Sonos announces new portable speaker, the Sonos Roam

Sonos has made its first real foray into affordable, truly portable speakers (let's be real, the 3kg Sonos Move isn't exactly bag friendly) with the announcement of the Sonos Roam.

Weighing in at 430g and standing just under 17cm tall, the Roam is about the size of a small water bottle, making it light and easy to pack for a picnic or beach trip since it should fit in your car's cup holder. It's made of a hardy rubberised material and is IP67 dust and water-resistant, so you don't need to worry about your Roam getting the odd splash or falling in the sand.

Despite its small size, Sonos claims the Roam's sound quality and adaptability "defies expectations for a speaker of its size", with two custom drivers, each with its own dedicated amplifier, and as always, you can adjust the speaker's equaliser from within the Sonos app. The Roam also features Automatic Trueplay, which fine-tunes your music on the fly, ensuring it's always sounding its best - no matter the environment.

Like all of Sonos' speakers, you can also expect some killer connectivity on the Sonos Roam, including Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and Apple AirPlay 2, plus your choice of voice assistant (Google Assistant or Amazon Alexa) for use when you're back on your home Wi-Fi.

If you've already got a Sonos speaker or two in your home, it's important to note the Roam may not be compatible with all older models - it can only pair with other Sonos S2-enabled speakers. For those that are compatible with S2, there's a pretty cool feature to take advantage of on the Sonos Roam - Sound Swap. Essentially, Sound Swap allows you to transfer whatever you're listening to from one speaker to another by pressing and holding the play/pause button, which emits a high-pitched tone (out of humans' hearing range) and sends your listening session to whichever speaker 'hears' that tone best.

The Sonos Roam packs a decent 10-hour battery life and can be charged via USB-C cable or wirelessly through a Qi charging pad or Sonos' own custom magnetic charger.

If you're keen to get your hands on Sonos' first ultra-portable speaker, you won't have long to wait. The Sonos Roam, which comes in Lunar White and Shadow Black, launches in Australia on April 10 for the reasonable price of $279. It's available for pre-order right now on Sonos' website.