JBL Go 3 tech specs Bluetooth version 5.1 Battery life 5 hours Finishes x8 Dimensions (hwd) 8.8 x 7.5 x 4.1cm Weight 210g Underneath that, you’ll find the USB-C charging port, which no longer needs a cover to boast an IP67 rating for dust and water ingress. The Go 2’s 3.5mm port for wired listening and the mic for speakerphone duties are no longer found on the Go 3, but we don’t really miss them in such a small and portable design. It’s a solution seen in many affordable Bluetooth options, but where it joins the rounded edges of the rubber panels on our sample, it has frayed slightly in several places. It still feels relatively rugged and durable, but given the strength of the previous iteration – and JBL’s rich heritage of rock-solid designs – it is a little disappointing. At this price, it’s perhaps unreasonable to expect such features, but then again, the affordable Tribit Stormbox Micro can create a mono or stereo pair, and that five-star model also boasts a mic and eight hours of playback on a full charge.
We then play Has It Come To This by The Streets, and find the JBL Go 3 a more musically pleasing listen thanks to the easier upper frequencies, a balance that allows sonic nuances through the mids to step into the spotlight. The keys in the track are sparkling but underpinned by a snappy dance beat through the low end that never intrudes on the melody or comes off bloated. As our playlist continues to R U Sleeping by Indo, we try the Go 3 in direct comparison with the Tribit Stormbox Micro and find its rival offers just an extra ounce of detail within a more spacious mix. If you can deal with a five-hour battery and lengthy charging time, you don’t want a mic for speakerphone duties and you’re prepared to overlook some minor concerns about the build quality, the JBL Go 3 sounds musically pleasing and surprisingly loud for the money.
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JBL GO 3 review
JBL has made a real name for itself as one of the big contenders in the outdoor Bluetooth speaker market with its Flip, Clip, and Charge lines, among others. Gone is the anonymous rectangular design, replaced with a rubberized, ruggedized compact little unit, ready to go out on hikes or to the pool.
Plenty of Bluetooth speakers make pretty incremental changes with successive entries, so it’s a little surprising to see how much of a departure the JBL GO 3 represents. In many ways, this portable Bluetooth speaker has more in common with something like the UE WONDERBOOM line than with the rather plain plastic rectangle that is the GO 2. The speaker comes in a rounded, oval-esque form, covered in tight-knit fabric and rubberized plastic. Just like the GO 2, the sound comes out of one side (emblazoned the JBL logo), with the other covered in a plastic patch so the speaker can lay flat without sliding around.
The cloth edge above the JBL logo sports three rather high-profile buttons for adjusting the volume and playback. You can play music all you like, and even when the cloth covering is soaked through, the speaker sounds totally fine, but as soon as it goes in the pool it’s going straight to the bottom and taking your tunes with it. It also includes a speakerphone, so if you’re out at the beach and you get a call you can take it without unpairing your devices (though everyone nearby will hear both sides of the conversation). This is fine seeing how the GO 3 serves as an adventure speaker, though you may run into some audio-visual lag if you watch videos while paired to it. At a constant output of ~75dB, the JBL GO 3 lasted 10 hours, 14 minutes on a single charge, more than double what was advertised. In Superfast Jellyfish by the Gorillaz, the rapping near the beginning of the song is clear and loud, though the bass guitar and kick drum fall a little to the wayside—they’re still both plenty audible, but they lack the typical oomph you’d hear listening over a pair of headphones.
However, the nature of outdoor speakers means that, apart from broadly decent sound (which the GO 3 has), the most important thing is volume. Additionally, the fact that the JBL GO 3’s strap is so small limits where you can hang it, and the lack of any sort of clip makes attaching it to something like a backpack a little less convenient than it could be. The JBL Clip 4 is a great alternative to the GO 3 for listeners who want an even louder output and more robust, versatile carry system.
Sound quality is quite good for a speaker this small, and while the bass response won’t blow you away, it will satisfy you more than what the GO 3 has to offer.
JBL Go 3 review: Tiny $40 Bluetooth speaker with big improvements
The Go 3 has a simpler boxy design than the Clip 4 that makes it easier to stand it up and play your audio in a directional manner rather than fire it up at the ceiling. While they’re both excellent pocket Bluetooth speakers, as I said in my review of the Clip 4, the JBL Go 3 may be the better pick for a lot of people. The Clip 4 plays a bit louder and has slightly better clarity and bass (it’s a 5-watt speaker compared with the 3W Go 3), but the Go 3 costs $30 less and some people may prefer its design, as I did in some ways.
It also works well for supplying richer sound for movie playback than your smartphone or tablet speakers are capable of.
Just don’t expect the bass to have any serious kick to it — you’re not going to power a dance party with it unless maybe if you host it in a walk-in closet. It can end up sounding a little harsh if you crank the volume, particularly with more demanding tracks that have a lot of instruments playing at the same time. Aside from having slightly better sound, the Clip 4’s higher battery life number (up to 10 hours) does give it an advantage over the Go 3. Other caveats: Note that like the Clip 4, the Go 3 has no speakerphone capabilities and doesn’t pair with a companion JBL app, so you can’t link up multiple speakers in PartyBoost mode like you can with some of JBL’s step-up Bluetooth speakers such as the , and upcoming Charge 5.
