience across Netflix, Disney Plus and Amazon Prime Video etc than is currently available.
The streaming market is currently dominated by more affordable devices, but if Sonos can get it right, the Apple TV 4K could finally have a serious rival.
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