If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, right? Wrong. It’s a bold move to take a product that’s loved by many and replace it with an entirely new one, but that’s exactly what Sonos has done with the Era 100.

Launching alongside the Sonos Era 300, the smaller Era 100 is a direct replacement for the fantastic Sonos One. It bumps up the price, changes up the design and introduces some great new features, but it still has some big shoes to fill.

We’ve seen and heard the Sonos Era 100 and if you love the Sonos One, you’re about to embark on a fabulous affair with it. Here are our first impressions.

Sonos Era 100 design

• 182.5 x 120 x 130.5mm
• Capactive touch controls
• Bluetooth switch, microphone switch
• Black or White

The Sonos Era 100 doesn’t look like the Sonos One. Sure, it’s similar in size – around an inch taller if you’re being pedantic – but it has been redesigned from the ground up and that’s immediately clear.

Where the Sonos One is small and boxy, the Sonos Era 100 is cylindrical with minimal fuss. The colour-matched metal grille that surrounded the Sonos One has been replaced with an environmentally-friendly polycarbonate grille, matching the look the company delivered with the Sonos Roam.

Ports exist on the back of the Era 100, while the power port is underneath – the same as what was the case for the Sonos One. You’ll find a USB-C line in port on the Era 100 though, like the larger Era 300. You’ll also find a physical microphone switch, allowing you to turn off smart functionality for privacy.

On the top of the Era 100 are the controls. There are capacitive controls for play/pause and forward and back, which is similar to what most Sonos speakers offer though previous speakers featured volume controls with forward and back traditionally been done via a swipe between these volume buttons. The Era 100 has an indented strip – or trough as the company called it – for volume control instead. Swipe your finger from one side to the other to adjust the volume, while forward and back are done via the dedicated buttons. It basically makes fast forwarding and rewinding that little bit more intuitive compared to older Sonos speakers.

The top of the Era 100 is much neater than the Sonos One too. The One has quite a thick hat with the Sonos logo printed on it, while the Era 100 has a very slim hat, with the Sonos logo moving to the grille, like the Sonos Roam. We were perfectly happy with our Sonos One speakers at home, until we saw the Era 100.

Don’t get us wrong, the Sonos One still looks great, but it’s definitely dated compared to the fresh and modern look of the Era 100. Like the Sonos One – and most of Sonos’ speakers, there are black and white colour options. White is almost always our favourite, but the black looks great too and in the case of the Era 100, neither will disappoint.

Sonos Era 100 features

• Adjustable EQ
• Compatibility with over 100 music services
• Amazon Alexa, Sonos Voice Control
• Trueplay, Quick Tune

The Sonos Era 100 brings all the features you would expect from a Sonos speaker, and then some. Starting with the usuals, you’ll get support for over 100 music streaming services, the ability to adjust EQ – something you can’t do on the likes of the Apple HomePod for example – and you can use the Era 100 individually or as part of a Sonos system.

You can also stereo pair two Era 100 speakers together but importantly, you can’t stereo pair an Era 100 with a Sonos One. If you have a Sonos One therefore, and you have been considering buying another for a stereo pair, do this before the stock depletes and the Era 100 takes over. Both the Sonos One and Sonos One SL are being replaced by the Era 100.

As with most multi-room speakers, you can play the same music on the Era 100 as any other Sonos speakers you have grouped with it, or you can play different music. We’ve got a Sonos tips and tricks feature that details a rundown of most of the features Sonos speakers offer. It’s worth a read as there is plenty they are capable of

The Sonos Era 100 also has smart functionality on board. There is no Google Assistant this time around – likely due to the ongoing legal issues between Sonos and Google – but you will find Sonos Voice Control which is great for control of the speaker itself, and Amazon Alexa if you want control of smart home devices or your shopping list for example. As we mentioned, there is also a microphone hardware switch on the back that allows you to turn the smart functionality off completely.

Most Sonos speakers have what the company calls Trueplay tuning on board too, enabling you to tune the speaker to its surroundings using an iOS device. The Era 100 has a feature called Quick Tune though, which uses the on board microphones to tune the speaker, enabling Android users to get a level of Trueplay tuning without having to borrow an iOS device. This means the Era 100 can be adapted to its surroundings whenever it is repositioned, delivering the best sound possible for the environment it is in.

Hardware and performance

• 25 per cent larger woofer than Sonos One
• 2 dual-angled tweeters
• Custom wave guides
• 47 per cent faster processor

The Sonos Era 100 has a different sound architecture to the Sonos One. When Sonos replaced the Play:1 with the One, it didn’t change the internals. That was fine though because the Play:1 sounded great, as does the One.

For the Era 100 though, everything has changed. Sonos told us there wasn’t a single part of the Sonos One in the Era 100.

The woofer has increased in size by 25 per cent compared to the One for starters, delivering extra punch and deeper bass, and there’s an extra tweeter too – making for two in total that are dual-angled, allowing for stereo sound and wider dispersion. The Sonos One is mono, though it does a great job of delivering great sound performance despite this.

There are also custom wave guides on the Era 100. You won’t find any upfiring elements so you’re not getting Dolby Atmos or Spatial Audio from the Era 100 like the larger Era 300. That’s not necessarily something you’d expect though so no judgement there.

We got some brief listening time with the Era 100 and from what we have heard so far, it sounds excellent. Of course we were in rooms that were specifically designed to make everything sound great, so there’s that to consider, but overall, the Era 100 appeared to handle everything well. As it should given it’s replacing one of the speakers we would recommend most.

We listened to October Sky by Yebba, Billions by Caroline Polachek and About Damn Time by Lizzo and all sounded great.

Elsewhere on the hardware front, the Sonos Era 100 features support for Wi-Fi 6 – though keep in mind you’ll need a compatible router to take advantage of this – and there’s USB-C line in too. You’ll also find Apple AirPlay 2, and Bluetooth – the latter being key here. This is the first time – along with the Era 300 – that Sonos has put Bluetooth into a non-portable speaker.

It means that you can use the Era 100 as a traditional Sonos speaker, using a Wi-Fi mesh network created when you set it up, or you can use it as a traditional Bluetooth speaker.

Lastly on the hardware front, the Sonos Era 100 has a new co-neural processor on board, along with a 47 per cent faster processor the Sonos One, which is said to set it up for future features, whilst also improving performance. It is also said to be more power efficient than the Sonos One, only using 2W or under when in standby or sleep mode.

First impressions

The Sonos Era 100 is a new era – pun entirely intended – for Sonos speakers. It takes the company’s excellent entry-level speaker and gives it a make-over, both internally and externally.

The Era 100’s design gives the baby Sonos a new lease of life, whilst adding a number of new features that make it even more appealing. Yes, it adds a few pounds and dollars to the One’s price tag, and for those with a One considering a stereo pair, the Era 100 won’t be up to that task, but if you’re considering entering the Sonos platform, the Era 100 is a perfect place to start.

We’ll update this initial review when we have spent some more time with the Era 100 in our own environment, but from what we have seen and heard so far, there is so much to love about the Era 100 that we can definitely forgive Sonos for replacing the excellent One.