Wireless sound for the home is nothing new, but the past few years have seen an increase in speakers using Wi-Fi streaming as an alternative to Bluetooth. The ability to turn music into a multi-room environment is one of the biggest features that Wi-Fi sells, but almost all Wi-Fi speakers also provide voice control via a voice assistant including Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant and Apple’s Siri.
It’s a challenge to find a budget speaker that does not have microphones on board, but they all have microphone switches or you can opt for a ‘stupid’ speaker. Sonos One SL, if you have privacy considerations. Keep reading for the best Wi-Fi speakers for your needs – there’s a short buying guide at the bottom of the page if you have additional questions and don’t miss them. CNET’s Guide to the Best Smart Speakers.
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For $ 100, there are some smart speakers to choose from, such as the Amazon Echo and the Google Home, but if you want an affordable, musical speaker, this is the Sonos range from Ikea. The Wi-Fi Symphonic Bookshelf smart speaker looks stylish and pulls well ahead of the Echo in terms of sound quality after calibration. The Sonos speaker is not going to get your party going, but this ‘dumb’ book rack speaker is perfect for background music or children’s bedrooms. Read our Ikea Symphonic WiFi Speaker Review from the bookshelf.
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The Sonos One is less than $ 200 and with both Alexa and Google Assistant as well as excellent sound quality the get smart speaker and will like any music fan. Connect it to another Sonos One and you’ve got a high quality flexible speaker system that responds to voice commands for less than the price of the Play: 5.
Look at this:
Sonos One is the best sounding speaker you can …
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The problem with most WiFi speakers is that they do not fit in with the rest of your decor. They are boxy and usually black. The Ikea Sonos speaker literally thinks outside the box and delivers a Sonos compatible lamp that sounds better at the price than most speakers. This is not smart, but the device responds to Siri, Google Assistant and Alexa commands. Read our Ikea Symphonic table lamp with WiFi speaker overview.
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The Apple HomePod, now priced at $ 50 from its original price of $ 350, is much more competitive with other Wi-Fi and multiroom speakers. It is one of the best sound-all-in-one wireless speakers with lots of space and deep bass. Read our Apple HomePod review.
If you want a portable and waterproof wireless speaker model, the Sonos Move offers excellent sound in a very large box. Read our Sonos Move review.
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Featuring a compact bar and excellent sound, the Polk MagniFi offers just about everything you need in a streaming TV speaker, including the built-in Chromecast. We chose the MagniFi over the Yamaha YAS-209 because it offers a robust multi-room system, but if you want a built-in Alexa, the Yamaha is an excellent speaker. Read our Polk MagniFi Mini review.
Bluetooth versus Wi-Fi
Wi-Fi offers the same basic convenience as Bluetooth: using your phone’s WiFi connection to play music through an external speaker or sound system. Just like speakers that use Bluetooth connectivity, it can work with a subscription music service app like Spotify (via Spotify Connect) of Apple Music, a radio service like Pandora or TuneIn, or your own music collection. Here are the top reasons to get a streaming Wi-Fi speaker:
- Due to its higher bandwidth, a Wi-Fi speaker sounds better than a Bluetooth speaker.
- Wi-Fi has a better range.
- Wi-Fi does not take over the audio channel of your phone – so you can make calls without interrupting the song, for example.
- It also works great for multi-room audio, allowing multiple home speakers to be played via your Wi-Fi network, all controlled by a single phone application.
Apple vs Sonos vs Google: the best (and worst) Wi-Fi speakers
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What are the key multiroom standards?
When you buy a Wi-Fi speaker, you are also investing in an ecosystem – a family of products and applications that work together but do not usually work with other ecosystems. Here’s a look at the major Wi-Fi ecosystems out there.
- Sonos: It’s quite expensive and a bit exclusive, but Sonos still offers some of the best hardware available. The company is moving away from the megalithic single app in favor of supporting third-party music services (Spotify Connect, Apple AirPlay 2). Considering the demanding sound quality and the bomb-proof build, Sonos is still the to get premium Wi-Fi system. The release of Ikea Symphony Series also makes the system more affordable.
- Apple AirPlay / AirPlay 2: The range of Apple’s AirPlay 2 will continue grows with its music streaming service – with the most intriguing feature being multiroom – but there are plenty of speakers out there that still support the original AirPlay. Ideal for iPhone ($ 599 by Apple) users.
- Chromecast ($ 15 on eBay) built-in: For the cost of access and ease of use and setup, the built-in Chromecast is our current favorite Wi-Fi music system. There are no new apps to learn – just press the Cast button in an existing, compatible app, and play music for the speaker (s) of your choice.
- DTS Play-Fi: This WiFi speaker ecosystem may offer the most manufacturers, but the number of hardware releases in the last 12 months has been fairly sporadic. Meanwhile, official partners such as Polk and Klipsch have chosen to release new Chromecast built-in speakers instead. The company will soon expand to TV and smart home with applications for Android TV and others.
Now that Chromecast Audio is discontinued, the $ 30 Chromecast dongle for Chromecast only will stream your audio
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There’s also Amazon’s Multi Room Music. The speaker market is run by Amazon’s family of Echo speakers which combines wireless audio with voice control and home automation. MRM is slow to rise, and the only non-Amazon product that supports it is the Polk command bar.
There are a number of other Wi-Fi systems, some are open and others specific to the single manufacturer. These include: Yamaha MusicCast, Denon HEOS, Bowers and Wilkins Formation, Bose Music and Bluesound. There are many systems that have largely been abandoned or replaced, whether in favor of a newer version or competition of more popular protocols. These include All-Play, LG MusicFlow and Samsung Multi-Room.
For example, if you want to play a song in ‘house party mode’, where it is blown simultaneously through several speakers in the house, all the speakers must share the same ecosystem. For Sonos and other proprietary systems, all speakers must be Sonos (or connected to a Sonos device). For Chromecast, all the speakers, regardless of brand, must be Chromecast compatible. And so on.
Most WiFi speaker products support streaming services like Pandora and Spotify, but first check to be sure. Do you store music in iTunes, Google Play Music or Amazon Music? It goes well with a Sonos (for example), but other products offer less than perfect support.