Bose SoundLink Max Portable Speaker Blue Dusk

Most Liked Positive Review

Simple Bluetooth Speaker that Packs a Huge Punch

This strikes me as an interesting product. At the end of the day, it's simple - it's a Bluetooth speaker without a ton of frills that jams a huge amount of sound and bass into a relatively small - but a bit hefty - package, in typical Bose fashion. But at the premium price tag, it does feel like it's missing a feature or two. Pros: - Incredible sound - Excellent battery life - USB-C charging - Fast-charge your phone from the speaker via the USB-C port - AUX input - Basic EQ via the Bose app - IP67 water resistant Cons: - No WiFi (no casting, SpotifyConnect, etc...) - Fairly large to be "portable" - Heavy - No USB-C audio support - No the white / silver color This thing is ideal for bringing along to a house or pool party, or jamming out at your own place, but it is fairly large and hefty. I have this listed as a con just because this is very much advertised as "take it with you on-the-go", and I'm not sure I would realistically take this with me unless I'm not bringing much else. It's not going in my backpack if I'm taking anything else with me, and I'm certainly not flying anywhere with it, but if I'm bringing it to a weekend cabin trip it is perfect. The simplicity of it - the fact that it is solely Bluetooth - could be a pro or con. It does feel as though it should have WiFi so you can cast music to it in full quality, perhaps have Assistant capabilities, and do things like Spotify Jams which leans right into the "bring it to the party" use case. The Bose app is pretty decent - it has its quirks, but overall it's pretty fast and easy to use. You're really only opening it if you want to clean up paired devices, update the software, or mess with the EQ which you're probably not doing often. The removable handle is interesting. I'll be curious what kinds of accessories they come up with to utilize that feature. The handle it comes with is extremely sturdy, featuring a rubber casing around a very thick and robust braided cord. The whole thing is built like a tank. If you're considering this product, you're really between this and the Portable Smart Speaker, which fills the "smart" gaps I'm bringing up here. This objectively sounds better than the Portable Smart, but the 360 sound and WiFi of the Portable Smart kind of make it a toss-up for me, especially since you can use them in all the same ways and they're the same price. This has better sound & battery. The only real issue I've had with it so far is, despite being advertised to support SimpleSync, it really doesn't work for me. It did for the first time or two, but ever since then the sound crackles and sounds terrible when I try to sync it with my Bose Soundbar 700. I'm sure they'll fix this. I haven't had any issues to speak of otherwise. This may or may not matter to you. The sound quality is the real stand-out feature of this. It will fill any room, and is excellent outdoors, although you certainly lose the punchy bass you get when indoors. It kicks. It's loud, clear, and never seems to distort. Bose continues to impress here. Overall, this thing is fantastic, and I'd recommend it if you're looking for a simple Bluetooth speaker with huge sound and don't mind lugging something fairly big and heavy around. If any of those things give you pause, you might want to look at the Smart Portable or other options. At the price, you can certainly get more features in other products including in Bose's own line-up, but you probably won't get this level of sound.