JBL Go 3 Review
There certainly isn’t any powerful bass depth coming out of a speaker this size, but the Go 3 does its best to muster some rich low-end presence at higher volumes. Yes, it’s true that a Bluetooth signal won’t do well underwater, but the point is that the speaker can get soaked without issue, which also means you can clean it off under the faucet or use it in the shower.
On tracks with intense sub-bass content, like The Knife’s “Silent Shout,” the Go 3 delivers decent thump for its size. The acoustic strums are also bright, and generally speaking, this is a balanced sound signature for a speaker this size—there’s not much bass depth, but the low-mids are full and the high-mids and highs are crisp. On Jay-Z and Kanye West’s “No Church in the Wild,” the kick drum loop receives plenty of high-mid presence, allowing its attack to retain its punchiness. The beat itself has some added thump, however, and once again the enclosure vibrates dramatically at top volumes, creating the sense of more power than the speaker actually possesses.
Orchestral tracks, like the opening scene from John Adams’ The Gospel According to the Other Mary, have a bright, crisp presence through the Go 3’s driver. So for what will sound like cleaner, clearer bass response, you want to place the speaker upright or hang it from the built-in loop so the back panel isn’t making contact with any surfaces.
We’re also slightly partial to the aforementioned Sony SRS-XB12 in this price range, but the Go 3 delivers solid audio from a tough frame for $10 less, making both worth your consideration. Weak battery life The Bottom Line JBL’s Go 3 speaker delivers solid wireless audio performance in a waterproof, easily portable design for a low price.
Specialisten review van de JBL Go 2
Door dit lichte gewicht en compacte formaat zie ik deze speaker als een perfect reismaatje.
JBL Go Review: Compact Body, Competent Sound
Companies making micro-sized Bluetooth speakers have to ensure harmony (pun unintended) between sound, portability, and design. It is a tough task to achieve this but we’ve seen some really competent products from Logitech and Harman in the recent past. Sporting circular designs, both, the Logitech X100 and Harman’s JBL Clip had good sound quality as well.
The JBL Go is Harman’s latest micro-sized Bluetooth speaker was announced at CES this year and made it to Indian shores in February.
It may not have the flair of Red Dot award winners such as the E40BT headphones or the Clip, but the JBL Go’s minimalistic boxy design is pleasant in its own way. The dimensions of 82.50 x 29.95 x 67.91mm mean it will even fit inside a trouser pocket, though the weight of 222g is on the higher side.
The JBL Go has a single 40mm driver which can operate in a frequency range of 180Hz to 20KHz, which means it cannot achieve really low-frequency sub-bass sounds. If you are going to listen to new wave EDM artists like Jai Paul and Nicolas Jaar then you can safely avoid the JBL Go because they rely extensively on low thumps.
Even so, like most Bluetooth speakers, it fires only from one side and one cannot expect to hear a multidimensional sound.
This puts it directly in competition with the JBL Clip and the Logitech X100 – two other great alternatives in the same price range.
The overall sound quality of the JBL Go is definitely better than the Clip but we still think the Logitech X100 is the best-sounding portable Bluetooth speaker of the lot.
JBL GO 2 review
Je kan de JBL GO 2 dus zonder problemen onderwater houden. Het bluetooth bereik is net als bij de andere JBL speakers ongeveer 10 meter. In onze test hebben we dit uiteraard getest en tien meter is ook echt het maximum, ga je verder dan valt de verbinding weg en gaat de muziek kraken. Met deze knop kan je naast het pauzeren van een nummer ook het volgende nummer opzetten als je twee keer op de knop drukt.
Dit is als je de speaker op een gemiddeld volume gebruikt. We hebben de speaker zonder problemen gedurende een hele middag aan gehad.
en een frequentiebereik van 180 Hz – 20 kHz heeft deze speaker dezelfde specificaties als zijn voorganger. Zo heeft de JBL GO 2 kleine pootjes onderop, we merken bij het afspelen op een hoger volume niveau dat er daardoor minder snel trillingen ontstaan.
Uiteraard is dit geen speaker die je gaat gebruiken voor binnenshuis muziek te luisteren. Verwacht geen diepe bastonen, maar wel een mooie upgrade van je normale smartphone geluid zonder dat je een zware en grote speaker mee hoeft te nemen. De JBL GO 2 past namelijk zonder problemen in je jas- of broekzak. Met de ingebouwde microfoon is het mogelijk om handsfree te bellen.
Het zit erop, maar de vraag is hoe vaak je deze functie zal gebruiken. JBL staat er om bekend dat ze hun speakers regelmatig van een update voorzien en verbeteringen doorvoeren. Het geluid is licht verbeterd, we merken iets minder kraak op een hoger volume, maar verwacht geen mega prestaties van deze mini-speaker.
* Wij hebben de JBL GO 2 zelf gekocht voor deze test.
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