Sonos CEO Claims S2 App Can’t be Rereleased Despite Earlier Reports

Sonos CEO Patrick Spence states that the old S2 app won’t be rereleasing for customers to use as an alternative to the divisive new app.

In a recent Reddit AMA, Spence says that he and the company were hopeful that they could relaunch the S2 app for users to install and use. However, that optimism was only kept alive “until very recently.” Spence believes that relaunching the S2 app could make things worse. “The trick of course is that Sonos is not just the mobile app, but software that runs on your speakers and in the cloud too,” Spence says.

“In the months since the new mobile app launched we’ve been updating the software that runs on our speakers and in the cloud to the point where today S2 is less reliable & less stable then what you remember. After doing extensive testing we’ve reluctantly concluded that re-releasing S2 would make the problems worse, not better. I’m sure this is disappointing. It was disappointing to me.”

Last week, it was reported that Sonos was considering relaunching the S2 app while the company continues to refine the current version of the app. The new app was released on May 7th and was designed to offer intregal connectivity features between its new Ace headset and the Arc soundbar. However, the app is plagued with issues and lost features like the sleep timer and editable queue.

This forced Sonos to offer an official apology to customers, promising to solve the issues. However, it doing so, Sonos had to take resources and focus away from the release of two major products. One, which is codenamed Lasso, is said to be a successor to the Arc soundbar. Both products have now been delayed. However, if Sonos is able to right the ship soon enough, there’s a chance these devices may launch as early as October.

For Spence, he proclaims that the app “remains my #1 priority,” a statement he’s repeated this year.