It’s no surprise Sonos has some new products on the menu with its new Sonos S2 update launching next month. Plus, there’s the fact that Sonos hadn’t updated its best soundbar (Playbar), most powerful speaker (Play:5) and wireless subwoofer in many years — so that’s exactly what it is doing now.
Here’s everything you need to know about Sonos’s newest soundbar, the Arc, its newest speaker, the Five, and its third-generation wireless subwoofer, the Sub.
Arc
The Arc is Sonos’s new premium soundbar that takes the place of the 8-year-old Playbar and the 3-year-old Playbase (neither of which Sonos will continue to make). It’s Sonos’s first soundbar to support Dolby Atmos putting it head and shoulders above any Sonos soundbar to date. It has a grand total of 11 high-performance drivers, two of which are upward-firing to enable those vertical high channels and immersive sound that Dolby Atmos known for. It also supports Sonos’s Trueplay tuning technology and is able to automatically adjust its sound based on the home theater set-up and what’s playing, whether that’s stereo, Dolby Digital 5.1, or Dolby Atmos sound.
Obviously, the Arc also looks more akin to the Beam than the Playbar. It features a 270-degree rounded plastic grille and comes in either matte black and matte white. It can be placed in front of a standing TV or wall-mounted. Sonos will release a specialized mounting unit ($79) that uses magnetic sensors so it knows if it’s mounted or not. It has a single HDMI eARC or ARC connection, so setup should be super simple. It’s also a smart speaker, just like the Beam, so you can control it with your voice using Amazon Alexa or the Google Assistant. It supports AirPlay 2 as well.
The Arc costs $799, which is $100 more than what the Playbar was going for. You can pre-order it today and it’ll be available everywhere starting June 10.
Five
The Five is an updated and refreshed version of the Play:5 (which Sonos will no longer make). Sonos increased the memory and the processing power of the speaker so that it’s able to take full advantage of the Sonos S2 update when it launches in June. Like before, the Five comes in matte white and matte black models, but this time around the white Five also has a white grille. It still has a line-in so you can quickly connect it to an integrated turntable. And you can still pair two Fives together and place them vertically, which then designates them as right and left channels for great stereo sound.
The new Sonos Five speakers cost $499, which is exactly the same as the previous Play:5. You can pre-order it today and it’ll be available everywhere starting June 10.
Sub (3rd Generation)
The third-generation Sub is an even more modest update than the Five. Sonos increased the memory and the processing power to prep for the Sonos S2 update, just like with the Five, and didn’t really change the look and feel at all from the Sub (Gen 2). The one cosmetic change the new model has is a round “join” button, instead of the previous square.
The new Sub costs the same as before: $699. You can pre-order it today and it’ll be available everywhere starting June 10.
This June, Sonos is about to roll out what is arguably its most significant change ever. It’s calling it “Sonos S2.”
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