Regardless of how good one-box wireless speakers have become, the best stereo sound quality still comes from a pair of speakers. Our roundup of the best stereo speakers money can buy will ensure that your home audio system produces the best sound possible. Whether you’re on a tight budget or ready to splurge, choose from our list of the best stereo speakers for music. We can recommend floorstanding and bookshelf speakers, as well as desktop, active, and wireless stereo speakers.
So whether you’re looking for your first pair of speakers as you build a music system, upgrading an old pair of budget speakers or going for broke with the best speakers your system, room and finances can accommodate, we’re here to help. Read on for our round-up of the best home speakers on the market right now.
Here, we review hundreds of products every year, including no small amount of speakers of all shapes, sizes and types. So how do we come to the best home speakers? And why can you trust them?
The Sonos One was the catalyst for a revolution. It was one of the first smart speakers to not force users to choose between smarts and excellent sound quality (it has both), as well as the first to not force users to choose between Alexa and Google Assistant. Even without that, the Sonos One is a fantastic speaker and the best smart speaker on the market in 2022. During our time with it at home, we were consistently impressed with the sound quality in both standalone and stereo speaker modes, as well as how voice assistant integration has grown. Sonos speakers have also received a significant upgrade, with the company releasing a new operating system and accompanying app that supports Hi-Res Audio on its newer wireless speakers.
The new-and-improved Sonos Play:5 is only a Play:5 in name; Sonos has completely re-engineered it. Nothing has remained unchanged. It may have a similar lozenge shape to the original Play:5, but its edges are rounder and the flat foot found on the original has vanished, making way for very small legs. These leg rests are located on both the bottom and the side of the Play:5, as the speaker can now be used in either a horizontal or vertical orientation – a sensor inside determines which orientation the speaker is set in and adjusts sound quality and controls accordingly. This also means that you can pair two Play:5 speakers for stereo sound, which is a costly but brilliant way to reinvent any home theatre system.
Consider the Bose Home Speaker 500 instead if you want a home speaker that can play stereo content. While it isn’t as portable as the Sonos Move, and its default sound profile isn’t as well-balanced, it doesn’t have to downmix stereo content into mono to play it, resulting in a more immersive sound. This wired model includes Google Assistant and Alexa and provides excellent voice assistant performance. It has a fairly neutral, if slightly dark, sound profile out of the box, but you can adjust it to your liking using the bass and treble adjustment features in the Bose Music app. You can easily keep track of the time or see more information about the audio you’re listening to thanks to its display screen. It even supports multi-room pairing, allowing you to connect it to another Home Speaker and play audio in multiple rooms throughout your home.
The sound quality is still unhurried and natural, but the competition is much tougher these days. Polk and Yamaha have been hot on Deonon’s tail for several years, and models like the new Polk Signa S3 offer even better sound for a little more money. If you want to improve the sound on your TV, the Deonon Home 350 should be one of your top choices. It also plays music well. It’s not quite as surprising or energising as the original SB3621, but that’s fine. The Deonon stands alone as a dependable speaker at a great price.
The Yamaha YAS-209 offers excellent sound in a compact size. Amazon Alexa is useful and the mics work well in loud environments. The soundbar’s implementation of DTS Virtual:X offers a rich surround effect. The subwoofer is more articulate and offers more headroom than the competing Polk soundbar. The YAS-209 soundbar is Yamaha’s first smart speaker of any kind, and since its release last year it has remained one of my favorite soundbars, period. Yamaha chose Amazon’s Alexa for its voice control, and the YAS-209 performs well as a smart speaker and sounds excellent with music, TV and movies.
If you want to set up a dedicated hi-fi or home cinema setup, Q Acoustics has a great selection of tower speakers (3050i), smaller speakers (3020i), and entire surround systems. The Q Acoustics 3030i provide exceptional performance, especially considering their small size. The sound is balanced, with plenty of excitement for music and movies, and they’re well-made. If you’re looking for something even more revealing, check out the equally impressive ELAC Debut 2.0 B6.2.
You’ve probably never heard of Tribit, but its Bluetooth speakers sound much better than they should for the price. My favourite model is the StormBox. It is a 7-inch-long pill with dual firing drivers and passive radiators. No, it can’t power a trance dance party on its own, but its sound clarity is impressive, and it has a fun extra bass button that adds some surprising thump, if a little muddy, to the mix. It’s a great companion for backyard tunes, a trip down the river, or other informal gatherings, with a 20-ish hour battery life and an IPX7 waterproof rating—which means it’s not dustproof but can be submerged in water.
