OS Monterey - iMac as Airplay speaker

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Level 2

287 points

OS Monterey - iMac as Airplay speaker

The latest OS iteration allows Airplay to iMac. I also have a Sonos SL speaker. Using an iPad as controller to play Apple Music, I can see both iMac and Sonos speaker in the Airplay dropdown. In practice I'm only able to choose one or the other of these for playback. When I check the boxes for both items, nothing plays at all. I'm guessing this might be a cross platform issue, either Apple, Sonos or both preventing this from happening. I'd still like to know if it's possible or if I'm doing something wrong. As always, thanks in advance for any help.

*I have posted this under iPad topics but on reflection that was the wrong place to put it.

iMac 24″, macOS 12.0

Posted on Nov 18, 2021 8:48 AM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

karina184

Community Specialist

Nov 19, 2021 10:02 AM in response to Switchblade

Hey Switchblade,

It sounds like you're looking into using AirPlay to play content to both your Mac and Sonos speaker. We can understand wanting to look into that further. We want to help.

It sounds like the behavior you're experiencing is expected behavior, as it is only possible to Airplay to one device at a time. You can learn more about that here:

"Stream audio from your Mac

Make sure that your Mac and speaker are on the same Wi-Fi or Ethernet network.
Open Apple Music on your Mac.
To the right of the volume slider in Apple Music, click AirPlay .
Click each speaker or TV that you want to play the current audio to.

If you don't see the AirPlay icon or if you want to stream audio from a different app:

On your Mac, select Control Center in the menu bar.
Click AirPlay under Sound.
Select a speaker that you want to play the current audio to.

You can't use AirPlay to stream audio to multiple speakers from the menu bar on a Mac."

Thanks!

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Answer 2

Switchblade Author

Level 2

287 points

Nov 20, 2021 1:19 AM in response to karina184

Thank you for replying! This is informative and probably answers my question, but I’d like to clarify what I’m trying to do here. I’m playing Apple Music on IPad. The Airplay drop down on this device shows both IMac and Sonos speaker as available. It also allows both of this to be selected simultaneously, showing them together as IMac+Sonos with one tick symbol adjacent to this message. They do not however play Apple Music together, in fact there’s no sound output at all. This is why I find this part of your post confusing;

Click each speaker or TV that you want to play the current audio to.

As it implies that I can select multi-room play in Airplay.

I guess that despite your answer pointing to IMac as the source for Apple Music, it won’t matter whether I attempt the same thing with iPad as source/controller and that the outcome will be the same. It confirms too that if I want multiple room play I need to expand my Sonos system, which will definitely achieve what I’m after. Thank you again for your help and I’d welcome any additional comments you might have.

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Answer 3

Switchblade Author

Level 2

287 points

Nov 24, 2021 5:32 AM in response to Switchblade

Fixed. After a restart on both the iMac and Sonos One SL, I can now play music through both simultaneously when Airplay is instigated form the iPad.

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OS Monterey - iMac as Airplay speaker

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