JBL Charge 3 Waterproof Portable Bluetooth Speaker (Black), 1

While I am seasoned in writing Amazon reviews to help my fellow millennial shoppers and older alike... I dont know where to start with this bad mamajama. So Im going to give you an unbiased review of this awesome speaker from this point on... OK. Overview- I got the JBL Charge 3 in black. It is a bulky design for your more extravagant consumer. The red JBL plate on the front is almost reflective, making it look like it lights up under indirect light. The Charge 3 is 100% water submersible and the bass subs on either side are able to house water which bounces to the tunes when your particularly bassy hip-hop starts booming. Has a stand built in on the bottom made of rubber to prevent rolling. 6 buttons on the top, four protruding to make it easier to know what youre pressing while not looking, and two flush. Behind the rubber tab on the back (built for waterproofing) houses an auxiliary port, probably 3.5mm, a micro USB port for charging the speaker itself, and a USB port for charging your mobile device (can be used as a power bank). There are 5 LED indicators for battery on the bottom of the frontal side. They are covered by rubber so they provide a very matte, non intense light. Same goes for the dual connect (read later) and the power indicator. A non voice activated pairing system uses various pulses, light coloring and sine waves to notify you when it is searching, pairing, and paired. It does not have NFC. The dual pairing feature allows you to pair two JBL speakers together. It has a built in speaker phone, I havent tested it myself, but uve heard from many people theres no difference in sound quality from a normal phone microphone. Specs- The loudest read I got on the Charge 3 (using the app Sound Meter not an SLM) was around 88 dB while playing Congratulations by Post Malone (see pictures). A step up on the 75 dB from the original Charge. With a 6,000 mAh power bank and a 13 hour battery life at full and 25 hours at half (measurement I took myself), the playtime is above most available speakers on the market today. The Charge 3 has a rated power of 2 x 10W and a frequency response of 65Hz-20kHz. Application- Amazing outdoor/pool speaker. Great for rain or shine because you dont have to worry about splash damage. However, if you want a travel speaker, Id go with the JBL Flip 4 ($100) or the Bose Soundlink Mini II ($180, an oldie but a damn goodie). Or if youre just that guy, Id recommend the JBL Extreme or the JBL Pulse... theyre for the flashier of people. Biased- For the price, it cant be beat. For the partying, rock n roll, hip-hop, rap, EDM listener. The bass cannot be beat in a speaker this size if you like your music bassy (part of us all do). For a relatable example of the bass, at full volume, if you cup your hands around the subs while playing the song Feel the Bass by DJ MagicMike, you can feel the vibrations in your legs... crazy power. I hope that this review has made an impression on your choice of what speaker to purchase. If not, I highly recommend Jims Review Room on YouTube for highly professional, unbiased reviews! Have a wonderful day.

Fantastic speaker. Ive had it for about a month now with no major complaints. I would love if I could hear a bit more of the mids. Its fairly bass-heavy, but then again, so is most of the music culture these days. Overall the sound is very good & it gets plenty loud. No distortion, even at maximum volume, which is great. It doesnt have the loudness to fill my whole condo, but certainly more than enough to fill the largest room. And much more than what I need to fill the garage. The point of the battery-powered speaker is that I can take it anywhere. If Im going into a different room, I can just pick it up and bring it with me. No need to fill the whole condo. I once borrowed a co-workers same model JBL Charge 3 & tested the stereo function & it worked great. The two speakers together make for a fantastic setup & very cool feature. I would love to have this at all times, but one of the points of having a battery-powered bluetooth speaker is so that I can take it places. And I dont have the space in my bag to lug around 2 of these things. Its already big-enough as it is. Big, but manageable. Possibly one of the greatest features about the Charge 3 is that the battery lasts FOREVER. Its awesome. I can watch movies on my tablet (which needs to be plugged in after 4 hours), but the speaker just keeps on going and going. More than anyone should ever need in one session. The other great thing about this guys battery is it has removed the need to carry an additional portable phone charger during long trips. I can use this bad-boy instead. Only issue is on planes it makes a loud startup & shutdown noise. Then again, that can be somewhat muffled & the plane is already somewhat loud itself, so its not the end of the world. Also, planes these days have plug-in chargers, so if youre really reluctant to use this to charge your phone on a plane, then youve got a work-around. And if youre thinking 20 hours of battery life seems excessive, then perhaps you havent considered the life-span of the speaker. My last bluetooth speaker was the Jabra SoleMate. It was a great little speaker with weather resistance & an 8 hour battery life. The thing was great for the first year. However, after a year, that 8 hour battery life was more like 6 hours. And after 2 years it was more like 4 hours. If extrapolation is true across all batteries (but it probably isnt), then I would expect the Charge 3 will only last about 10 hours in 2 years. And I will be okay with that. That is still a great amount of battery for a whole day using the thing. Anyways, thats kind of like worst-case planning. Before buying this I did a bunch of comparative research. The closest competitor I found was the UE Boom 2. Its smaller/slimmer and at least marketed as durable during drop. My co-worker had one that he let me borrow to test. I think at medium volume that the UE Boom 2 sounded better. Very warm mids, no muddiness, great overall clarity; however, there was a lot of distortion above ~75% volume. If I cant use the full loudness range of the speaker, then why does UE even allow it to go that loud? Especially such a great-sounding speaker at medium volume? Very disappointed that their audio team wasnt allowed or able to push harder to fix this. Another, more minor downfall of the UE Boom 2 is that it doesnt float. So although it is waterproof, if you bring this thing out on the lake and accidentally drops in the water (God forbid), then someone better catch it before it sinks to the bottom & busts from excessive water pressure. And the last benchmark where the Charge 3 had the Boom 2 beat was the battery life. 15hrs for the UE Boom 2. Quite admirable, but it didnt match up to the Charge 3. So thats how I ended up with this bad-boy. TL;DR: Great speaker, buy it.

