If you're deeply invested in Google's hardware ecosystem, you're undoubtedly aware of the ongoing legal battles between it and Sonos. The company behind some of the best connected speakers around first filed a lawsuit against Google back in 2020, and since then, the two have been engaged in courtroom fight after courtroom fight. After several attacks and counterattacks — not to mention a win for Sonos back in January — Google is filing two more lawsuits against Sonos.

As first reported by The Verge, this fresh round of legal battles concerns seven total patents, split between both filings. The first lawsuit is all about hotword detection and charging. Google alleges Sonos used its technology when implementing low-power voice control into its speakers while also relying on patented methods for wireless charging. The second lawsuit involves four additional patents, all of which revolve around a group of connected speakers working together within a specific area while using voice commands. Google alleges that Sonos speakers use its technology when determining which speaker responds to the user.

Both lawsuits were filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California, where the ongoing legal fights between both companies have been playing out all year. Google also plans to file with the US International Trade Commission this week, where it plans to pursue an import ban on any infringing Sonos device. According to Bloomberg Law, those products include the Sonos One, One SL, Move, Roam, Roam SL, Five, Arc, Beam, Ray, and One.

As we've previously covered, the only real victims in this ongoing battle are the consumers. While Sonos and Google continue to punt a legal football back and forth — rather than one or both companies licensing these patents from each other — Google users, in particular, have faced a wide variety of missing features with their existing gadgets. After Sonos won one of its legal battles in January, Google immediately disabled group volume control for speakers while also requiring some users to download an additional app to update Nest devices.

Over the last few months, the list of affected devices and apps has grown exponentially. Most notably, Pixel phones in the US lost the ability to set up older Chromecasts, preventing anyone with a non-Google TV device from being able to move it to a new Wi-Fi network. Although Google could effectively solve these issues for users simply by licensing technology from Sonos, the company has continued to move forward with counter lawsuits, including those filed today.

A spokesperson for Google told The Verge that today's lawsuits are about the company defending its technology, specifically as Sonos "started an aggressive and misleading campaign against our products, at the expense of our shared customers." If Google does win any of its legal complaints — either those filed today or the planned ITC lawsuits planned for later this week — it's hard to see how anyone but Sonos users will really lose.