How to Build a Sonos Sound System
With Sonos, you can create a home sound system that fits the space you live in. Each Sonos speaker and component is designed to sound amazing on its own, but they’re even more powerful when combined in a system that spans your entire listening space — be it your living room, bedroom, office, or all of the above.
Don’t know where to start? Focus on one room first. Once you’ve nailed the audio or home theatre setup there, you can gradually add more components until you have a truly multi-room sound system.
That may sound complicated, but with Sonos, there’s no need for extra clutter and complex controls. Access and tune your entire system to your preferences via the Sonos app, and use Sonos Voice Control for hands-free listening.
Ready to start building your Sonos sound system? First, make sure you have the basic system requirements for setting up and using a Sonos system. From there, the next step is figuring out where you’ll be watching and listening.
Think about where you want sound in your home
One of the most powerful advantages of a Sonos sound system is its versatility.
There’s a Sonos speaker to fit virtually every listening style and type of physical space, from an expansive living room to a kitchen with narrow dimensions. And a Sonos sound system seamlessly connects these speakers from room to room, allowing for an immersive listening experience that moves with you throughout your home. But you might not need to fill every room just yet, and you’ll get the most immediate enjoyment by focusing on the spaces where you listen the most.
Living rooms, family rooms, and other large entertainment spaces are usually a primary focal point when building out a Sonos sound system. These rooms tend to require a multi-purpose system capable of producing top-quality audio for TV, movies, music, and video games.
Smaller rooms — like the kitchen, bedroom, and office — might not require multiple speakers, and there may be less space to work with in any case. A compact Sonos speaker that connects to your larger surround sound system can do wonders in such spaces.
The good news is that there’s a Sonos speaker to fit nearly every need and space. Some speakers offer a bit more versatility, while others are tailored to specific use cases, such as outdoor listening or immersive home theatre.
Determine which Sonos speakers you need
Entertainment spaces: Soundbars and surround speakers
If you plan to use your Sonos system to watch TV and movies, start with a soundbar. These sleek, low-profile speakers deliver a cinematic surround sound experience, with deep bass and crisp dialogue in a single package. Soundbars like Arc Ultra and Beam use Dolby Atmos technology to immerse you in a digital soundstage, creating a surround sound experience that sounds great even with no additional components.
Heighten the sense of immersion even further with a pair of rear speakers, like Era 100 to create a surround sound experience. And to complete your home theatre system, you can add a subwoofer like Sub 4, specifically designed to handle deep bass sounds like explosions, rolling thunder, or the low end of music.
Offices and larger rooms without TVs: Premium wireless speakers
If you want to keep the focus on music, start with a premium wireless speaker. Engineered to put you inside the music and make every instrument sound better than ever, these speakers create a vivid stereo soundstage no matter where you listen.
Among our premium speakers, Era 300 is best for listeners who want to experience the spatial audio capabilities of Dolby Atmos in their music. Not just for home theatre, Dolby Atmos is available to subscribers of Apple Music or Amazon Music. This immersive surround sound technology creates a richer, more layered listening experience, where sounds seem to move through the space around you.
If your primary focus is rich, high-fidelity stereo sound with deeper bass, consider Five. When used as a standalone speaker, Five automatically separates the left and right channels for full stereo sound that permeates even a large room. Or, pair two Five speakers and position them vertically for an even more expansive soundstage.
Worth mentioning is that both speakers feature a line-in audio input, which allows you to play music from a turntable, laptop, CD player, or other audio source.
Kitchens and transitional spaces: Small, versatile speakers
Not every room requires a multi-speaker setup. If space is tight, a sleek, compact speaker like Era 100 fits best. Era 100 delivers detailed stereo separation and deep bass at any volume — and in a design that fits nicely on any kitchen counter or bookshelf. (If you don’t need the voice control capabilities of Era 100 but still favour its size and sound, consider Era 100 SL, which is nearly identical to Era 100, but doesn’t contain a microphone.)
As you expand your Sonos system into a multi-room audio setup, you may find that some rooms sound perfect with a single speaker. Can’t wait to expand the sonic blueprint of your setup even further? Tackle two rooms at once with a set of two Era 100 speakers.
Bathrooms: Waterproof speakers
When you hear “waterproof speaker”, you might think about hanging poolside or hiking through a downpour. But Sonos portable Bluetooth speakers are built to withstand different types of damp or misty environments — including your bath and shower.
If you’re looking to add a bathroom speaker to your Sonos setup, we recommend the powerful, versatile Sonos Play. Its compact size doesn’t take up too much bathroom-counter real estate, and it’s rated IP67, which means it can withstand everything from the occasional splash to temporary immersion in water (1 m of water for up to 30 minutes).
Backyard and outdoor spaces: Portable and outdoor speakers
You may be surprised to learn that Sonos Play and our other portable Bluetooth speakers aren’t just for listening to music on the go. Using WiFi, you can integrate any Sonos portable into your home Sonos system.
