Sub Mini is a wireless subwoofer designed to pair with the most affordable soundbars from Sonos (Image: SONOS)
Sonos has unveiled the latest addition to its speaker lineup, Sub Mini. This wireless subwoofer is a more affordable alternative to the Sonos Sub (Gen 3), which launched back in June 2020, and is designed to bring bold bass to smaller rooms. It can be paired with almost any Sonos speaker (the portable Sonos Roam is one of the only speakers that does not work with the new subwoofer) to generate a deep, dynamic low end to your favourite music, audiobooks, TV shows, sport, and blockbusters.
Offloading the bass to a dedicated speaker frees up the remaining kit in your Sonos set-up to focus on the mid and high-end of the spectrum, producing much richer and more powerful results from all paired speakers. If you want to enhance the sound from your existing Sonos speakers, and add some bone-rumbling bass to the mix, the Sub Mini is available to preorder today.
Sonos Sub Mini has been designed with the Sonos Ray and Sonos Beam (Gen 2) soundbars in mind. The long-rumoured Sonos Sub Mini arrives with a stylish cylindrical design, which Sonos assured us will work brilliantly as a small coffee table for those tight on space. Since the Sub Mini is wireless, it can be placed anywhere in the room, with Sonos’ clever Trueplay algorithms analysing the space and ensuring the sound is tuned correctly. Even pressed up against a wall, the Sub Mini will provide rumbling bass without rattle and distortion, the US smart audio company says. Of course, we’ll need to get our hands on the Sub Mini to test these claims, so stay tuned.
Sonos Sub Mini costs £429 – some £320 cheaper than the Sonos Sub (Gen 3). That means you can pick-up a Sonos Ray soundbar and a Sub Mini and still have £41 to spare compared to just buying the Sonos Sub (Gen 3) on its own. Preorders are available now, with the first cylindrical subwoofers shipping to customers from October 6, 2022. If you’re looking to complete a home cinema setup, check the best Sonos deals to secure your remaining kit at the lowest possible price.
Since the Sub Mini is wireless, it can be placed anywhere in your room for a clutter-free setup (Image: SONOS)
The Sub Mini stands at 12-inches (230 mm) tall, so shouldn’t be too difficult to fit into your home décor. It’s 9.1-inch (305 mm) deep, so isn’t very bulky. Sonos says that it designed the Sub Mini to blend with your home aesthetic, rather than the boxier designs seen from most competitors that you’d rather hide away behind a sofa.
Unlike the Sonos Sub (Gen 3), which can still produce its chest-rumbling bass when lying on its side, the cylindrical shape of the Sub Mini (and speaker arrangement inside) means that it has to be standing up, otherwise its performance will be compromised.
It’s a good thing that it’s a looker, as chances are, it’s going to be placed out in the open as part of your home sound system.
The cylindrical design is to enable a pair of force-canceling woofers (Image: SONOS)
Inside the Sub Mini, you’ll find a pair of force-cancelling woofers, which are designed to generate a deep, dynamic low-end while minimising buzz or distortion. Using digital signal processing, Sonos claims that its diddy speaker “reproduces the full-toned low frequencies expected from a much larger subwoofer”. The opening in the speaker is designed to have the same shape as the Sonos Ray (when viewed from the front) and the Sonos Beam (when viewed from above) to create a cohesive home cinema setup.
Sub Mini relies on a 5Ghz network to communicate with the Sonos Ray and Sonos Beam when working as a home cinema system, which should drop the latency as low as possible so that everything is synchronised perfectly. There’s no option to use a wired connection with the Sub Mini, so you’ll be reliant on the local wireless network.
Of course, there’s nothing to stop you pairing the Sub Mini with a Sonos Arc …but there’s little point. This all-in-one Dolby Atmos soundbar is designed for bigger rooms and can already provide a healthy amount of bass on its own. If you’re spending the £899 necessary to bag a Sonos Arc, you should really be looking at the pricier Sonos Sub (Gen 3) to enhance your home cinema setup.
The Sub Mini was designed to look apiece with both the Beam and the Ray soundbars (Image: SONOS)
While its possible to pair the £749 Sub (Gen 3) with a Sonos Ray or Sonos Beam, that’s a bit overkill for these speakers. That’s the gap that the Sonos Sub Mini aims to fill in the lineup.
Sonos says that as production values have skyrocketed in cinematic TV shows (Amazon has splashed out $58.1million on each episode of its new The Rings Of Power show, and Netflix topped its own record with the latest season of Stranger Things) and video games it has seen more customers looking to invest in a good sound system at home.
This prompted Sonos to launch the Ray soundbar – an affordable way for viewers to enhance their viewing experience and bypass the notoriously terrible speakers built into flatscreen tellies. As more people look to invest in good sound for their favourite TV shows, streaming blockbuster films from the likes of Disney+, Netflix and Prime Video …the Sub Mini could be the must-have new addition to any home cinema system.
If you prefer to listen to music, the Sub Mini can be paired with a Sonos One, One SL, or IKEA SYMFONISK speaker for more depth and clarity to your music experience. As you’ll find when paired with a soundbar, offloading the bass allows the paired speaker to focus entirely on the mid- and high-end of the track, boosting overall performance from your existing setup, Sonos says.