youThe Era 100 is the first in a new line of Wi-Fi speakers from multi-room audio specialists Sonos, taking what’s good about their popular One series and adding more bass and stereo sound.
The new compact smart speaker costs £249 ($249/A$399), making it the mid-range option in the company’s speaker lineup after the firm’s collaboration with Ikea starting at £99.
With a similar aesthetic to the previous one, it is only 2 cm taller and 1 cm deeper, making it quite compact and easy to fit in a cupboard or shelf. It only requires a power cable, connected to your router via Wi-Fi 6 to stream music from over 100 different services, including Spotify and BBC Sounds, controlled from the Sonos app on your phone.
In a first for non-portable Sonos speakers, it also supports Bluetooth 5 for impromptu streaming from guests’ phones or other Bluetooth devices, which works great.
A button at the top turns the voice assistant on or off. You can choose between one or both local Sonos voice assistants for playback control and Amazon Alexa, but not the Google Assistant.
If all you want to do is control the speaker, the Sonos voice assistant It’s the best, it works faster and without having to connect to Amazon. A switch on the back of the speaker can disconnect the microphones completely if not needed.
Specifications
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Dimensions: 18.3x12x13.1cm
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Weigh: 2kg
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Speakers: two tweeters, one midwoofer
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Connectivity: Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth 5, USB-C, AirPlay 2, Spotify Connect
big wide sound
The Era 100 may be a compact speaker, but it packs surprisingly big, room-filling sound. It has a 25% larger woofer than the One and a pair of tweeters angled left and right to create stereo sound.
We’re not talking about the new spatial audio capability like Apple’s offering or the more expensive epoch 300, but the result is much wider audio with more bass that makes the speaker sound much bigger than it is. The stereo effect isn’t bad at all when looking directly at the speaker, but it quickly merges when you move to the side.
It sounds really good, packed with detail, warm mids, crisp highs, and plenty of low end. It can play all but the deepest notes when pressed and has excellent pitch separation while maintaining good balance even when playing tracks up to 90% volume. Vocal clarity is excellent, and it handles a wide variety of music genres better than many competitors. It occasionally has a little too much mid-bass hit for my liking on some tracks, but that was easily adjusted with the bass, treble, and “loudness” settings in the app.
The Era 100 also supports Sonos’s room-setting Trueplay feature for the first time on Android, previously an Apple exclusive. Using the “quick tune” option, the speaker emits a tone and uses its built-in microphones to adjust the sound to best suit your room. The option for the most labor intensive full adjustment, waving an iPhone or iPad around a room, is still available, but I’m not sure it’s necessary here.
If one isn’t enough, you can pair two Era 100s together for stereo sound or use them as rear surround speakers with one of Sonos’s soundbars.
Sustainability
The Era 100 is generally repairable by Sonos. The company commits to a minimum of five years of software support for feature updates after it stops selling a product, but it has a much longer track record, including bug and security fixes for its legacy products.
It consumes approximately 1.5W when idle and less while sleeping at night, up to 4-11W at 50% volume and a maximum of 24W at 100% volume.
The speaker contains 48% recycled plastic and is designed with disassembly in mind for repair, refurbishment and recycling. He offers exchange and product recycling, and publishes annual responsibility and sustainability reports.
Price
The Sonos Era 100 comes in black or white and costs £249 ($249/A$399).
For comparison, the Ikea Symfonsik line starts at £99the Sonos One line costs from £179the Era 300 costs £449the Apple HomePod costs £299Amazon Echo costs £99.99 and Google Nest Audio costs £89.99.
Verdict
The Era 100 is Sonos’ best-sounding small speaker and takes the crown as the top new smart speaker for music.
Its compact frame hides powerful, room-filling, high-quality sound with plenty of bass, adding to the winning formula of its popular predecessor. It won’t pull any spatial audio tricks, but it produces a nice wide sound or surprisingly good stereo if you sit directly in front of it. Pair two of them together for even better sound.
The additions of Bluetooth, line-in capability, and modern Wi-Fi 6 are very welcome updates, as are progress in repairability and sustainability. Sonos’ excellent multi-room audio platform continues to set the standard, is compatible with a wide variety of streaming services and is continuously updated with a very long lifespan. The recent addition of its own voice assistant that controls playback rendered locally on the device for speed and privacy is great, and it’s also used in conjunction with Amazon’s Alexa.
It’s not exactly cheap, costing double or more than some smart speakers bought from Google or Amazon, but it’s not tied to their ecosystem, it sounds better, and it has much greater compatibility for using your favorite music services.
Advantages: great sound, good looking, easy setup, broad support for music services, long lifespan, Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth and line-in options, pairable, good optional voice control, Alexa support, recycled materials.
Cons: comparatively expensive, no Google Assistant support, no Dolby Atmos/spatial audio support.