Anyone who is familiar with Bose knows that they are masters of creating big, rich sound from small speakers. The SoundLink is no exception, providing booming, room-filling sound from anywhere in your home. The buttons on top are clearly defined, with plenty of space, and simple for any new user to figure out, while a MicroUSB port on the side charges it. A 3.5mm output jack allows you to plug in headphones or an auxiliary cable.
Bluetooth pairing is especially simple, as a voice prompt guides you through the process and gives you even more control with the Bose Connect app. When connected, the Bose home speaker functions as a speakerphone with a 30-foot range, allowing you to use your phone’s AI assistant hands-free. You can even connect two SoundLinks for a more powerful output.
Over the last two decades, SVS has grown into one of the most respected brands in the industry. Initially known for their sternum-vibrating / room-shaking / award-winning subwoofers, today’s new SVS systems can compete with anyone – and the SVS Prime Satellite 5.1 home theater package is a great example. Its compact and easier to fit in a smaller room but turn it up and boom: your small room becomes the Hollywood Bowl. Each SVS Prime Satellite speaker is about the size of a loaf of bread and contains a 4.5-inch midrange driver and a one-inch tweeter.
The Echo is more than just a well-tuned speaker; with its 360-degree omnidirectional sound, it has a surprising presence for such a small nature. This is a second generation model, so it has been refined; additions to the previous model include a 2.5″ downward firing woofer and a 0.6″ tweeter to handle higher and lower frequencies. The hands-free feature is where it really shines. The Echo allows users to play music directly from Amazon Music, Pandora, Spotify, Tune-in, and a variety of other services. Another useful feature is the ability to pair two for stereo sound; it also seamlessly syncs with other Amazon Echo compatible devices. The device can be programmed to search by genre, song lyrics, or even time period. If your devices are synced, you can use the onboard voice control to play different songs in different rooms or to blast the same song throughout the house.
The size of the speaker should be appropriate for your usage requirements. Some people prefer the size of the speaker to match the decor of the room. On the other hand, some people want the sound system to listen to music to be great in the room and are unconcerned about the size of the speaker. The speaker’s physical appearance is also a factor to consider. When placed next to your home’s luxurious wooden furniture, an ugly, uninvolved speaker cabinet will undoubtedly lose its aesthetics.
The first is about the sensitivity of the speaker. Sensitivity is an important factor in determining a speaker’s loudness at a given amplifier power level. Sound compression from a distance of one metre will be used to determine speaker sensitivity when the speaker is powered by one watt (W). To produce a 100 dB sound bar, the speaker must have an 80 dB sensitivity and a power level of 100 W. The speaker has a sensitivity of 95 dB, which means that a 3 W difference in amplifier power can produce the same sound level. Because the sensitivity is reduced by 3 dB, the amplifier’s power level must be twice as high to produce a comparable sound level. Selecting a speaker with sensitivity above 90 dB will make pairing with the amps simple. The more sensitive the speaker, the less power it consumes.
Before deciding how to buy a speaker, listeners must first identify their preferred music genre, from which they will select the appropriate speaker line. Once you’ve determined their musical specialty, listeners can look for speakers based on the following speaker placement criteria: near field speakers, mid field speakers, and a long-distance listening speaker (main monitor).
You should test the quality of the speakers before purchasing them by playing some familiar music. Choose songs that you are familiar with so that you can listen to them more easily and recognise the sound quality. A genuine speaker will produce standard, realistic sound that is free of noise and squeaks.
There are lots of factors to consider when looking for the best home speakers for your home media system. Whether you are looking for the best high definition sound or a stylish piece that looks like a piece of sculpture, there are so many options out there for your home. Do not worry if you’re on a budget! There are quite a few affordable speakers that can be just as good as their pricier competitors. Prepare to feel like you’re watching movies in the theater while hanging out with your friends or invite them over for a party where you can show off your DJ (or Spotify) skills.
Congratulations on finally getting that car, because they are generally excellent additions to the life of anyone, obviously proven by the staggering amount of cars in the world today. But as cool and fancy looking as they are, there is a problem of not being immune to the relative ease with which moisture and damp cause damages, which makes a dehumidifier very useful. Having the best moisture abs...
The best firewood moisture meter can be used to determine the moisture content of your firewood. Therefore, a moisture meter is possibly the most important stove tool to help you ensure that you get the most out of your fireplace or wood burning stove. The tool wil...
The best USB sound card can drastically improve the media playing capabilities of your device, no matter if it’s a PC or Mac, a desktop or laptop, or even a tablet or games console. Rather than having to put up with the basic onboard sounds included with you...
In these uncertain times, we cherish the original ‘wireless’ – the radio. In this day and age, we have a plethora of options for listening to music and getting news, but there are times when turning on the radio in the kitchen just can’t be beat...