Smartphones these days have some pretty good speakers, but it’s always nice to have a Bluetooth speaker that may be portable, or may just sit on a table, to play music from your smartphone. It usually gets a good bit louder, and also offers up a better experience. There are literally tons of great speakers out there, and we’ve rounded up 10 of the best available.
JBL Flip 3 Portable Bluetooth Speaker
JBL, part of HARMAN, makes some great looking and sounding Bluetooth speakers and this is one of their cheaper models. The Flip 3 is a splashproof speaker, so it can get wet although it’s still a good idea to keep water away from it, and it offers up 360-degree sound. With the included 3000mAh battery, you can get around 10 hours of playback.
Buy the JBL Flip 3 Portable Bluetooth Speaker
Anker SoundCore Bluetooth Speaker
Anker isn’t really well-known for their audio quality, but their quality isn’t bad. It’s just not on par with companies like Sonos, Bose and Harman Kardon. The SoundCore Bluetooth speaker here from Anker is actually well known for its size, price and battery capacity. Anker promises 24 hours of playback out of this speaker, which is more than any other portable Bluetooth speaker on the market right now.
Buy the Anker SoundCore Bluetooth Speaker
Sonos PLAY:1
This is the cheapest speaker in Sonos lineup, and an easy way to get started in their ecosystem. The PLAY:1 isn’t the largest speaker in their lineup, but it does still provide some incredible sound. Sonos streams over WiFi instead of Bluetooth, but it made the list because it can still stream from your smartphone. The Sonos PLAY:1 comes in at under $200 and is almost an impulse buy at that price.
Bose SoundLink Color Bluetooth speaker II
The SoundLink Color has a few things going for it. Bose offers it in a few different colors, like black, red, blue and white. Additionally, it’s nice and compact making it portable, it has great battery life and incredible sound. That’s something you would expect from Bose anyways, so it’s nice to see that available in the SoundLink Color, their cheapest Portable Bluetooth Speaker.
Buy the Bose SoundLink Color Bluetooth Speaker II
Harman Kardon Aura Bluetooth Home Speaker
Definitely a unique looking Bluetooth speaker here from Harman Kardon. The Aura offers the type of sound you’d expect from Harman Kardon, and it’s actually a somewhat small speaker. It’s not quite portable, as there is no battery, but that leaves room for things like the 4.5-inch subwoofer which provides incredible sound to the user.
Buy the Harman Kardon Aura Bluetooth Home Speaker
Harman Kardon One
Unlike the Aura, above, the One from Harman Kardon is a portable speaker. This one is actually fairly small and sports a 2000mAh battery. That’s good enough for around 8 hours of continuous playback on the speaker. It does also still have that same great sound that Harman Kardon is known for.
JBL Pulse 2
How about a show to go with your music? That’s what you’ll get with the JBL Pulse 2. This one will pulse different colors along with the music that is playing. Like many other speakers in JBL’s lineup, it will also play music in 360-degrees, so you can hear it no matter where you in relation to the JBL Pulse 2.
Philips BT3500B/37 Wireless Portable Bluetooth Speaker
Philips offering here is a pretty nice one. This one is a portable speaker that looks great, but it also has NFC. This means that you’ll be able to pair it with your device by simply tapping it on the speaker. Making it super easy to pair a new smartphone or tablet with the speaker. Of course it does also have some pretty great battery life, around 8-10 hours per charge.
Buy the Philips BT3500B/37 Wireless Portable Bluetooth Speaker
UE MEGABOOM
UE has another speaker that does output sound in 360-degrees, allowing you to go ahead and fill up an entire room with sound. The MEGABOOM is a much louder speaker and it allows you to get a whole lot more bump to that bass. The MEGABOOM Has a fairly large battery, offering up to about 15 hours of playback. Finally, the UE MEGABOOM is waterproof, so you can take it over to the pool.
Amazon Echo
This speaker is a bit different from others on this list. This one is made by Amazon and has Alexa built in. For those that don’t know what Alexa is, it’s a personal assistant that Amazon has built. Alexa has thousands of skills, including the ability to order Domino’s for you, order an Uber to pick you up, read you the news and much more. Of course, Amazon Echo can also play music over Bluetooth, but it is not portable.