Sonos - Arc Ultra
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Reddit Reviews:
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Last updated: Aug 1, 2025 Scoring
Liked most:
77
41
"Speech was much clearer than the Arc. ... I could clearly understand everything that was being said from the center channel, without needing any additional adjustments, and this was a __huge__ improvement over the Arc, imo. ... I would argue that having speech enhancement turned off on the Ultra, is better than the Arc, turning it to low or medium really kicks up even more. ... the center channel is much clearer & louder, that is for sure… the wife isn’t complaining at all today in that room, so it passes the test for me. 😂 ... My wife says the live Hockey games are much louder and easier to hear, if that is anything for you. Haha. ... The ultra has just a better (and wider) center channel, so much louder and clearer speech dialog, plus you go from 7.1.4 to 9.1.4, so you add the additional __wide__ surround channels, from my own testing Atmos is better, period."
"Atmos bubble is massively improved, with excellent clarity and locality or sounds. ... I am far more convinced I have working height channels than I ever did on the Arc... ... I also feel I am able to "follow" sounds around the room n k8p9ow with no breaks or interruptions."
"The Sonos Arc was always a little bit too weak in comparison to the era 300s. So much so that it distracted me listing to music because I heard a lot more vocals in the back and nothing the front as how it was supposed to. The ultra fixed that for me. The sound isn’t filling the room anymore it seems more like the sound is the room. You can’t tell from where the sound is coming from because it is so well balanced between the front and the back. So much so that I got nauseas because my brain couldn’t make out the exact location of the singing voice. My girlfriend experienced the same so that was pretty wild. I got used to it really quick tho."
135
52
"Atmos bubble is massively improved, with excellent clarity and locality or sounds. ... I am far more convinced I have working height channels than I ever did on the Arc... ... I also feel I am able to "follow" sounds around the room n k8p9ow with no breaks or interruptions."
"Played COD on ps5 yesterday home alone, and a female voice shouted fro LHS era 300. It was so clear and distinctly "in the room" that my adrenal gland dumped as ot freaked me out before I realised the source."
"In terms of height...game changer vs the arc atleast. ... I played an atmos test vid where it's nothing but rain falling and the rain literally sounds like it's coming through the ceiling."
16
4
"I went with the sonos, but I only wanted the bar for now. I'll buy the sub next year, and then the rears. Yes I'm spending more overall, but im spending within my limits with the money I have available at the time, and I dont mind spending that money."
"soundbars now can be very good with basic plug and play. ... No wires is a huge plus too."
"It went super smooth! Plugged the Ultra in, it automatically popped up in the Sonos app, created a new room, needed to be firmware updated, and then it was usable. Zero issues. ... Again, super smooth. Just followed the prompts in the app, and everything re-bonded to the Arc Ultra."
69
17
"The dialogue volume is an absolute game-changer for me as well. ... I've always had trouble understanding dialogue clearly, even with speech enhancement turned on. It drove me crazy with every movie, and we were constantly adjusting the volume up and down. ... With the Arc Ultra, this problem is finally solved, and I couldn’t imagine a better setup."
"I only have an arc ultra in use for tv and I can't understand how anyone without hearing loss can't make out voices clearly. ... I've turned the enhancement to low or had it off in other occasions since it sometimes seems voice forward if that makes sense. ... I'm in a small room going by American standards. I'm sitting about 8/9 feet from the bar, 9 foot ceiling. Have it on low enhancement, volume of 8. Night mode is not on. The app is saying dolby digital plus 2.0 whilst watching youtube. I can hear speech perfectly."
"The sound is so clear it’s unreal. ... Like I can hear storm trooper lasers flying around my room."
50
15
"It will also have much more bass, adding the value of a complete system without necessarily a need for a sub."
"Sub can shake your teeth out in the right scene. ... I watched the Seismic Charge scene from Attack of the Clones and oh boy…"
"if you want a standalone, all-in-one sound system without sub + surrounds (its sound motion driver is insanely good at producing bass, I would toggle sub on/off when demoing it the difference was near imperceptible at times) it's the best option from Sonos. ... Can’t deny that the Ultra is far better standalone with its sound motion driver, though."
Disliked most:
0
12
"It only supports DTS "Core" so the ancient non HD DTS which does not require a license. ... So despite charging eye watering prices they still refuse to pony up for a proper DTS-HD license."
"Absolutely! It ’s a premium product. It should be able to support a wide range of codecs."
"No surround from PC. The bar can't accept audio signal from gpu HDMI, even running thru Sonos optional optical adapter. No surround thru sound card or onboard optical even though they're 5.1 compatible. Sound must go thru tv, and my tv won't pass surround channels."
7
11
"This is a joke… maybe someone has a fix.. Not able to do trueplay. Just keeps failing."
"trueplay with sub(s) and surrounds flatten the sub(s) so I turned it off again.."
"I tried running the Trueplay tuning again but it crashes every time."
2
14
"Sonos is way overpriced for what it sounds like"
"I paid way more for the Sonos setup ... for value alone Samsung destroys the Sonos setup."
"I only use my system for that and it doesnt feel good that my Sonos System that costs 2x the Samsung one is way worse..."
7
46
"overall, the Arc Ultra is an improvement over the OG Arc, but still doesn't compare to the Playbar for stereo content ... When comparing both soundbars for music, the Playbar still wins out. ... In many of the songs I listened to, the Playbar just sounded better. ... There's a richness to the sound of the Playbar that can't be matched by the smaller drivers in the Arc. ... If you're simply listening to music, the Playbar is better. ... However, the Playbar was wonderful to listen to for music. Better than most soundbars I've tried."
"Trueplay is massively broken. ... I get zero bass and midbass when I have Trueplay enabled. ... Run it more then 20 times, with 2 iPhones and 1 Android device and different seeting positions. Yes I also cleaned the microphone. Same result. ... The soundstage with Trueplay is really great but without any bass its just very thin sound overall. ... I checked with my ears close at every speaker and it sounds like they all get a lowcut AND canceling each other out. ... Tested with Atmos, 5.1 and music."
"There is an issue with my unit, there is hardly any bass...very thin sounding. ... I turn the bass EQ on the app to 10 and it BARELY rumbles. ... So it seems that the trueplay was greatly diminishing the low end, however even with it off, it was sorely lacking. ... I am in a medium-to-large living room and while the surround effect was impressive, and the dialogue is very clear, I was let down big time by the low frequencies. ... Like I said, it barely even rumbles. I even played some of the bassist EDM tracks I have, car chase from Furiosa, the gun fight in the Continental on John Wick 3, all just super thin and flaccid. ... If you get the Arc Ultra and are in a medium or larger sized room, *at the very least* the Sub Mini is a must have."
4
21
"they're still having so many connection issues I can't possibly recommend them. ... It was the worst headache I've ever had to deal with when it didn't work, which was most of the time."
"the Sonos app experience is terrible. ... It’s so bad that I have just bought a Denon AVR to replace it."
"Setup Experience: 2.5/10 ... The app continuously froze and wouldn’t allow for a retune, making the initial setup frustrating. ... Frustrating multi-hour troubleshooting, resets, and setup cycles: 2.5/10 (I really didn’t think it was going to work by the third cycle) ... The out-of-the-box experience was defective and terrible, and the troubleshooting was frustrating—I almost gave up."
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