If you have a Sonnet, the short answer is: very hard to use, because the web app it needs appears to be gone. If you need something that actually works today, Nelos is a modern, actively maintained app built on the same good idea Sonnet had.
"Does it still work" bundles several questions together. Take them apart.
An intact Sonnet will most likely still power on and charge - it's a radio with a battery. But "powers on" is not the same as "can be used to communicate". A radio does nothing on its own; it needs software to drive it and something at the other end to talk to.
This is the most important blocker. Sonnet had no ordinary installed app - you connected your phone to the device's Wi-Fi access point and opened a web app at app.sonnetlabs.com in a browser. As of this research (September 2026), the domains sonnetlabs.com and app.sonnetlabs.com do not resolve in DNS. If the interface for operating the device relies on that server, and the server is gone, then the normal way to control a Sonnet is gone with it.
Some firmware versions served the interface from the device itself (a local address). Early users hit certificate warnings and lost messages on disconnection even when everything was new. How well a local interface still behaves in a current browser and OS is not publicly documented, so this article does not claim either way.
Because the interface ran in a browser rather than as a native app, it is less exposed to iOS/Android updates - but only if the rest of the chain works. With the app server gone and documentation missing, this is an open question.
A single Sonnet does nothing - it needs other Sonnet devices nearby to form a network. There was never a large installed base of Sonnet devices; the number that shipped was small. And reports from early recipients said the mesh functions did not work even on new hardware. Sonnet also never interoperated with anything else - it only talked to Sonnet.
There is no public evidence of active support. The official website no longer resolves (see What Happened to Sonnet Mesh?).
As a practical group-communication tool today, a Sonnet is very hard to use: the interface/service side appears to be gone, the mesh was hard to get working from the start, and the device is not compatible with anything else. If you need the capability Sonnet promised, Nelos is a finished, actively maintained app that delivers it now - group chat, offline maps, trackers and a Need Help button, on hardware that's actually sold today. If you have working Sonnet units and can test them yourself, your experience may differ - but here is the known versus the unknown:
If what you need is the capability Sonnet promised, the Sonnet off-grid communicator concept, done today and Sonnet Mesh Alternatives cover what achieves something similar now. The underlying technology is in What Is a LoRa Mesh Radio?
Nelos brings group messaging, location sharing, and a shared group map with location updates to LoRa mesh — with no cell service, no server, and no account.
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