This gives you impressive flexibility, with a single speaker that can move in and out of your multi-room setup depending on whether you’re on vacation or relaxing at home. If you want a speaker with enough power to fill your backyard, patio, or lawn with heart-pumping stereo sound, Move 2 is a great option that you can swap indoors and outdoors whenever the feeling suits. Prefer an ultra-portable speaker you can slip into your pocket as you wander from backyard to kitchen? Roam 2 is your perfect on-the-move companion.
For a more permanent setup that blends into your backyard and garden spaces, consider Sonos outdoor speakers. Work with a Sonos professional installer to create an audio system that extends from your house to your yard.
Bedrooms: Smaller soundbars and wireless speakers
Your bedroom setup will likely depend on whether you have a TV. If so, a smaller soundbar like Beam or Ray offers an ideal compromise between size and performance that fits the more modest dimensions of a bedroom.
If you only listen to music in the bedroom, a single Era 100 speaker should fit the bill nicely.
Set up your system in the Sonos app
Getting started with Sonos is simple. Download the Sonos app, plug in your speaker, and follow the on-screen prompts. The app will take you step-by-step through the setup process, which includes:
- Creating your account: Set up the sign-in information you’ll use when you need to make account updates and changes.
- Connecting the speaker to your WiFi: This is a requirement, as it allows your entire system to play over your home WiFi network. Connecting to WiFi gives you the best possible sound quality and also opens up flexible ways to use your system, like streaming different songs in different rooms.
- Customizing rooms: You can assign different speakers to different rooms, giving them easy-to-remember names like “Living Room”, “Bedroom”, or “Hall of Mirrors”. You can also adjust the bass, treble, balance, and loudness of individual speakers to your liking using the EQ setting in the Sonos app.
Once you're set up, you can add your favourite streaming services like Spotify, Apple Music, or Amazon Music, plus access Sonos Radio for free right out of the box. As your system grows, just plug in a new speaker and use the Sonos app to add it to your existing system.
For more on how to set up your system, check out our step-by-step setup guide.
Customize your Sonos sound system
The customization doesn’t stop once you’ve chosen your speakers and components. There are other ways to make your speakers a perfect fit for your unique listening space and habits:
- Tune your speakers with Trueplay™: Trueplay measures the acoustics of your room, then fine-tunes your Sonos speaker to make sure it sounds great no matter where you've placed it. Note that you’ll need a Trueplay-compatible device to use this feature.
- Group and ungroup rooms: You can group two or more Sonos speakers together so they play the same content in sync. You can also group and ungroup rooms to fully customize where your sound plays throughout your home — for example, you might add separate groups for your upstairs and downstairs speakers.
- Surround sound for home theatre: If you have a soundbar, add two Era 100 or Era 300 speakers as rear channels for a more immersive surround sound experience.
- Works with Sonos: Products bearing the “Works with Sonos” badge are certified to seamlessly connect with your Sonos sound system, creating an even more harmonious experience across your home devices.
Special considerations and recommendations
Outdoor spaces
Outdoor spaces can be complicated additions to your home sound system. You’re dealing not only with the elements, but also with the unique acoustic properties of open air. If you want to add surface-mounted outdoor speakers to your home system, you’ll likely want to get them professionally installed.
Portable Bluetooth speakers, such as the high-powered Move 2, are another option for outdoor spaces. These speakers can pull double duty as indoor-outdoor speakers, depending on what the situation calls for.
For more on how to achieve great sound en plein air, check out our guide to outdoor speakers.
Listening to vinyl
If you plan to listen to vinyl with your Sonos speakers, make sure you choose a compatible speaker or component. The list currently includes:
- Era 300
- Era 100
- Era 100 SL
- Five (+ Stereo Mini-Jack to RCA Y-Audio Cable)
- Move 2
- Sonos Play
- Amp
- Port
All of these feature line-in, which will allow you to easily connect your turntable.
You’ll also need a turntable with a phono preamp. Don’t overlook the phono preamp — it may be built into your turntable, or you may need to purchase one separately to plug in between your turntable and your Sonos speaker.
Personal listening with Sonos Ace headphones
Our premium Bluetooth headphones, Sonos Ace, let you seamlessly swap your TV audio from a compatible soundbar.
Once you set up Sonos Ace in the Sonos app, just press and hold the button on the right ear cup to instantly transfer what's playing on your TV to your headphones. You'll get the full spatial audio experience, complete with surround sound and Dolby Atmos support. You can even enable Dynamic Head Tracking so the audio shifts with you as you turn your head.
Enjoying your Sonos system
With speakers and components to suit a wide variety of listening spaces and styles, you can build a Sonos sound system that perfectly suits your life. And there’s no need to build out your system all at once. Many Sonos listeners have added new rooms and speakers to their systems over time, moving gradually from a single room to a multi-room audio setup.
Ready to start building? Get in touch with a Sonos expert by phone or chat.
