JBL Authentics 300 review: A bilingual portable smart speaker

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Pros

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Our Verdict

The JBL Authentics 300 is unparalleled among smart speakers for its ability to respond to “Alexa” and “Hey Google” voice commands interchangeably. It’s also a great-sounding portable speaker that successfully merges yesterday, today, and tomorrow.

Price When Reviewed

$449.99

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I’ve been enjoying a Back to the Future adventure with the JBL Authentics 300, the only truly portable in the maker’s new three-model, Bluetooth and Wi-Fi-streaming smart speaker line. This one can operate on either battery or AC power.

Where most smart speakers serve only one master—Alexa, Google Assistant, or in the case of Apple’s speakers, Siri—the Authentics line responds to the “Alexa” and “Hey Google” wake words interchangeably.

Design and build quality

Like its AC-powered stablemates (you should also read TechHive’s JBL Authentics 500 review), the $450 JBL Authentics 300 boasts a distinctively retro enclosure wrapped in chocolate-brown faux leather with pale gold-tinted aluminum trim. A charcoal Quadrex foam grill in front of its active drivers evokes the classic JBL L-100 studio monitor from the 1970s.

It’s a hefty box, weighing 11 pounds and measuring 8 x 13 x 7 inches (20x33x18 cm) (HxWxD), but a well-balanced handle makes this speaker easy to take with you.

Jonathan Takiff/Foundry

Dials on top of the speaker control treble, bass, and volume levels, and the last one toggles play/pause when you press it. A ring of white light surrounding the dials advances/recedes as you spin them, lending a modern touch to the old-school experience. The cute rattle sound the speaker’s power button makes when it connects to the online world is also entertaining (be patient—it takes a few seconds).

You can program the heart-labeled “Moment” button (you can see it beneath the Bluetooth-pairing and power buttons in the photo below) to summon your favorite playlist or internet radio station. To start an instant party, I’ve assigned the ever exotic and festive Allzic Radio Africa to it. (Give that station a shot!)

Jonathan Takiff/Foundry

A mic-mute button on the back of the speaker adds a level of privacy. You’ll also find a 3.5mm aux input, a USB-C port that serves as an audio input on models sold in the U.S. (in other markets, it can charge other devices), an RJ-45 ethernet port, and a power jack. There’s no clunky external power brick to lug around, the JBL Authentics 300 comes with a simple cord ending in two-prong plug.

But don’t even think of leaving this portable outside in the rain. JBL hasn’t posted an IP rating for the Authentics 300 for protection from the elements (the Sonos Move 2 is rated IP56, meaning its water resistant, but not waterproof). Speaking of which, here’s everything you need to know about IP codes.

Jonathan Takiff/Foundry

You’ll use the JBL One app to connect to popular music-streaming services via your home network: Amazon Music (with Alexa Multi-Room Music support), Qobuz, and Tidal (with Tidal Connect support) are accessible in their high-res versions; plus, Spotify (with Spotify Connect support), Napster, TuneIn Radio, and Calm Radio. The JBL Authentic 300 can also play any content you send from your smartphone, tablet, or computer via Bluetooth, Airplay, or Chromecast. Don’t miss TechHive’s top picks in music-streaming services.

Battery life

When worked as a portable, running a full 8-hour marathon after a 3.5-hour charge of its Li-ion battery, I’ve found the JBL Authentics 300 holds onto wireless streams quite well. I moved it up and down two flights of stairs and even outdoors, a good distance from both my Wi-Fi router my and iPhone (while streaming over Bluetooth). And I could crank it pretty darn loud: measuring upwards of 103dB on my trusty Realistic sound pressure meter. But take note bassaholics: Plugging this speaker into an AC outlet will kick its bottom end up a notch.

Jonathan Takiff/Foundry

Listening tests

I gotta say, there’s more than a bit of throwback in the JBL Authentics 300’s dynamic, toasty-warm musicality. It’s a sonic personality that’s entertaining and easy to live with. Is it the best at everything? No. When put up in direct competition with a 6.6-pound, $449 Sonos Move 2 or a 7.7-pound, $549 Brane X with its radically reinvented subwoofer, the JBL Authentics 300 is neither as bright and bell-toned as the Sonos, nor as deep and wide of a bass-note digger as the Brane.

And yet, at identical volume levels, the JBL does seem to cast a bigger sonic shadow, offering a heftier sense of presence. Its larger, more reverberant cabinet is a factor to be sure, just as hulking heavyweight contenders blew away smaller portables in the boom-box era.

Another factor is the JBL Authentics 300’s near-monaural-deployment of two 25mm silk dome tweeters and a single 5.25-inch woofer running collectively on 100 watts of power. A 6.5-inch passive radiator on the bottom of the speaker adds thump. This speaker feels dramatically massed, put your hands on it while it’s playing and you can feel the power of the music.

