#ANKER FLARE 2 VS JBL FLIP 5 FULL#
#ANKER FLARE 2 VS JBL FLIP 5 PORTABLE#
#ANKER FLARE 2 VS JBL FLIP 5 PLUS#

Input jacks and level controls for a guitar and microphone make this speaker a great choice for casual DJing and musical performances, too. Although it maxed out at 1.1 decibels less volume than the Hyperboom in our tests, it sounded fuller and a little clearer when cranked up. At 23.8 pounds and 22¾ inches high, it plays loud, but it sounds as smooth and refined as many of the best wireless speakers.

#ANKER FLARE 2 VS JBL FLIP 5 PORTABLE#

If you want yard-filling volume with plenty of bass: The JBL PartyBox 110 is one of our favorites (along with the Ultimate Ears Hyperboom) among the growing class of portable Bluetooth speakers designed to power large parties. As you can read in our first look at the Roam, the two downsides are a short battery life (about six hours, depending on how you use the speaker) and a high price. But thanks in part to its TruePlay technology, which automatically optimizes the sound for the space you’re in, it sounds much smoother and more natural than any small Bluetooth speaker (and most large Bluetooth speakers) we’ve tried. It’s about the same size as the Tribit XSound Go and plays only 1 decibel louder. It also works as a smart speaker, with built-in support for both Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant, and it serves as a Bluetooth interface for a Sonos system-so you can stream content from a Bluetooth source to the Roam, and that content can stream to your Sonos S2 system. It offers Wi-Fi support and can join a Sonos S2 multiroom speaker system (it’s not compatible with the older S1 operating system), automatically reconnecting to your Wi-Fi network when you bring it home from an outing. If you want smart-speaker functions or a speaker that works with a Sonos system: The Sonos Roam is technically a portable Bluetooth speaker, with a small, travel-friendly, IP67-rated design-but it’s so much more.

#ANKER FLARE 2 VS JBL FLIP 5 PLUS#

If you don’t like the sound with Adaptive EQ, the app has a five-band equalizer plus Bass Jump, Game/Cinema, and Podcast modes.

(Of course, many listeners prefer a bassier sound.) Outdoors, Adaptive EQ seemed to work perfectly.

#ANKER FLARE 2 VS JBL FLIP 5 FULL#

In our tests indoors, Adaptive EQ allowed a little too much bass to sneak through, and the full bass tended to obscure some of the treble, so acoustic guitars had less twang and cymbals less ping. The Hyperboom also incorporates an Adaptive EQ feature, which is said to adapt the speaker’s sound automatically to the acoustics of the surroundings. With two tweeters (to reproduce the higher-frequency sounds), two woofers (for the lower-frequency sounds), and two passive radiators (to further help with bass reproduction), it’s like two good stereo speakers in one box-in fact, I noted that it had the kind of clear, robust sound I’d heard from the ELAC Debut 2.0 B6.2, a pick in our best surround-sound speakers for most people guide, but rarely in a Bluetooth speaker. In Wirecutter reader polls and comments we’ve read, every person has seemed to have their own opinion as to which (if any) Bluetooth speaker features are the most important, so we don’t require any particular features when picking models to test.įrom a sonic standpoint, the Hyperboom is the most technically sophisticated Bluetooth speaker we’ve encountered. These extras include speakerphone capability, pairing (the ability to play the same material through two Bluetooth speakers at once), built-in lighting, and even integrated bottle openers.

Special features: Bluetooth speakers offer all sorts of features beyond the ability to play audio from Bluetooth-sourced devices.

Playback controls: Because you can control the playback from your Bluetooth source device (usually a phone or tablet), we don’t require the speaker itself to have playback controls, but it’s a convenient plus.

Bluetooth speakers are often available for as little as $5, but we’ve never found such an inexpensive model to sound good enough to bother using-especially when the speakers built into today’s better phones can play loud enough for light listening.

Price: Even though we would like to test every type of portable Bluetooth speaker, we set a bottom price of $15.

Although we don’t limit our testing to waterproof speakers, we do give preference in our judging to speakers with an Ingress Protection (IP) rating, which tells you exactly how waterproof and dustproof a speaker is.

Ruggedness and waterproof design: We give priority to speakers that are built to survive the knocks and bumps of travel.

For our top pick, we prioritize speakers that are compact and easy to toss into a backpack, beach bag, or suitcase-yet still produce great sound.

Portability and battery life: Although any Bluetooth speaker can be lugged around, we focus on models that have rechargeable batteries and are designed to take a trip to the beach or the park with no hassle.

Anker flare 2 vs jbl flip 5