Bose SoundTouch house theater techniques regress into dumb audio system Feb. 18

Bose will brick key options of its SoundTouch Wi-Fi audio system and soundbars quickly. On Thursday, Bose informed customers that as of February 18, 2026, it would cease supporting the units, and the units’ cloud-based options, together with the companion app, will cease working.

The SoundTouch app enabled quite a few capabilities, together with integrating music providers, like Spotify and TuneIn, and the flexibility to program a number of audio system in numerous rooms to play the identical audio concurrently.

Bose has additionally mentioned that some saved presets received’t work and that customers received’t be capable to change saved presets as soon as the app is gone.

Additionally, Bose will cease offering safety updates for SoundTouch units.

The Framingham, Massachusetts-headquartered firm famous to prospects that the audio system will proceed having the ability to play audio from a tool linked through AUX or HDMI. Wireless playback will nonetheless work over Bluetooth; nonetheless, Bluetooth is understood to introduce extra latency than Wi-Fi connections.

Affected prospects can commerce of their SoundTouch product for a credit score value up to $200.

In its discover despatched to prospects this week, Bose supplied minimal clarification for end-of-life-ing its expensive SoundTouch audio system, saying:

Bose SoundTouch techniques have been launched into the market in 2013. Technology has developed since then, and we’re now not in a position to maintain the event and assist of the cloud infrastructure that powers this older era of merchandise. We stay dedicated to creating new listening experiences for our prospects constructed on trendy applied sciences.

Ars Technica has reached out to Bose for remark.

“Really disgusted”

Bose launched SoundTouch with three audio system starting from $399 to $699. The firm marketed the wi-fi house audio system as a solution to lengthen high-quality sound all through the house utilizing Wi-Fi-connected audio system.

In 2015, Bose expanded the lineup with audio system starting from $200 to $400 and soundbars and residential theater techniques starting from $1,100 to $1,500.

By 2020, nonetheless, Bose was distancing itself from SoundTouch. It informed customers that it was “discontinuing sales of some SoundTouch products” however mentioned it was “committed” to supporting the “SoundTouch app and product software program for the foreseeable future.” Apparently, Bose couldn’t see past the following 5 years.