Sonos customers may not have much to be excited about at the moment as the company continues to clean up the mess it made with its May app update, and yet, it looks like we’ll soon see the arrival of the Sonos Arc Ultra. High-quality images of the as-yet-unreleased flagship Dolby Atmos soundbar, surfaced on X (formerly Twitter) on September 17, and they look a lot like previously leaked (but low-quality) images.
Arc Ultra ($999) https://t.co/z6sXvj2dAg pic.twitter.com/iuwG2vGXDv
— Arsène Lupin (@MysteryLupin) September 17, 2024
The leak is courtesy of an individual who calls themselves Arsène Lupin (@MysteryLupin), after the fictional French thief. The account’s many leaked images in recent months have proven to be accurate, lending credibility to these Sonos images.
Also pictured is the also as-yet-unreleased Sonos Sub 4, a wireless subwoofer that appears to be identical to the current third-gen Sub, except for a new matte finish.
While Sonos has never officially mentioned the Arc Ultra by name, reports surfaced recently that it accidentally added it to its own website before hastily removing it. In 2023, Bloomberg reported on the existence of a new soundbar product code-named “Lasso” that would reportedly offer better performance than the existing Sonos Arc. Both Bloomberg and The Verge claim that Lasso will be based on speaker technology developed by Dutch audio company Mayht, which Sonos acquired in 2022.
The photos show a soundbar that looks very much like the current Sonos Arc, but with a potentially wider footprint and with new top-mounted controls that sit on a rectangular rear module that also acts as the speaker’s base, allowing the sides of the soundbar to float when surface-mounted.
A separate image shows what the soundbar would look like when wall-mounted and accompanied by two Sonos Sub 4s.
Lupin claims the Sonos Arc Ultra will cost $999 (a $100 increase over the price of the current Arc), but The Verge’s Chris Welch suggests that it could cost more — possibly as much as $1,199, a price that the accidental Sonos website inclusion seems to corroborate.
As to the timing of the Sonos Arc Ultra, it could be soon. But as I’ve said before, the company would be foolish to debut a new soundbar (or any new product for that matter) while major issues still remain with the new app. Customers are still angry about the botched update and will likely share that sentiment on social media in response to any new product announcements — not exactly the kind of atmosphere most companies hope to accompany a new product debut.