Sonos is expanding its range of speakers with the announcement of the Ray, a compact soundbar designed to enhance your home theatre setup without taking up too much space.
Hitting shelves worldwide from 7 June, the Sonos Ray comes in at a cheaper price point than the company’s existing soundbars: $399 compared to the Sonos Beam at $699, and the premium tier Sonos Arc, which is priced at $1,499. The Ray is also the smallest of the Sonos soundbars by far, spanning only 55.9cm in width compared to the Beam’s 65.1cm.
Some of Sonos Ray’s key selling features include balanced sound, solid bass, and crisp dialogue, the latter of which is aided by Speech Enhancement technology to boost dialogue clarity. As is commonplace with Sonos speakers, the Ray can connect wirelessly via Wi-Fi to other Sonos-branded speakers, such as a pair of Sonos Ones, to create a full home theatre listening experience or play audio across multiple rooms at once. You can also use various control methods with the Ray including a TV remote, Apple AirPlay 2, or the proprietary Sonos app.
There are a few omissions the Ray makes in its quest for affordability. Unlike its Beam and Arc counterparts, the Sonos Ray does not include an in-built microphone for use with smart assistants like Google and Alexa. Another concession is only offering optical audio, with no HDMI options, meaning there’s no Dolby Atmos here. This is understandable given its positioning as an affordable soundbar.
Along with the Sonos Ray announcement, the audio company revealed its popular portable Sonos Roam speakers will soon be available in three new colour options. Currently available in black or white, the Roam will also come in Olive, Wave, and Sunset finishes as of 17 June for $299.
A soundbar is one of the easiest ways to enhance your TV audio, adding bass and increased sound quality to the otherwise flat soundscapes in-built TV speakers produce. Sonos has a strong reputation in the home audio market and the Ray’s affordable price sounds like a decent first investment for improving your home theatre setup. Plus, you won’t need to make much space for it, either. Keep an eye out for our full review of the Sonos Ray, appearing soon.