Probably a bit early to rate battery life. Good so far.

This is my second Charge 3. I loved my first one. After major abuse on my part for a couple years it was finally time to replace it. I went with the Charge 4 thinking I would like it even more because well it was a newer version. I was very wrong. The 3 is simply better sounding in my option. For one it is simply louder with much more bass. They are both water proof and very durable. The Charge 4 is a more balanced sound with a bigger battery, but i definitely prefer the smooth bass that comes out of the Charge 3. I ended up losing my Charge 4 so i was pleasantly surprised to find the Charge 3 still available and at a much reduced price from the first time i purchased. For the price I dont know of anything better.

Envío rápido y excelente calidad ☺️

It sounds better than I expected, especially considering its size. JBL should be proud as it lives up to its brags.

Realized I bought this thing four years ago and still havent reviewed it. I was delighted this morning at how bluetooth on the charge always just works. So easy to connect / disconnect and seems to have some intelligence around this. Other devices are a pain (and have been especially, lately) but this guy always just gets it right, no matter which device Im using (personal MBP, work MBP, iPhone, iPad - I switch around all the time). And, of course, it sounds amazing. Starting to see some diminished battery life here, which isnt surprising after 4 years of heavy use - but can still get several hours off of a single charge. And can always just plug it in if needed. Im a JBL customer for life if they keep making products like this.

I was given one of these as a gift many years ago. It just finally stopped working. I did lots of research to decide which JBL would be the best replacement. I was very happy to see this model offered again. Its excellent quality, reliable and holds its charge for a long time. It really is water & dust proof. I used my older one while doing all sorts of projects indoors and out where moisture and dust were everywhere....it continued to work very well.

Easy to connect via Bluetooth. Excellent quality and great sound for the money.

Please read to the end, you wont regret!!! So I received my speaker on a Wednesday, tried to connect it to my Mac and for some reason it wouldnt connect. I didnt have my phone at that time so I tried to connect it to my Windows computer and the speaker was just flawless. Firstly, I was very impressed with the sound quality of the speaker. The mids and highs are great, super crisp, and the lows are awesome. The speaker has a very rich and deep bass thanks to the radiators on either side of the speaker. The speaker is covered with a mesh fabric material giving it a premium feel. Overall I love how the speaker looks and feels. Just by holding the speaker, it is by no means a cheap product. This speaker is built to last. Now, this is the best part. Since I had slight issues with connections which I later learned could have been simply solved with the latest JBL update (oh me, yea I know), I wasnt comfortable keeping the speaker. So I immediately contact the seller, AcousticSoundDesign Factory Authorized Dealer on Thursday night at 10 pm, and noted the issue. At first, it didnt seem like they were serious because I immediately got an automated reply the following morning Friday at 6 am MNT stating that a replacement will ship on that same day and delivered on Thursday the following week. So, this was obviously too long for me to wait, so I told them to provide a tracking number just to make sure. Again what seemed to be an automated reply, stated that the replacement was on its way. Due to the poor dialogue, I contacted Amazon and the representative said she didnt see any replacement being sent to me. So she proceeded to ship one due to deliver on Tuesday the following week. Again just a reminder all this happened on a Friday. So you guessed it if the seller really sent the replacement, it meant Ill have two speakers being sent to me. And that is exactly what happened. This seller is just spectacular, remember when they told me the speaker will deliver the following Thursday, well I got it on Sunday, literally one and a half day later. This seller literally overnighted me a replacement unit beating Amazons replacement due on Tuesday. I was really impressed with the quick replacement. And mind you the seller did not even mention in the email that I had to return my current bad unit to get a replacement unit. Now, this is a 10 start consumer service. The customer service is as good as the speaker. Believe me you will not regret your purchase. I usually dont write product reviews, but I always find myself reading through them before I buy a product. I took my time writing this one because it was worth every minute I spent typing this. Go out there and get you JBL chargeX. Cheers.