Sonos - Beam (Gen 2)
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Reddit Reviews:
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Last updated: Aug 1, 2025 Scoring
Liked most:
33
9
"the Beam has better voice quality. ... You won't have an issue with hearing dialogue with this soundbar."
"I have a Beam and the voice clarity is excellent."
"I love that I can listen on lower volumes or night mode and still clearly hear every detail."
94
35
"Yes Beam 2 is a fucking beast. ... how much more value the Beam 2 is for the money. ... You basically get 80-90 % the same experience, for half the price"
"It was *unbelievable*. ... For the first time since my standing speaker setup, I thoroughly enjoyed listening to music again, cranking the volume and just in awe at how good it sounded (sorry neighbors). ... I sat there for hours playing through some of my favorite albums. ... No overly processed highs, no muddy mids, everything just sounded clean, direct, and enjoyable. ... music is in a league of its own (when paired with a Sub to fill in the lows) due to a significant, and very welcome, lack of over-processing."
"I still blown away to this day when watching DA content."
12
0
"for my small living room, and for how much little space it takes up, the package is unbeatable. ... It ’s an easy and compact way"
"Yep, that spot is just screaming for a Sonos bar."
"needed something physically smaller to attach to the underside of a wall mounted tv."
29
2
"Yes Beam 2 is a fucking beast. ... how much more value the Beam 2 is for the money. ... You basically get 80-90 % the same experience, for half the price"
"it sounds so much better than my arc ultra lmfao. for a 3rd of the price."
"it simply reaffirms how good the Beam Gen 2 is and how it absolutely punches above it's price. ... the Beam Gen 2 is the best overall Sonos product when you look at performance coupled with price. It's an absolute steal of a product. ... it's just that good for it's size and price."
18
0
"one thing I do really like about Sonos is modular expandability. Start with just a Beam today. Add a sub or maybe add surrounds depending on what ’s important to you. Maybe one day you want better Atmos surrounds and now your old surrounds can be kitchen or bathroom speakers."
"easy to use ... AVR + wiring surround sound speakers just sounds like a hassle for an apartment."
"What I like most about the Sonos system is that although it's proprietary, it's very customizable and modular. ... Want to start with just a soundbar, go ahead; want to add surrounds first, sure; want to upgrade your soundbar and use the same surrounds, no problem; want to add a sub, okay; want to upgrade the surrounds, go ahead, and you can then use your old ones as standalone speakers elsewhere."
Disliked most:
4
16
"He said all I needed was an HDMI cord and no internet was required. He was wrong. ... where I live the internet has a firewall preventing those kinds of things from connecting to it. ... When I had the Beam it did work but only for about 30 minutes at a time before shutting off because it wanted to be set up. ... I also tried the hotspot thing using a friend's hotspot but the beam could not detect it, we then tried my hotspot and setting it up through her phone and it didn't work either so I don't know what was going on there lol. ... It's not a network issue, the network I have has a firewall that prevents things like that and they aren't gonna do anything to change it. ... I can't make changes to my Wifi. It's up to the people who run it which I've asked them before and they said no. ... I decided not to because what was the point in having a smart bar if I couldn't use the features lol."
"last week it stopped working and now just has a flashing white light."
"But you really should not buy anything Sonos, they may be bankrupt in some monthes with the app debacle."
11
19
"The clarity somewhat was not there and I struggle to hear spoken words ie lyrics and speech regardless what of switching speech enhancement and night mode on and loudness turned off ... I feel what ’s the point having this system if you can ’t use these features ... beam 2, despite being really good on it ’s own when connected to era 300s, is not powerful enough to compliment era 300s as 300 does not use centre firing drivers when in surround mode with beam, so when paid it lacks an ability to generate clear sound. ... In short, I personally don ’t suggest connecting beam 2 with Era 300s."
"The beam gen 2 is terrible for music and only ok for movies and tv."
"The Beam 2 is eh. Quite weak & very dull sounding. ... If I can comfortably listen to a movie at 60%+ volume, that sucks in my book. ... Hell I even had it at 100% in my bedroom before & I was just like "that's all this things got???""
11
18
"Atmos has not impressed me in the least, especially with music. ... My 2 channel system completely trashes it for music"
"I have never gotten surround to work with my the frame 2023 + Apple TV + Sonos beam (gen1) to work :( ... I'm getting dolby digital formatted sound when using streaming services directly on my samsung tv, but not from my apple tv. think it has something todo with the apple tv sending some uncompressed format that the beam does not support ... Mine just says PCM 2.0 all the time"
"The reality is that anyone who wants to be able to support all audio codecs should be using a traditional AV receiver and passive speakers. I have two Beam setups in my home (family room and bedroom), but when we want to watch movies or games with audio in mind we use the rec room with a traditional 5.1.2 setup. Especially when playing Blu-ray discs, it's the only way to guarantee that the audio codecs are supported. ... It's just that I don't expect to be able to use the full suite of audio codecs in that setup."
25
10
"The clarity somewhat was not there and I struggle to hear spoken words ie lyrics and speech regardless what of switching speech enhancement and night mode on and loudness turned off ... I feel what ’s the point having this system if you can ’t use these features ... beam 2, despite being really good on it ’s own when connected to era 300s, is not powerful enough to compliment era 300s as 300 does not use centre firing drivers when in surround mode with beam, so when paid it lacks an ability to generate clear sound. ... In short, I personally don ’t suggest connecting beam 2 with Era 300s."
"Very noticeable difference in clarity between the arc and ultra. For our aging ears spend the money on the ultra. ... Return it and buy the Arc Ultra. Much better. ... I also own both and still recommend the ultra over beam for clarity"
"I tried the Beam Gen 2 and Q990C and the dialogue on the Bose beats them hands down."
2
7
"He said all I needed was an HDMI cord and no internet was required. He was wrong. ... where I live the internet has a firewall preventing those kinds of things from connecting to it. ... When I had the Beam it did work but only for about 30 minutes at a time before shutting off because it wanted to be set up. ... I also tried the hotspot thing using a friend's hotspot but the beam could not detect it, we then tried my hotspot and setting it up through her phone and it didn't work either so I don't know what was going on there lol. ... It's not a network issue, the network I have has a firewall that prevents things like that and they aren't gonna do anything to change it. ... I can't make changes to my Wifi. It's up to the people who run it which I've asked them before and they said no. ... I decided not to because what was the point in having a smart bar if I couldn't use the features lol."
"Not happy you cannot shut it off without unplugging or disconnecting from WiFi so the soundbar is always on. ... I don want it on all the damn time."
"Sonos would require me to use the Sonos app."
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