We review dozens of speakers each year here at PCMag, and we thoroughly test each one. The short story is that we listen to them. The long story is a bit more complicated. This is how we test speakers.
Testing Speaker Connectivity
We test audio devices using their primary means of connection. If a product is marketed as a Bluetooth speaker, we evaluate it based on how it sounds over a Bluetooth connection and note the Bluetooth codecs it supports. If it suffers from Bluetooth-related compression artifacts that disappear with a 3.5mm auxiliary connection, we’ll let you know.
If it’s a Wi-Fi speaker, we test it over Wi-Fi using its main streaming platform, like Apple AirPlay, Google Cast, or Sonos.
Even when a wireless connection is the preferred choice, we also check what other options are available (3.5mm, HDMI, optical, RCA, USB-C, etc.) so you know what fallback options you have.
How We Test Bass
Especially for portable and wireless speakers, low-end is usually the biggest audio shortcoming. For example, if a speaker is small and battery-powered, it can’t physically produce deep sound in the 20Hz to 60Hz range. Even if it’s larger and plugged in, like a soundbar for your TV, it probably can’t reach very low into the bass region without a separate subwoofer. Speakers that lack the capability to hit deep sub-bass tones generally either don’t try or try and distort at higher volumes, causing a harsh crackling sound and potentially damaging the drivers.
Edifier MR5 (Credit: Mark Knapp)
To evaluate deep low-end reproduction, we use a test track with deep bass synth and kick drum hits, like The Knife’s “Silent Shout.” The Roland TR-808-style bass kick in the song is a rite of passage through which all speakers and headphones must endure, and only the strong ones can reproduce it without crunchy, unpleasant distortion as we crank the volume up. Some speakers use digital signal processing (DSP) to heavily process the song and filter out the deep low end, which is its own issue.
Listening to Different Genres
Besides the bass test, we cycle through multiple songs in the classical, dance, jazz, metal, and rock genres to get a better idea of how the speaker handles each one. Every genre of music tends to have its own emphasized instruments and frequency ranges, like the low rumble of an upright bass on a Miles Davis recording or the deep-but-crisp-edged baritone vocals on a Bill Callahan track.
LG XBoom Bounce (Credit: Mark Knapp)
Depending on a speaker’s response across the entire audio spectrum (usually between 20Hz and 20kHz), a given model might make a synth-heavy dance track sound amazing, but classical and jazz music end up sounding muddled or even too bright, just to give one possible example. Similarly, even though a speaker might capture the guitar riffs and screeching vocals of heavy metal well, it might lack enough low-end force or speed to faithfully reproduce bass-heavy funk songs.
Songs can vary heavily in balance based on how they were mixed, so we don’t simply randomly shuffle through tracks, either. The songs we play are ones our reviewers have heard hundreds of times across a multitude of different speakers and headphones, including high-end models, so we know exactly how they should sound and exactly what a given speaker or pair of headphones might be reproducing well or poorly.
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Testing Audio for Movies and TV
For soundbars, we need to go beyond music to get a good sense of their performance. We listen to movie content with prominent soundtracks, powerful sound effects, and plenty of dialogue. This lets us determine how wide a sound field the soundbar can produce and whether any spatial audio or surround sound features function well. It also demonstrates how well any voice-enhancing modes sound and how much they can make the couch shake during action scenes.
Sonos Arc Ultra (Credit: Christian de Looper)
Voice Assistants
Since there are so many smart speakers now available, we also consider what, if any, voice assistants a speaker might have and how well they work. Whether it’s a first-party speaker like an Amazon Echo, Apple HomePod, or Google Nest Audio, or a third-party speaker that incorporates Amazon Alexa or Google Assistant, the features they enable also factor into our overall score.
With that in mind, visit our guides to the best wireless speakers, the best computer speakers, and the best cheap speakers for more tips on how to buy the right speakers for you.
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About Will Greenwald
Lead Analyst, Consumer Electronics
