Sonos Ultimate Immersive Set with Arc Ultra

Sonos's new Arc in a full package is extravagant but spectacular

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Sonos makes some seriously bold claims for its new Dolby Atmos soundbar’s performance, saying that it features 'breakthrough' speaker tech and “up to double the bass” of the original Arc. The Arc Ultra’s main rivals, the Sony Bravia Theatre Bar 9 and Samsung HW-Q990D, are a fair bit more expensive, but the Samsung comes with a wireless sub and wireless surrounds in the box. The Arc Ultra with the Sub 4 and a pair of Dolby Atmos-enabled Era 300 speakers in the 'Ultimate Immersive Set with Arc Ultra', which is how we’re testing it here. At first glance, it’s quite hard to tell the Arc Ultra from the original Arc, but there are some design differences, most notably the 'ledge' at the back/top of the chassis. This houses the touch controls that were integrated into the main grille of the Arc. It’s a little wider (118cm to 114cm), but it’s slightly less tall (7.5cm to 8.7cm) than the Arc, making it less likely to obstruct the bottom of your TV’s screen. It’s also 350g lighter than the outgoing model. As with the original Arc, the Ultra is pretty much all grille, with just a Sonos logo and glowing status-light breaking up its appearance. This is deliberate – by perforating pretty much the entire chassis, Sonos has ensured sound can emanate from the soundbar in almost any direction.

The Arc Ultra boasts a 9.1.4-channel configuration, up from the 5.0.2 arrangement of the original Arc. There are 15 Class-D amplifiers powering 14 drivers that are all Sonos-engineered. There are seven tweeters, six midrange woofers, and a ‘Sound Motion’ woofer – and it’s the last of those that is the really big deal.