We have been reading rumors for some time that Sonos could enter the market for voice assistants. And, although it seemed like a risky bet, the Santa Barbara company has presented today Sonos Voice Control, a voice assistant to control music from Sonos systems in an easy, fast way and with which we guarantee the most absolute privacy.
Sonos bets on a voice assistant that does not need to connect to the cloud
Sonos tends to bet a lot on innovation, and its new service will undoubtedly make people talk. Is about Sonos Voice Control, a voice assistant specifically designed so that we can control what we hear with our Sonos speakers using only the voice. Apparently, this service was born after an investigation by the brand in which they concluded that many users do not use Sonos-compatible voice assistants for fear that their data will be used.
Sonos Voice Control fully committed to privacy, and it works one hundred percent offline. When we make a request to the assistant, the software processes the order locally, without connecting to Sonos's servers. It then uses the information to play the content. Sonos warrants to us that the device will never store an audio transcript. Nor will our voice or our commands be sent to the cloud, so no one will be able to hear or read us. It will arrive as a free upgrade to customers who already own speakers that have voice control - that is, those with a microphone - as well as it will also come standard on new models.
Activation and supported services
The wake word for this assistant will be “Hey Sonos” in English or “Hey Sonos» when the service reaches Spanish-speaking countries. For now, Sonos will launch Voice Control in the United States on June 1 through a firmware update. The second country on the list will be France, but according to the brand, it will also reach more markets in the coming months.
Regarding the list of compatible music services, we can give commands to listen to content from Sonos radio, Apple Music, Amazon Music, Deezer y Pandora. However, Sonos assures that more compatible services will arrive soon, so it is to be expected that we will end up also having options to control content from Spotify or Tidal with our voice.
A voice that has nothing to do with Siri or Alexa
Almost all the voice assistants we know of opted to put the female voice as the default option. Sonos is going to change that, and they've chosen the magnificent Giancarlo Esposito to put the voice to Sonos Voice Control —in English, because we already know that the owner of Los Pollos Hermanos does not make himself understood too much with the language of Cervantes. Apparently, as the months progress, we will be able to download new voices. However, Sonos ensures that his assistant sounds very natural and attractive thanks to having had the actor from Breaking Bad. y B. Without a doubt, if what you want to transmit with this service is privacy and discretion, the choice of Esposito is absolutely brilliant.