Sonos releases Beam, a new smart soundbar designed for people's home

Sonos has launched Beam, a new, small speaker meant to sit in your living room.

The speaker brings a whole host of features: not only sitting under the TV to give it better sound, but also working with Alexa to control the TV as well as listen to music.

Sonos has previously launched two speakers that help out the TV. The new Beam is smaller than both of those existing products, and brings new technology.

Chief among the additions is new HDMI technology that allows the Beam to control the TV. And that can be done by Alexa: the combination of new technologies allows people to shout at their TV and ask it to turn on, as well as turning up the volume.

The new speaker will be released on 17 July and is available for pre-order now. It will cost $399 or the same in pounds, Sonos said.

The Beam was announced alongside support for Apple's AirPlay 2, which will also arrive in July. That will allow people to send music to their newer Sonos speakers directly from their phone, as well as controlling them using Siri.

Sonos announced its first soundbar – known as the Playbar – in 2013. It has not been updated since.

That was followed last year by the Playbase, which flattened out the speaker so that the TV could sit on top of it rather than behind it.

The new speaker is not only much smaller but also much cheaper than those older models. The existing TV speakers cost $699, almost twice as expensive as the new model.