Bluetooth speakers do come in different shapes and sizes, and as competition heats up between various brands, it’s the smaller models that take up the least amount of space that make it so hard to decide on the best one for you.

The good news is that the quality and quantity of good speakers are continuing to increase. Unlike speakers that have to rest on top of a shelf or ledge and lie stationary, the portable speakers here are very much the opposite — mobile, flexible and battery-powered. The fact they come in different colours, styles and feature sets makes choosing one all the more interesting.

The flashiest of the group is the Beats Pill, a small and thin speaker with a nice profile and good features, but expensive at $200 and surprisingly ineffective at playing bass-heavy tracks — the very thing Beats products are good for.

This is the same scenario for Monster’s ClarityHD Micro speaker. It’s wonderfully small and portable, with solid sound quality, though lacking a bit in battery life. If you have it plugged in often when playing music, this is a great option, and at $120, it’s much cheaper than it used to be.

Of all the portable Bluetooth speakers, Jawbone’s Jambox is among the most popular, thanks to its retro-inspired design and cool colours. Its stylish credentials are complemented by good performance that belies its diminutive frame. It doesn’t come cheap at $180, and that’s where the biggest challenge comes from. At that rate, you can buy a bigger wired speaker that may lack portability but would pump out better overall quality.

This is the trade-off in going with portable Bluetooth speakers. Manufacturers can’t be held entirely responsible for not being able to pack bigger amps or woofers into the smaller frames. Even if they could, there’s no way they would do it for under $200. This might explain why Bose’s SoundLink Mini is more expensive at $220. Based on the larger SoundLink model ($380) that is very expensive, yet also well-designed and reliable as a true speaker sound system, the Mini is essentially a smaller iteration of the same components.

Logitech’s UE Boom is right up there with a $230 price tag, which might seem a bit hefty for a product that really doesn’t show its size. But there’s a bit of an optical illusion at work here. The UE Boom uses a cylinder-style design that wraps the speaker grill almost 360-degrees for more spatial output. With between 12-15 hours of battery life, it also beats out most of the competition in longevity per charge. Another unique advantage is that you can pair two Booms together for a true stereo left and right channel setup. It’s cool to hear it work, but it doesn’t make much sense when you’re talking about close to $500 to get two of them.

And if the Boom is a little high in price, the UE Mobile Boombox is a good alternative for $130. It’s not quite as bombastic as its counterpart, but it can be a good speaker to have for smaller spaces, be it a bedroom or even the kitchen. Like the other Bluetooth speakers it goes up against, it also proves to be a great audio source for Skype or FaceTime video calls.

 

In equal measure, the JBL Flip are both small speakers that offer similar profiles and performance. Both can double as speakerphones, though the Solemate wins out with longer battery life per charge and excellent voice guidance to walk you through everything. The Flip is a little more versatile and flexible because it plays the same, regardless of whether it’s laid down horizontally or upright vertically. It’s also cheaper at $100 compared to the Solemate’s $160 price tag.

So, with all those models in the market, is there a standout amongst them all? The short answer is no, because they’re all similar but different at the same time. Your purchasing decision will probably depend on the speaker’s size and design just as much as its audio performance. As mentioned earlier, you won’t bring the house down with any of these but you will definitely fill a small room or personal space by dropping your tunes in these small boxes.