Happy days are Era gain

The next generation of high-end Sonos magic has landed, and it introduces spatial audio support too. But is this chunky speaker worth the chunky price?

The Sonos Era 300 represents exactly what the name suggests – a new Era for Sonos. While the Era 100 is a direct replacement for the tremendous One speaker, the Era 300 drops into a new zone. Sonos claims it doesn’t replace the Five (R15 000), but it does mean you’d be crackers to buy one of those given what this can do for R4 000 less (sorry for the spoiler).

This does pave the way for an even more capable Era 500 to replace the Five at some point, though. And you can already use Era 300s as rear speakers in a more comprehensive Dolby Atmos-capable Sonos setup – up to a 7.1.4 system when used alongside the Arc or Beam (Gen 2) and the Sub.

But top of the list for the Era 300 is standalone support for what some people call spatial audio and others call Dolby Atmos Music. Essentially, this enables more immersive ‘3D’ mixes of tunes to be created. It’s here to stay, because there are lots of new tracks being created in the format while masses of old stuff is also being reimagined for it.

The difference it makes to songs is immediately obvious, just as it is on key rivals such as the Apple HomePod and Amazon Echo Studio. The latter is a natural competitor for the Era 100 – but just how good is the bigger, beefier new Sonos?