Soundcore Boom 2 Vs JBL Xtreme 3 And Sony XG300 - Why Pay More?

So I was pleasantly surprised by the Soundcore Boom 2 cause this is a great speaker for summer 2024 cause it gives you a lot of sound at a relatively affordable price. But naturally we have to see how the Soundcore Boom 2 stacks up to both the JBL Xtreme 3 and Sony XG300, 2 very popular speakers to take to the beach or pool with you. And obviously, we need a little something to keep us busy while we wait for the JBL Xtreme 4 which is right around the corner.

Regarding pricing, the Soundcore Boom 2 retails for $130, which is insane especially when you compare it to either the JBL Xtreme 3 which retails for $380 but I do except it to drop in price dramatically cause the Xtreme 4 is right around the corner… or the Sony XG300 which has a retail price of $350 but it likes to routinely go on sale for $200. Nonetheless if you want to pick any of these speakers up they’ll be linked down below or you can always press on the YouTube shopping button.

So first theres the design of these speakers, now all three of these speakers are about the same size as one another except the Boom 2 is a little thinner and its a little lighter. In general, all three of these speakers are easy enough to take on the go with you but the Xtreme 3 does have that included shoulder strap so you can just throw this speaker over your shoulder, and that should strap does have that built in bottle opener, which is a nice touch that is missing on these other two speakers. Now durability wise, all three of these speakers are water proof, so if you drop any of these speakers in water or if they get rained on, they’re all going to be perfectly fine. However, when it comes to bumps and scrapes, but the JBL and Sony are much more durable cause they have mostly fabric wrapped bodies, where as the Boom 2 has a mostly plastic body and a metal face plate, meaning that this speaker is going to collect scratches a lot easier. Overall, the Boom 2 is going to have no problem keeping up with you, but both of JBL’s and Sony’s speakers are more durable and premium feeling.

However, something that the Soundcore Boom 2 does have over these 2 speakers is that it has a built in light feature in the passive radiators. And this light feature is fairly dynamic and vibrant. Its so vibrant that it does a decent job of illuminating the ground around it at night. Now I know the Sony XG300 also has a built in light feature, but this light feature isn’t as imrepssive as the light feature found on the Boom 2, so I dont think that its worth using. Where as the Boom 2’s light feature, I do think that its worth using.

But just keep in mind, if you do decide to use the light feature on either of these speakers, that is going to take an additional toll on the battery life. Now when it comes to battery life, the Boom 2 has an advertised battery life of 24 hours, which is very impressive. However, this advertised battery life of 24 hours is with this speaker playing at 50% volume, and with the light feature turned off and with the bass up feature turned off as well.

Real world use with this speakers playing at 80% volume, with the light feature turned on and with the bass up feature turned on, its going to be good for about 6 hours of playback time.

And then theres the XG300 which has a similar thing going on. This speaker has an advertise battery life of 25 hours, but that’s with this speaker playing at 50% volume but with the light feature turned off but with the mega bass feature turned on which is good. And real world use with this speaker playing at 80% volume, with the light feature turned off, cause personally I don think that its worth using on this speaker and with the mega bass feature turned on, then its good for about 11 hours of play back time.

And then theres the Xtreme 3 which has an advertised battery life of 15 hours… but real world use with this speaker playing at 80% volume its good for about 8 hours of playback time. So overall if battery life is very important to you, then you’ll might want to go with the Sony XG300 here.

And when it comes to charging these speakers, they all charge via a USB C port, which is great. However, the USB C port on the Xtreme 3 is very different from the USB C ports on these other two speakers. With the Xtreme 3, you can use its USB C port to charge your own devices and you can also use it as a wired connection. And personally I think that this is a very useful feature that many other speakers out there dont have.

However, all three of these speakers have a USB A port so that you can charge your own devices. But I dont think that these USB A ports are going to get use all that much cause most phones these days come with USB C to USB C chargning cables. So that’s why I think the USB C port on the Xtreme 3 is a hidden gem.

