Bose SoundLink Max review: bringing the portable party

Bose is one of the most well-known audio brands in the world, and there’s a good reason for that. Its devices deliver top-quality performance across the board, whether you’re listening to its best Bluetooth speakers, wireless speakers, true wireless earbuds or over-ear noise-cancelling headphones.

SoundLink is Bose’s range of portable speakers, and within that, there are a few different devices: the tiny SoundLink Micro, the mid-sized SoundLink Flex, the super smart Bose SoundLink Revolve+ II, and the biggest of the bunch – on review here – is the SoundLink Max.

I’ve been using the biggest Bose portable for a few months as my go-to Bluetooth speaker, and I’ve made a lot of use of it. In that time, it’s been a party speaker, a park speaker, a bathroom speaker and a chilled-night-in speaker. And naturally, it’s better suited to some scenarios than others – as I'll get to in my below review.

Is the SoundLink Max worth it?

The Bose SoundLink Max is available to buy right now from several retailers including Bose and Amazon. It launched at £399 / $399 / AU$599.95, depending on your region.

You can regularly find discount deals though. For instance, at the time of writing, it has been discounted to £349 in the UK, $299 in the US and AU$475 in Australia – but check out the embedded shopping widget above for live and up-to-the-minute results.

Just how big is the Bose SoundLink Max?

Bose has developed quite a distinct design language for its SoundLink speakers – and the Max supersizes it.

A rectangular device covered with smooth silicone, it looks and feels premium. You can buy one in black or blue. As you can see from my review images, I tested out the blue version – and it fits nicely when placed on a shelf in my living room.

At 12 x 26.5 x 10.5cm and 2.13kg, the Bose SoundLink Max is a fairly hefty bit of kit, so you won’t be carrying it around all the time. But it does come with a handy rope strap across the top for when you do.

The steel body beneath the silicone is robust and will survive knocks and bumps, which is handy if you intend to put it in the back of the car to take on camping trips or days out. And IP67 water and dust resistance protects it from the elements. If the speaker does get water inside, it will let you know with a blinking amber and white light, so you can wait for it to drain out.

Across the top, there are a few buttons to control the music, including the standard volume controls which you can also use to skip backwards and forwards through tracks, and a play/pause button, as well as the Bluetooth button and the Shortcut button (which I had set to play music from Spotify).

The battery should last around 20 hours of playback, depending on your listening volume. To conserve power, it’ll shut down after 20 minutes of inactivity and you can check how long you have left by pressing-and-holding the power button.

A full charge takes about 5 hours through the USB-C port on the back, so I usually plugged it in overnight. You can also use that port to charge your other devices like your phone if you’re running out of juice. But it's a slow charger, which is one of my main criticisms.

Connecting to the speaker is most easily done wirelessly through its Bluetooth 5.3 connectivity, and it supports multipoint so you can share the DJ responsibilities by connecting to multiple phones, tablets or laptops at once. You also get the option to use a wired connection using the 3.5mm audio port on the back.

Unlike some other similar speakers, this one doesn’t have a built-in microphone, so you won’t be able to take calls using it, nor will you be able to talk to your phone’s voice assistant.

Does the SoundLink Max sound any good?

The name 'Max' feels very fitting for the performance of this speaker, as it’s powerful and loud – with a bass so booming that it will be sure to get any party started.

This is very much a party speaker though. I used it for a quiet dinner with friends and found the default bass settings overwhelming, but it worked a treat when I hosted a bustling barbecue in the garden.

Listening to high-energy tracks like Ezra Collective’s Streets is Calling, the SoundLink Max delivers its best work. The bouncing bassline is electrifying, yet every instrument pushes through engagingly. Similarly, Pencil Full of Lead by Paolo Nutini makes great use of this speaker’s rich performance, while allowing for crystal-clear vocals and plenty of room for the piano, brass section and drums to hold their own.

In the Bose smartphone app, there’s a three-band manual EQ and four preset sound modes including Bass Boost, Bass Reducer, Treble Boost and Treble Reducer. I made a lot of use of the Bass Reducer when it was just me listening, which did a good job of balancing out the sound a little – especially when it came to more laid-back tracks.

To create an even bigger sound, you can connect the Max to another compatible SoundLink speaker. Although that won’t be necessary most of the time – as it is plenty loud and bassy enough on its own.

The app doesn’t have tonnes of functionality other than that. You can use it to change what the Shortcut button does, you can set it to link two Bose speakers, switch the audio to your AUX-in device, or resume Spotify. You can see the speaker's battery percentage, change the volume, adjust the auto-power-off settings, manage the voice prompts and even change the name of the speaker if you want.

Bose SoundLink Max review: Verdict

If you’re looking for a powerful portable Bluetooth speaker for listening to music outside, the Bose SoundLink Max is ideal. This booming Bluetooth device will happily pump out tunes and be heard over dozens of voices. Even more so if you connect two of them together, but I can’t see many people needing that level of power.

The Max's design is slick and sturdy, the battery life is solid, and it’s great that you can connect your devices through a wired or wireless connection. It’s very useful to be able to charge your phone from it in desperate situations as well – I made use of that feature more times than I’d like to admit.

But it is lacking in a couple of small ways. There’s no microphone to make calls and it takes ages to charge. You shouldn’t buy it if you don’t intend to regularly host more than a couple of people either, because the sound performance isn’t particularly suited to chilled-out listening.

Also consider

Get the Sonos Move 2 if you want something a little more feature-packed. A T3 5-star rated speaker, it delivers excellent sound whether you use it in the house or outside. You can connect using either Bluetooth or Wi-Fi and it’ll work alongside your other Sonos speakers too. Battery life is limited to around 11 hours, but that will still be more than enough for a day out.

A similarly-sized and similarly-priced speaker to the Soundlink Max is the JBL Xtreme 3. It’s super durable and comes with a long strap to carry it. Like the Bose, it’ll deliver punchy, loud audio that will carry well outside. It’s a great choice for parties and even has a bottle opener attached, although the battery life is limited to around 15 hours. It's far cheaper, though, which will be a big appeal.