While Sonos continues to squash bugs and improve the performance of its poorly received mobile app redesign, the company also continues to focus on several new hardware products. Among them is an ultra-premium soundbar that will serve as a successor to the current Sonos Arc — and presumably at a higher price. The device, code-named Lasso, is currently in limited beta testing , and today I’m able to share the first images of it.
From the outside, the Lasso soundbar looks a lot like the Arc, which Sonos introduced more than four years ago. But inside, the components and speaker drivers have been completely overhauled and redesigned, and that’s expected to result in a price tag of more than $1,200. Sonos is aiming to ship the Lasso later this year, though that timeline is subject to change.
Whenever it comes, Lasso (hardware model S45) will be the first Sonos product to integrate technology from Mayht, a Dutch startup that the company acquired in 2022 for $100 million in cash. At the time, Sonos credited Mayht with “inventing a new, revolutionary approach to audio transducers.” CEO Patrick Spence said the deal would bring Sonos “more incredible people, technology and intellectual property that will further differentiate the Sonos experience, expand our competitive advantage and accelerate our future roadmap.”
But it’s taken quite a while to translate Mayht’s ideas into a shipping product. Sonos has released several small speakers in recent years — including the Era 100, Move 2 and Roam 2 — that could have benefited from Mayht’s innovative transducers, which it says “enable smaller and lighter form factors without sacrificing quality.” But it’s the soundbar that will offer the first taste of what the acquisition has yielded. Sources tell me that making Mayht’s transducer system more cost-effective has been a challenge, since it relies in part on “expensive” neodymium magnets.
Bloomberg previously reported the Lasso codename, rumored price, and the inclusion of Mayht’s technology. Final consumer branding for the product is still unknown, but for now, Sonos is playfully taking the Ted Lasso font on beta units.
The Arc is already a very impressive Dolby Atmos soundbar, and you can expect even more immersion from the Lasso and its updated internals. Additionally, the upcoming soundbar is reportedly said to offer significantly better bass performance than its predecessor. With the Arc, you’ll really need to add a Sub or Sub Mini to get the most out of it. Sonos might be able to get away with that with an $899 product, but if it’s going to charge well over $1,000 for the Lasso, it’ll need to deliver top-notch home theater audio without any extra help.
The images also show a dedicated Bluetooth button, suggesting the Lasso could support Bluetooth audio playback, a feature that has been absent from all previous Sonos soundbars. And as with the company’s other recent products, there will be a physical switch to disable the built-in microphones.
Like the Arc, the Lasso is designed to work with the recently released Sonos Ace headphones for private listening with spatial audio. The company has promised to expand Ace compatibility to its more affordable Beam and Ray soundbars by late summer or early fall.
Looking ahead, Sonos will continue to release regular updates to its mobile app as it attempts to address customer frustrations and break the negative sentiment that has been building in the company’s community since May.
It’s clear to me that Sonos is listening and acting quickly, but the damage has already been done: the Android version of the Sonos app currently has a brutal 1.2-star average rating. The Apple App Store rating isn’t so bad, as older reviews still offset the flood of complaints about the new design.