The Sonos Arc Ultra is the successor to the Sonos Arc. The Ultra may look largely similar, but it’s been redesigned and acoustically re-engineered to deliver more immersive sound, crisper vocal clarity and beefi er bass. The newer Ultra squeezes 14 speakers inside, arranged across seven tweeters, six mid-woofers and one ‘Sound Motion’ woofer. The earlier Arc model has eight woofers and three tweeters. Further catering for not only the high-end with a more significant array – useful for dialogue and vocals – but also a stronger focus on bass output shows the Ultra’s upgraded position clearly. The Arc was no stranger to three-dimensional sound output, with virtual Dolby Atmos surround achieved in a 5.0.2 output, but the Arc Ultra, however, upgrades that to a 9.1.4 output, arranged across nine front/side channels, four upfiring height channels, and one integrated woofer. You can still upgrade this by adding a sub (such as the new Sonos Sub 4) and a pair of rear speakers (like the Sonos Era 300), but the channel arrangement remains fundamentally the same – it’s still 9.1.4, just the crossover for low-end frequencies will be adjusted and the true rear channels will pick up an adjusted share of output.
Despite featuring more speakers, the Ultra is actually smaller than its predecessor – by around 1cm less tall, 0.5cm less deep – but measures a significant 117.8cm across, making it an ideal fi t for 65-inch TVs. Setting up the Arc Ultra was initially tricky, due to the Sonos app not quite playing ball. You don’t need to spend Sonos Arc Ultra THE BEST BAR NONE Sonos fans rejoice – the ultimate soundbar is here to upgrade your system too much time in the app, but what it is useful for is adjusting the sound profile of the soundbar using Quickplay Tune. The function measures the room’s reflective qualities and modifys it accordingly. In terms of design, the Arc Ultra is undoubtedly one of the best-looking soundbars available right now. The curved metal surface looks very high-end, the subtle Sonos logo is so delicately integrated front and centre, and the status light can be hidden through settings if you don’t want any illumination. Oddly, the Bluetooth button is located at the back of the soundbar, suggesting Sonos wants you to use Wi-Fi for multi-room listening rather than Bluetooth, perhaps. One slight downside? There’s only one HDMI port. at means you can plug an HDMI cable into a TV’s ARC or eARC slot and it’ll handle sound effortlessly. But there are no further ports, therefore no HDMI passthrough option, as many other high-end soundbars offer, sometimes even into the multiples – and that might mean surrendering a 4K/120Hz slot on your TV as a result. If you have multiple games consoles, such as the PS5 Pro, you won’t want to do that.
As one-box solutions go, the Sonos Arc Ultra is arguably the best-sounding soundbar without the need for any extras. You can augment the low end courtesy of the new Sonos Sub 4, but it might actually be overkill; the Arc Ultra is seriously capable for bass as it is. It isn’t a one-trick pony either: surprisingly the sometimes less-than intelligible dialogue 8here punches through, with the Speech Enhancer option further coming to the rescue.
Dolby Atmos soundtracks certainly deliver a wonderful frontal soundstage that has height and width, with some great left-to-right bouncing of SFX – ricocheting bullets a clear example – that give a heightened sense of immersion. No soundbar with virtual processing is a match for a separates system, of course, as there are no speakers placed behind the listener here – but as confident three dimensional output goes, the spread of sound is seriously impressive. There’s a great clarity to the overall delivery, the Arc Ultra never sounds stretched nor imbalanced at any volume level, dialogue doesn’t sound flat nor sibilant. This is being a Sonos, it would be remiss to not feed it a variety of musical sources, of course, as many will be lured because it plays nice with other Sonos multi-room products. Whatever music you like, the breadth of this soundbar is never in question. The Sonos Arc Ultra is arguably the best-sounding single-box soundbar solution on the market right now. As an upgrade over the original Arc, the bigger bass profile, clearer vocal presentation and broader soundstage all make it worthwhile.
Pricing and Availability
- ₹ 99,900
- sonos.com