But something that is missing on the Soundcore Boom 2 is an audio jack, so you can only use this speaker wirelessly where as these other two speakers do have 3.5 millimeter audio jacks. So just keep that in mind depending on your set up.

But when it comes to wireless connectivity, all three of these speakers can be connected to 2 devices at the same time so that you and a friend can both be DJ and latency is not an issue for any of these speakers so you can use them to watch videos with on your phone… but when it comes to audio codecs both the Boom 2 and Xtreme 3 only have support for SBC which is fine, but the Sony XG300 has support for SBC, AAC and LDAC.

But with all of that out of the way lets talk about sound. Regarding speaker set up the Soundcore Boom 2 has a single frontward firing subwoofer which is flanked by dual frontward firing tweeter and there are dual passive radiators that shoot out the sides, and this is a fairly unique speaker set up. Where as with both the Xtreme 3 and Sony XG300, they both have dual frontward firing woofers, dual frontward firing tweeters and dual passive radiators that shoot out the sides. But now we’re going to jump into the sound test. All three of these speakers are playing at 87% volume, the Boom 2 is playing with its signature EQ and bass up turned on, the Sony has bass up turned on and the Xtreme 3 is playing with its stock EQ.

Soundtest

So when it comes to the sound quality of these speakers, I cant help but feel that the Soudncore boom 2 has the weakest instrument separation. The highs are well defined and the bass is strong with this one, but the mids on the Boom 2 can be a little weak. Where as with both the Sony XG300 and JBL Xtreme 3, these two speakers have better separation in the mids and the bass has more resonances to it. Now with its signature EQ, the Boom 2 sounds fairly balanced, but the XG300 does lean towards a warm sound signature and the Xtreme 3 leans towards a brighter sound signature. But with all of these speakers you can go into their apps and you can adjust their EQ to your liking… and definitely with the Xtreme 3 I would recommend that you go in and raise the bass a bit. But where the Boom 2 really shines here is max volume, this speaker gets impressively loud for both its size and price and it actually get a little louder than these other two speakers. Now it doesn’t sound better than these other two speakers, but it does sound louder, and if youre looking for a speaker to use outdoors most of the time, loudness might be a little more important than quality.

But finally lets talk about pairing these speakers up with other speakers. Now with all of these speakers, if you have two of the exact same speakers you can wirelessly pair them up and get them to play in left and right stereo mode so one speakers will be your left channel and the other speaker will be your right channel. However, with the Boom 2, I cant help but feel that one speaker is a few miliseconds behind, those causing a slight echo. Where as echos are not an issue for the Xtreme 3.

But with all of these speakers, you can always pair them up with other speakers that are using the same speaker protocols as them, for soundcore its Partycast 2.0, for JBL its JBL Partyboost and for sony its party connect. And you can get up to 100 speakers wirelessly paired together and get them to play in sync.

But the unique thing here about Sony’s Party connect is that you can connect this smaller speaker to any of Sony’s larger box speakers that are also using party connect like either the Sony XV900, XV800, XV500 or XP700 or XP500. So with Sony’s party connect, it is a little more accommodating cause with the JBL Xtreme 3, you cant wirelessly connect it to any on JBL’s larger Partybox speakers.

But with all of that being said, the Soundcore Boom 2 does a really good job of keeping up with both the JBL Xtreme 3 and Sony XG300 while being a lot more affordable. Sure, the Boom 2 doesn’t have as good instrument separation as these other two speakers, but it gets very loud which I feel is more important for an outdoor speaker to constantly take on the go with you. Even though it has a mostly plastic body its still very durable and its easy enough to take on the go with you and it also has a decent looking light feature. The only think that look out with on this speaker is going to be its battery life, but if you use it with it light feature turned off you can always extend it a good ammount.

Alexis Herrera