For this month’s episode of top tech, we are checking out some of the best Bluetooth speakers under $100. I know there are countless Bluetooth speakers that probably could have made this list, but I chose these based on their features, their build quality, how they sound and the company behind them and I feel like I have a pretty good mix and range of prices too. If you’re interested in learning more about any of these speakers, or picking one up for yourself, I’ll have links to everything down below in the video description. And as always, if you’d like to win one of these speakers, I will be giving one away. All you have to do is of course be subscribed to the channel and leave a comment down below letting me know what you might want. Here are all of the winners from the October Top Tech video as well as the top tech under $5 and $10 videos, so if you see your comment here, be sure check your messages to claim your prize.
Creative Halo (Amazon Link)
Sony XB20 (Amazon Link)
iHome iBT77 (Amazon Link)
JBL Flip 4 (Amazon Link)
UE Wonderboom (Amazon Link)
And also, I know the most important factor in choosing any Bluetooth speaker is how they sound, so I went ahead and put together some audio samples of all of the Bluetooth speakers at the very end of the video so you guys can get an idea of how they all sound. If that’s really all you’re into, you can skip over my annoying voice and head to the last couple minutes of the video to check that out.
So with all that out of the way, let’s take a look at the first speaker on the list which is the Creative Halo. This is a speaker I actually did a dedicated video on a while back, and I’ve liked it so much over the last couple months that I just had to include on this list as well. The halo right now retails for $69 bucks and I feel like that’s an awesome price considering what you’re getting here. I’d call it a medium sized portable speaker with a really unique design featuring a mirror finish, LED light show and the housing covered in what I would best describe as a cloth material that feels nice and high quality. Up top you’ve got all of your buttons and controls, you can play and pause music, adjust the volume, take calls and adjust the led lights which I’ll talk more about in a second. The speaker itself like I mentioned has a nice size and weight to it, it feels super sturdy but the little loop there makes it easy to carry around and it is definitely portable enough to fit in a bag or backpack no problem. Of course, one of the main reasons you might get the Halo over something else is for it’s really unique led lights that show off when music is playing. There are a whole bunch of light show modes you can flip through just using the button on the speaker, but if you want to take it to the next level, creative offers an app for iOS and Android that lets you customize every aspect of the lights. You can flip through the different modes, but you can also adjust the colors that are featured, you get a color wheel you can slide through which Creative says supports 16.8 million colors, so you can basically get the exact look and color combinations you want.
Creative is a brand that’s been in the audio game for a long time now and I think they have a really solid product with the Halo. The speaker looks great, it sounds great, it’ll last up to 8 hours, you get LED lights if you’re into that, and while it isn’t necessarily a rugged outdoor type speaker, it is an all around great product and honestly at $69 I think this is probably the best value Bluetooth speaker on the list considering how much it offers.
Nest up on the list is a speaker with a little less light and a lot more bass, this is the Sony XB20, the XB I’m gunna say stand for extra bass because that sort of makes sense. This speaker right now is on sale for $30 off, also $69 and coming from a brand like Sony, whatever the price you know you’re getting a solid product. Up top you’ve got all the necessary controls to play and pause music, take a phone call and also of course boost the bass at the press of a button, and I gotta say with the extra bass enabled you really notice the difference. The speaker gets bass heavy to the point where it’s almost vibrating on the table and I think Sony is a brand that does extra bass really well, it isn’t distorted or obnoxious it just adds an additional unique element to the music.
As far as the lights go on this guy, there is an all that goes along with the speaker and 3 modes to adjust the lights so they aren’t constantly blinking, but I’d say the all is more useful if you’re tying to connect a couple speakers together at once. The XB20 is also IPX5 water resistant so it’ll handle an accidental splash, and it gets up to 12 hours of playback time which is definitely on the higher end for a speaker of this size.
Our number 3 speaker is another one I’ve mentioned in other videos before, this is the ihome ibt77 and it’s probably the most simplistic speaker on the list at least as far as features and functionality, maybe not so much in the design department. The outside is more of that rugged cloth-like material that makes the speaker grippy and fairly tough, it’s about the size of a coffee cup I’d say so it’s very portable and around back you’ve got all the buttons and ports. It’s IP65 dust and water resistant so it’ll definitely be able to handle the outdoors, it can get up to 16 hours on a single charge which is pretty crazy, and for $50 the price is definitely right for this speaker too
Next up we have probably one of the most popular Bluetooth speakers of the year, this is the JBL flip 4. JBL really has been I think the top brand as far as Bluetooth speakers go over the last few years and it’s really easy to see why. The Flip is a super rugged and compact speaker that looks great, that sounds great and even though it’s just a penny shy of $100 I think if you want the best of the best, this is what you should go with. Around back along the rubber housing you’ve got a couple buttons along with a flap covering the ports that ensures the flip remains water resistant with an IPX7 rating, so it is definitely an outdoor type of speaker. You’ve got a few more buttons up front for volume and music control and just like a lot of the other speakers, JBL also has an app to go with it. You can connect multiple speakers together at once for simultaneous or stereo playback, and can even have the speaker act as an extension of Siri from your iPhone if you’d like. Like I said, for $99 this is definitely the peak of the budget here, but considering that this is one of the highest rated Bluetooth speakers on Amazon and Best Buy, I don’t think anyone would be disappointed if they picked this up.
And last but not least, we’ve got the tiny but mighty UE wonderboom and this is the speaker I was most impressed with out of all of them. To start off, this is definitely the smallest and most portable of them all. With the loop on this thing, you could clip it on to a backpack or bag if you wanted to and it’s small size really only leaves enough room for the power button and some big huge volume controls that act more like a design cue than anything I think, it’s a super rugged outdoor speaker with water resistance and 10 hours of battery life, but holy crap is thing loud. This speaker fills up a room at like 60% volume no problem and could probably single handedly throw a house party on its own, it is definitely the loudest speaker of the group and if you’re looking for a small, portable and rugged speaker that’ll blow out some windows, this is the speaker for you.
