JBL Charge 3 Waterproof Portable Bluetooth Speaker (Black), 1

(Disclaimer: This is not a much a review as it is advice for avoiding getting ripped off.) As for the review on the JBL Charge 3, it definitely does not disappoint! It gets very loud for the size and the mids and highs are very crisp. The bass is decent, but its not gonna shake any windows. I dont own a flip 3 or 4, so I cant do a side-by-side comparison, but I have used one in the past, and from what I can remember, this one seems to get about 20-30% louder. So that is nice for a $20 price difference. I have owned several JBL products over many years and have never had an issue, and I definitely do not anticipate having one with the Charge 3 ***THIS NEXT PART IS VERY IMPORTANT*** There are a LOT of 1 star reviews of this speaker, but if you read through them, you will see that the majority (probably 90%) of the negative reviews are due to the fact they the purchaser received a counterfeit unit. This is easily avoidable. Amazon uses multiple vendors to ship the same product, and these vendors change quite frequently. Once your item is in the cart, you are able to see who is actually selling it. It is extremely important that you make sure the seller is listed on JBLs authorized seller list. I bought mine on Amazon from Acoustic Sound Design, and they are listed on JBLs authorized seller list, as are several others. If the name of the vendor does not show up on their list, chances are, you are going to be receiving a refurbished soon-to-be paperweight or just an outright fake.

Had a friend say it had a better quality sound than her Bose speaker. Very happy. Got it because my son got one and I was so impressed by the sound I had to get one too.

I have owned a my speaker for almost 4 years now. I bought it as a cheaper way of listening to music from my phone on the road than buying a new stereo system specific to my old car. Now it gets daily use at home and work, and it’s still going strong. The good bass and volume mean I can hear my stories from another room. The waterproofing was put to the test when I accidentally left it outside overnight in a rain storm. We got over an inch of rain and one end had water puddled on the exterior, but it turned on and worked like nothing happened. It’s been through the dirt of two house remodels and dropped many times, but still continues to perform with amazing sound quality. The battery still lasts without charging for my whole 10 hour work day. That’s what I’m looking for in a speaker.

Great quality speaker! Sounds good/loud and is still going strong after years! I definitely recommend it!

Good sound for what it is and the price

All very good accept you sent me 2 I only ordered 1

This was a great purchase, bought with the strap for golf cart. Use it while golfing with friends, battery last longer than expected. Great sound

Fantastic speaker. Ive had it for about a month now with no major complaints. I would love if I could hear a bit more of the mids. Its fairly bass-heavy, but then again, so is most of the music culture these days. Overall the sound is very good & it gets plenty loud. No distortion, even at maximum volume, which is great. It doesnt have the loudness to fill my whole condo, but certainly more than enough to fill the largest room. And much more than what I need to fill the garage. The point of the battery-powered speaker is that I can take it anywhere. If Im going into a different room, I can just pick it up and bring it with me. No need to fill the whole condo. I once borrowed a co-workers same model JBL Charge 3 & tested the stereo function & it worked great. The two speakers together make for a fantastic setup & very cool feature. I would love to have this at all times, but one of the points of having a battery-powered bluetooth speaker is so that I can take it places. And I dont have the space in my bag to lug around 2 of these things. Its already big-enough as it is. Big, but manageable. Possibly one of the greatest features about the Charge 3 is that the battery lasts FOREVER. Its awesome. I can watch movies on my tablet (which needs to be plugged in after 4 hours), but the speaker just keeps on going and going. More than anyone should ever need in one session. The other great thing about this guys battery is it has removed the need to carry an additional portable phone charger during long trips. I can use this bad-boy instead. Only issue is on planes it makes a loud startup & shutdown noise. Then again, that can be somewhat muffled & the plane is already somewhat loud itself, so its not the end of the world. Also, planes these days have plug-in chargers, so if youre really reluctant to use this to charge your phone on a plane, then youve got a work-around. And if youre thinking 20 hours of battery life seems excessive, then perhaps you havent considered the life-span of the speaker. My last bluetooth speaker was the Jabra SoleMate. It was a great little speaker with weather resistance & an 8 hour battery life. The thing was great for the first year. However, after a year, that 8 hour battery life was more like 6 hours. And after 2 years it was more like 4 hours. If extrapolation is true across all batteries (but it probably isnt), then I would expect the Charge 3 will only last about 10 hours in 2 years. And I will be okay with that. That is still a great amount of battery for a whole day using the thing. Anyways, thats kind of like worst-case planning. Before buying this I did a bunch of comparative research. The closest competitor I found was the UE Boom 2. Its smaller/slimmer and at least marketed as durable during drop. My co-worker had one that he let me borrow to test. I think at medium volume that the UE Boom 2 sounded better. Very warm mids, no muddiness, great overall clarity; however, there was a lot of distortion above ~75% volume. If I cant use the full loudness range of the speaker, then why does UE even allow it to go that loud? Especially such a great-sounding speaker at medium volume? Very disappointed that their audio team wasnt allowed or able to push harder to fix this. Another, more minor downfall of the UE Boom 2 is that it doesnt float. So although it is waterproof, if you bring this thing out on the lake and accidentally drops in the water (God forbid), then someone better catch it before it sinks to the bottom & busts from excessive water pressure. And the last benchmark where the Charge 3 had the Boom 2 beat was the battery life. 15hrs for the UE Boom 2. Quite admirable, but it didnt match up to the Charge 3. So thats how I ended up with this bad-boy. TL;DR: Great speaker, buy it.

3 years later, this product still seams brand new. Never experienced a problem charging, holding charge, noise, sound, it’s all quite perfect. The sound range is awesome and it is super durable which is great when transporting and taking it with you. Don’t hesitate to purchase this! It’s promising and will last you years!

It has a nice sound