Probably not for everyone, but really great if you have a use for it.
I bought this speaker because the speakers on my Nothing Phone 3 are not great, and my wife and I had gotten in the habit of continuing listening to the music of my alarm that goes off in the mornings. We don’t need something super loud, just something a little richer than the fairly pathetic sounds coming out of my Nothing Phone. And seriously, the speakers on it are pretty bad. I actually returned my first phone thinking it was defective, but the second one is basically identical. Oh well, I like the phone otherwise. Anyway, I thought this would be a nice option as an overnight wireless charger as well to solve my problem. Set it on my phone, let it charge overnight, and have a better speaker for music in the morning. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work to charge my Nothing Phone 3. I don’t know why. It starts to charge, then after a minute, just stops. I tried several different cables and charging bricks, but none of them work. I tested it on my wife’s Pixel 7 though and it charges her phone fine, so it’s not necessarily a fault of the MagBeat. I don’t know what it is. Other wireless chargers work fine on my Nothing Phone, so who knows. Just be warned, if you are one of the approximately 17 people who bought a Nothing Phone 3, the wireless charging probably won’t work for you. So, with half the point of buying this not working, I almost returned it the next day. It still worked for the actual listening to music in the mornings though, so I decided I’d give it a shot for that, and to see if there were any other uses I’d want it for. Turns out I use it quite a bit. Now, here’s the deal, I’m not going to post any videos playing audio of this thing compared to any of the dozen other devices I have in the house that produce audio to some degree or another. It’s not going to translate well from this speaker, to whatever mic I use to record the video, then to whatever speaker you use to listen to it with. Who does that help? I think the better thing to go over with this type of speaker is actual use cases and how it’s good for those things over other speakers. But, if you want some comparisons, it’s better than any cell phone speaker you’re going to compare it to, richer, deeper, louder. It is no where near as loud or rich as my Edifier M60 speakers (which, by the way, amazing speakers, and worth every of the pennies of the person who bought it for me for my birthday). It’s not going to give you the audio quality of desktop speakers, like my Pebbles. And it’s certainly not as nice as listening to headphones or a decent pair of earbuds like my Anker Space A40s. It gets about as loud as my Google Minis, though of course doesn’t have the smart speaker features. Ok, so what is it good for then? If it’s not as good as a lot of other options, why buy it? And why did I decide to keep it? Is this just a result of the influence of rampant consumerism in America that I’ve fallen into? A little, yeah, but also, I quite like my new toy and have been having a lot of fun with it. Here’s how I’ve been using it to justify its honestly not super high cost. Aside from an upgrade for music in the mornings that is still not too loud, I’ve found this to work very well for when I’m active and moving around the house and wanting to listen to music, but also want to be able to listen for my surroundings. I’ve got several kids, and like to keep an ear out for them when I’m doing things like cleaning the house. I’ve tried to use my Anker earbuds in transparency mode in the past for this, and they work ok for it, but they’re still a bit distracting. And, honestly, no earbuds are super comfortable for long periods of time, so sometimes I’ll just switch to the MagBeat to give my ears a break, and still remain portable. If I’m at my desk, I’m listening to my speakers there usually. If I’m in my living room, that’s where my M60s are and I’m definitely listening to those. But if I’m moving around, the MagBeat is great. My kids also play outside a lot, and I’ll sometimes sit in a camping chair in the front yard to keep an eye on the younger ones and make sure they’re only causing a minimal amount of chaos in the neighborhood. Again, I don’t want earbuds in, but I also don’t want to sit there and be too bored. The MagBeat is once again great here. It’s not obnoxiously loud where it’s going to disturb the neighborhood. It is loud enough and of good enough quality that I’ll still enjoy it. Now, how I do this is probably a bit, odd, and I don’t think I recommend you do it like this. But I’ve found the magnet on the MagBeat, in combination with the magnet on my case, is strong enough to go through the outer layer of my pants pocket. So when I want to walk around with my MagBeat playing music or listening to a podcast, I just stick it on the outside of my pocket instead of letting my pocket muffle the sound, or needing to hold it or find somewhere else to stick it. The fabric obviously weakens the magnetic hold, and you can easily knock it off if you bump into something. With heavier fabric like jeans, any quick jerking motions will do it too. But, I’ve found as long as I’m aware of it, it works really well just to sit there on the outside of my pocket. I have dropped it a few times this way, and definitely more when wearing thicker jeans than with some of my thinner shorts, but so far the durability has been solid and other than a few scratches, it still sounds great and everything functions perfectly. TLDR: It’s a great speaker for its size, but don’t expect it to replace a larger, more expensive speaker. It shines if you have a niche use for it that larger speakers can’t fill. Read more