Jonathan Takiff/Foundry

JBL says automatic onboard detection and processing tunes the Authentics 300 to its environment, beyond the two-way (bass and treble) EQ-ing you can do with the speaker’s dials or the three-way tuning available in the JBL One app, which has an additional mid-range control.

But in my quest to coax the best sound out of this thing, I found that proper physical location of the box proved the most critical tweaking factor. Put it as close to ear level as you can, because those soft dome tweeters have less reach and stamina when placed off-axis. The Authentics 300’s grid-backed, non-removable grill might also be a diminishing factor.

And to bring out the tightest bass this speaker can deliver, set it on a very solid platform, such as a granite countertop, or a well-built wooden table. If you can’t manage that, try placing a set of vibration dampers under its feet. Tuneful Cables’ cork-and-rubber isolation pads ($15 on Amazon) worked marvels to eliminate the music blurring and rattles initially inflicted on my ears when I plopped the Authentics 300 on my soft-pine kitchen table while cranking Christian McBride and Edgar Meyer’s new double bass standoff But Who’s Gonna Play the Melody? Sometimes less bass is better, you know?

Jonathan Takiff/Foundry

Meanwhile, my listening sessions with SoCal singer-songwriters (Jackson Browne), Yacht Rock (the Doobie Brothers), and West Coast jazz (Chet Baker, Shelly Manne) conjured memories of JBL’s signature “West Coast” sound, something I fell in love with decades ago with those L-100 monitors I mentioned earlier. In fact, they were the first grownup speakers I ever emptied my bank account to acquire.

But don’t worry that this speaker sounds as if it’s stuck in the past. In addition to its modern skill set, the Authentics 300 punches like a champ with contemporary music, too; from rap heavies Future, Metro Boomin’, and Kendrick Lamar’s chart-topping “Like That,” to pop darlin’ Olivia Rodrigo’s “Guts,” to blues-basher Gary Clark, Jr.’s “JPEG RAW.”

The JBL Authentics 300 as a smart speaker

Jonathan Takiff/Foundry

The JBL Authentics series can be considered smarter than most smart speakers thanks to their ability to respond to either the Alexa or Google Assistant wake words without need of any configuration changes. If you want that flexibility–and that future-proofing–JBL has a leg up over the Brane X (Alexa only) and the Sonos Move 2 (Alexa or Hey Sonos). The same goes for the Alexa-only Ultimate Ears Megablast and the Hey Google-only Bang & Olufsen Beosound Level.

To evaluate this experience with the JBL Authentics 300, I used GE Lighting’s Cync Direct Connect Smart Bulb and Roku’s Smart Bulb SE LED smart bulbs, both of which are certified compatible with Alexa as well as Google Assistant. I labeled the Roku bulb “TV Bulb” and formally linked it to the Alexa app, but I didn’t add it to my existing collection of Google Home devices. Still, when I shouted the command “Hey Google, turn off TV Bulb,” it responded appropriately. Even more surprising, when I opened the Google Home app, I saw that “TV Bulb” now appeared in its Assigned Devices list, under the heading “Linked to You.” Kinda spooky.

Jonathan Takiff/Foundry

I took the opposite approach with the Cync smart bulb, which I named “Bed Bulb.” I linked it only to the Google Home app, after which “Hey Google, turn Bed Bulb on [and off]” commands delivered the expected results. Spoiled by my Roku bulb experience, I was mildly miffed when the Cync bulb wouldn’t also react to Alexa commands. (Such a first world problem, right?) To fix that, I opened the Alexa app, confirmed that “Bed Bulb” was a legitimate element of my smart home, and registered it as part of the Alexa platform’s addressable family. As I later discovered in a JBL FAQ, that’s what you’re supposed to do to enable bi-platform voice control. In any event, I can now control both bulbs with commands to either digital assistant.

In theory, such command interchangeability on JBL’s latest smart speakers should also be useful to communicate with a streaming radio station, summon a music service playlist, and to set an alarm or timer. Operating instructions for the Authentics 300 suggest it’s possible to start a stream or alarm countdown with a command to one digital assistant, and to stop it with a command to the other.

I’ve found this operation doesn’t always take—and it really bothers me that I can’t speak a “pause” command while music is streaming and the phone rings or a housemate has something to discuss, followed by a “resume” or “play” command when the interruption is over. Once you say “stop,” “dismiss,” “cancel,” or “quiet,” you need to start the streaming entertainment from scratch. So, I’m coloring this application a work in progress.

Should you buy the JBL Authentics 300?

The JBL Authentics 300 delivers big sound, striking looks, flexible wireless connectivity, and portability. As a hi-fi speaker, it’s a very close competitor to the Brane X, which has a bigger bottom end, and the Sonos Move 2, which delivers clearer highs.

But as a smart speaker, the JBL Authentics 300 is unparalleled in its ability to respond to both “Alexa” and “Hey Google” commands interchangeably. It’s a portable speaker that successfully merges yesterday, today, and tomorrow.