Review: Bose Portable Home Speaker – The easy-to-take multiroom Wi-Fi speaker

With this model, Bose is surfing on a new use: to also use in Bluetooth and anywhere, the Wi-Fi speaker that usually sits in the middle of his living room. However, are the two solutions reconcilable?

Bose couldn’t let Sonos rule the speaker market on its own. The brand from Framingham (Massachusetts) is reacting to the release of the Move, a model that can be used both in Wi-Fi in multiroom like a classic Sonos speaker, or in Bluetooth outside thanks to its battery. The Portable Home Speaker offers exactly the same service, but in a much more compact size.

When the Move displays more than 3 kg on the scale, the speaker from Bose barely exceeds the kilo. A first good point therefore for this model which offers a much more portable DNA than that of Sonos. Despite its small size, however, the autonomy of the Portable Home Speaker is greater. While Bose announces 12 hours of use in both Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, the 01net lab measured a performance of 18:08. In this little game, the Move had only achieved 13:12, a result that went all the same beyond the initial promise of 10 hours.

In lack of streaming services

In Bluetooth, the management of the speaker is classic and easy: you just have to pair it with any device to use the streaming service of your choice. In Wi-Fi, the uses are more limited since it is necessary to use the Bose Music application to control the speaker. It only offers three integrated streaming services: Amazon Music, Spotify and Deezer. For radios, we will use the TuneIn service. As you will have understood, if you have subscribed to Apple Music or if you want to use your Qobuz account elsewhere than on your hi-fi installation, you will have to go through Bluetooth.

With such a size, Bose understood that it was useless to fight against the Move, very powerful, even outside. For its Portable Home Speaker, the manufacturer has instead bet on 360-degree diffusion. Not stupid for a speaker that moves very easily and around which we can potentially settle.

Bose has thus chosen to use three passive radiators (mainly for the bass) and a single speaker. This is directed downwards onto a deflector which allows the signal to be distributed all around the speaker. The system is very efficient since wherever you are around the device, you actually get the same sound quality, without loss of frequencies.

Bass, still bass, still bass

Despite everything, we are once again cautious about the sound signature that Bose wanted to give to its Portable Home Speaker. It is undeniable that the three passive radiators are quite effective since the bass is once again extremely present, as we had already noticed on the Home Speaker 300 and 500 .

It will therefore obviously be necessary to get used to this sound signature clearly oriented towards the bass and low mids. A signature completely dedicated to a powerful listening to hip-hop or electronic music. For other styles, we will go our way.

We regret all the more that Bose did not endow this Portable Home Speaker with a little more power. It is indeed difficult to avoid distortion when you start to push it to more than half of its sound volume. If you are in a large room or outdoors – one of the precisely intended uses of this model – you quickly reach your limits.

Bose Portable Home Speaker – Specifications

Bose Portable Home Speaker – Conclusion