Zone

Think of a zone as a room in your house, or as an audio device that you use to play music.

Roon is a multi-room system that supports playback of music to one or more Zones. The very bottom area of Roon's user interface, called the footer, is dedicated to showing information about the currently selected zone. You might have a zone for the Living Room, one for the Bedroom, another for your Office Speakers, and yet another for your Office Headphones. For more information about output devices that work with Roon, see our Partners page. For more information on Roon's architecture at a higher level, see Architecture

Switching Zones

To switch the zone you're controlling in desktop and tablet interfaces, click the Zone Picker in the footer, next to volume:

On a phone, you'll find the zone switcher listed in the bottom right corner, next to the volume icon:

 

Transfer music to a different Zone

What if you want to move the party from the living room to the patio while music is playing? No problem! Roon allows you to transfer or move your current track, queue, and radio station to another zone. Press the volume icon in the footer, then tap on the double arrow icon and select the new zone. 

Click the volume (speaker) icon, and then you will see the zone switcher icon appear in the menu.

Pressing the zone switcher will open your device menu. Simply press the device you’d like to move your queue to and wait a few seconds while Roon transfers your music to the new device.

Other Ways to Transfer Zone

You can also Transfer Zone by right-clicking (or long-press) the Zone Picker at the bottom right of the screen. From there, select Transfer Zone.

Zone Grouping

Roon supports Zone Grouping, or synchronizing audio playback in several zones within your house. Zones can only be grouped with other zones of the same type, meaning Squeezebox zones cannot be grouped with RAAT zones, Meridian zones can't be grouped with Airplay zones, etc. Not all technologies support grouping, but the most commonly used options do. These are the types of zones within which grouping is possible:

1. RAAT Zones
   
1. Roon Ready devices
   
2. Roon and Roon Remote outputs on macOS, Windows, Android and iOS
   
3. Roon Bridge outputs on macOS, Windows, and Linux
   
2. Squeezebox zones
   
3. Meridian zones
   
4. Airplay zones
   
5. Sonos zones
   
6. Chromecast zones
   
7. KEF Zones (LS50 v1 + LSX)

Note that Chromecast zones are not grouped using Roon, but grouped using the Google Home app. See the Knowledge Base article on Chromecast for more information.

MQA Playback to Grouped Zones

Since MQA authorization by an MQA device requires MQA signaling information to complete the decoding and rendering processes, grouped zone playback interferes with MQA devices’ abilities to authenticate and decode the stream. If you’d like your MQA device to be able to authenticate and decode an MQA stream while playing in a grouped zone, you should set its “Clock Master Priority” setting to the highest in the group. To Group Zones, select the Zone you're controlling in the bottom right corner, next to volume:

From there, click on "Group" (here highlighted in the screenshot).

This brings up the available zones; for example:

Now click the desired zone(s) to be added and select Save. Your grouped zone will be called something like 1st DAC + 2nd DAC.

If you wish, you can name the grouped zone in the Zones pop up menu. 

Right click or long-press your newly created grouped zone, then click Zone settings

Enter a name in the Grouped zone name text block.

Ungrouping Zones

1. To ungroup your zones, press the Grouped Zone icon.
   
2. Then tap Group.
   
3. Uncheck the box next to the device name to remove a single device from the group.
   
4. Click Save.
   
5. Or press Ungroup at the top of the device window to ungroup all the devices.
   

Note: grouped zone names are purged once devices are ungrouped. 

Accessing settings from the Zone Picker 

You can also use the Zone picker to quickly access a number of settings. Right-click (or long-press) the Zone Picker for Zone Settings, Device setup, and Roon DSP features.

The Zone picker is in the bottom right hand corner of your screen

Right click (or long press on mobile or tablet) on the Zone picker, and then click on Zone settings in the menu that appears

If you wish, you can edit the name of a Device or Grouped Zone or set Crossfade and Volume Leveling in the Zones pop up menu. Note that if you have Volume Leveling set to "Off", you will not see the additional Target Volume Level and Volume adjustment settings. The Zone settings menu gives you access to other options as well, such as Device Setup and Auto Standby.

From the Zone settings menu, you'll find access to your Zone's options and name, as well as buttons to access other options for your Zone

Another Quick Way to Rename Zones or Set Crossfade, Volume Leveling and Volume Limits

You can also access Zone Settings by clicking or tapping on the volume icon at the bottom right of the screen. From there, select the gear icon . 

Private Zones Private zones are special because they don't support remote control. They are invisible unless you are controlling Roon from the same device where the private zone lives. They are most commonly used on laptops and mobile devices when you might not want other people in your household to take control of your speakers or headphones remotely. Because they can only be controlled locally, they are excluded from Zone Grouping.

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