To talk about Sonos is to talk about a company that has managed to find this complex combination of technology and design in the fiercely competitive smart speaker market. It has invested a lot of effort and investment to ensure that both the appearance and performance of its speakers are always at the forefront, with a special emphasis on multi-room audio technology that is virtually unique on the market.

So it’s perhaps surprising that Sonos hasn’t released a truly portable outdoor-oriented speaker until the arrival of the Roam, when most of the competition has some kind of solution in their catalog. We had the opportunity to test this new Sonos Roam to verify its features and design.

The first meeting place is the box. In fact, the Sonos boxes sent us a handy wireless charging base with a magnetic support for the speaker, so we can charge the speaker without having to prop it up. Both boxes are made from recycled cardboard and strangely have a belt loop or similar textile material solution. This partly compensates for the absence of mounts on the speaker itself.

Opening the Roam box we find the usual and very careful Sonos packaging. The speaker is wrapped in a white cloth closed with a sticker, so it is easy to open. In the box we also find a USB C power cable, but not a charger. Instead, there is one available in the wireless charger box.

compact design

The Roam design is elongated and compact in the shape of a triangle with rounded corners on the side. The front is occupied by a grille that hides the active elements of the speaker, on the two remaining sides there are four silicone protrusions that act as supports to keep the speaker stabilized and not moving, and on the other side is the power button. Bluetooth power/pairing and USB-C charging connector.

Roam is available in five colors: Black (Shadow Black), White (Lunar White), Red/Orange (Sunset), Blue (Wave) and Green (Olive). The wireless charger can be purchased in white or black. It has a low weight, although at 429 grams it cannot be considered ultra-light. An interesting detail is its IP67 resistance to liquids and dust, which means that it can be submerged in water for up to 30 minutes at a depth of one meter.

The sides of the Sonos Roam are made of silicone rubber to withstand impact. On one of these sides there are touch controls with which we can increase and decrease the volume. The pause or resume playback button is also used to go to the next or previous track, but also allows us to group with other Sonos speakers or change playback to the nearest grouped speaker.

Intelligent

Next to the microphone button is a light that indicates which mode the speaker is in. If it’s on, we can use Amazon or Google voice control and Trueplay is working. If the light is off, just press or hold the button to activate the voice functions and then deactivate them.

Configuration of the Sonos Roam is done, as with all of the brand’s speakers, using the Sonos mobile app available for both Android and iPhone. It is also possible to pair it directly via Bluetooth using the button we have already mentioned. However, and unlike other competing speakers, we will inevitably need to install an app to activate this feature.

Configuring the application with the speaker is not the easiest and sometimes requires several attempts and even a factory reset of the speaker. It must be said that the configuration of the system using the app has a reward, the first that we fully enter the Sonos ecosystem, so if we already have a multiroom playback system of the brand, we can use it with our little Roam.

This means we can pair it with other speakers for stereo playback, share every channel on one speaker, play the same music on all speakers in the house, or play the same music on a speaker in a room we move into. The second advantage is the ability to configure Sonos Roam as a voice assistant with the option to choose between Alexa and Google.

Compatibility

We can also configure playback services such as Spotify to play over WiFi. It is interesting to point out that once the mobile is paired with the speaker, it does not reproduce all the sound of the device, but only what we want it to reproduce. For example, we can play songs on Spotify through the speaker and listen to a Twitter video on the mobile speakers without interrupting the music playback.

The Sonos app also includes Sonos Radio, which offers its own archive of music content. Interestingly, it also has a number of controls to equalize the audio played through this app, but these are only available for Sonos Radio and not for the rest of the audio or video apps.

Sonos Roam can be charged via a USB cable or a magnetic wireless charger. According to Sonos, we can charge 50% of the battery in an hour using a cable or in two hours with a wireless charger. In our tests, the Roam’s battery drained in an average of six to seven hours, depending on connection type (Wifi or Bluetooth) and volume. According to the manufacturer, we could achieve 10 hours of playback under ideal conditions.

Adaptable

Sonos Roam has a system called Sonos Trueplay that uses a microphone to automatically adapt playback parameters to the characteristics of the room, taking into account walls, furniture and other obstacles. However, this system, among others, is not available if we play via Bluetooth. In short, to get the most out of the speaker, you need to use the app and a WiFi connection.

In addition, and although the speaker has a microphone, the Bluetooth connection does not allow you to receive phone calls. If a WiFi connection is not available, Bluetooth is the only alternative. We can connect the Bluetooth device by pressing and holding the power button, then the speaker light will flash blue and make a sound. Then we can detect the speaker as a Bluetooth device and pair it.

In our sound quality tests, we followed the manufacturer’s instructions and left 2.5 centimeters from the wall and tried different situations where we propped the speaker up on different surfaces. We also placed the speaker in horizontal and vertical positions, although in our tests the horizontal position proved to be the best, mainly to take advantage of the bass boost provided by the vibrations of the surface we rest it on…

The speakers that Sonos includes are a tweeter for high frequencies and a woofer designed for mid frequencies. It’s a normal choice for speakers of this size to tend to sacrifice low frequencies, but the design and construction Sonos used on the Roam allows for good performance even in the low frequency range.

quality sound

The purity of the sound left a very good impression on us, although it falters a bit in the low-frequency range, it does not lack punch, even less, especially considering its size. However, it is immediately apparent that what Sonos has focused on the most are the mid-range frequencies, where we do not lose nuance even with a large increase in volume.

That’s one of the nice surprises about the Roam, by the way: it’s capable of fairly loud volume while keeping distortion at bay, which is very useful for a speaker who has to show off his talents outdoors. It also shows quite a bit of clarity in the treble range, although brilliance is lost at times. In any case, you can recognize the trace of sound quality that the brand’s speakers usually offer in a size that we are not used to.

Conclusions

Sonos has entered the portable outdoor speaker market with a very interesting product. Integrating Sonos Roam into the ecosystem and making it compatible with the brand’s multi-room and speaker system has been a success, giving it significant added value that will be appreciated primarily by users or wannabes.

As a portable speaker, it fully meets expectations, although its price range is on the high side, which, on the other hand, is also common for the brand’s products. Its design is really nice and the touch and feel of the controls are flawless. Durability remains to be seen, which should be good given the build quality, but that would have to be experienced.