The powerful five-driver set up delivers an immersive, full-range sound that adapts based on the speaker's orientation. Experience the Beosound Level's dynamic bass when laid flat, unmatched clarity when it's upright, or an enveloping soundstage when wall mounted. The Beosound Level’s magnetic charging plug and power cable are color coordinated. Flies in the ointment Don’t come to the Bang and Olufsen Beosound Level expecting a value speaker. There are plenty of low-cost boxes, cylinders and spheres if you want decent audio and a handful of features at a low cost.

Beosound Level review: A top-tier portable music streamer Beosound Level review: A top-tier portable music streamer

Despite being a wireless device, and having a handle, the Beosound Level certainly isn’t a portable speaker. It weighs 3.3kg and measures 34.8 x 23 x 6.6 cm – suffice to say you won’t be carrying this out on your picnics. Jonathan Takiff is a veteran tech and entertainment writer based in Philadelphia. A long time staffer for the Philadelphia Inquirer, Daily News and Philly.com, his work has also appeared in numerous publications including Sound & Vision, Playboy, and Popular Science. Equipped with two 4" woofers, one 2" full-range drive and two 3/4" tweeters, Beosound Level delivers an impressive sound experience. The Digital Signal Processing (DSP) has been specially tuned to challenge the limits of physics no matter how or where you place the product to listen to your music. The Beosound Level goes loud too – we generally tested it on a third of the max volume and it was already providing room-filling sound. For the sake of our neighbors, we didn’t try to test the speaker at max, though an accident that involved us leaning on the ‘volume up’ button without realizing it showed that this thing can really hit deafening heights (if you’re leaning on it). Because of the music quality aspects, we’re struggling to be down on the Beosound Level. That’s something we need to state given that you’ve just seen a positive score for the speaker and are about to read over a thousand words of criticism for it. But it’s worth pointing out: this is a speaker for audiophiles and if you just want a budget or affordable speaker that plays music as soon as you press ‘play’, there are many other options out there for you. Bang and Olufsen Beosound Level: Price and release dateThe battery is replaceable and can be swapped over by the user simply by removing the speaker grille. The grille is also replaceable and B&O says there will be optional covers available in a range of finishes in the future. It’s good to see a company providing a battery that can be easily replaced because no lithium-ion battery lasts forever. I don’t know of any other wireless speakers that have a user-replaceable battery. Take care when toting the Beosound level, lest you press the buttons that delivery a factory reset. Shopping at Holburn Online couldn't be easier. We accept all major card providers as well as offering 0% finance on many of our products.

Beosound Level Wireless - Forbes Exclusive Review: The Beosound Level Wireless - Forbes

Despite its diminutive proportions, this thing can fill a room—even to a second floor. Cranking the volume control to the max for a lush Baltimore Symphony rendering of Bernstein’s ‘ West Side Story’ Symphonic Dances on Vermont’s VPR Classical stream, my trusty sound pressure meter showed the Level outputting a house-filling, distortion-free 98 decibels. That’s the same level as the Sonos Move (which, to my ears, sounds bloated when pushed to such an extreme), and it’s 4dB more than the Bose Portable Home Speaker delivered. But honestly, there’s no need to crank the Level to 11 to make it sound special. Any setting above the 50-percent volume mark wakes its full dynamic range and nuanced “Hear the rosin on the bow?” delivery skills. Fine tunings The sound produced by this classy wireless speaker is truly sublime. There’s a clarity in the midrange and a projection that makes it sound divine. The precision of the drivers, coupled with the solidity and weight of the aluminum chassis, provide a solid performance that’s both light and substantial at the same time There’s a richness that permeates from behind the speaker grille and fills the room with music that’s omnidirectional and fulsome but without ever distorting. When it comes to streaming audio, there’s a choice of Google Chromecast Built-In and Apple AirPlay 2. Both these wireless protocols mean that the Beosound Level can work as a multi-room audio system so that speakers all around the home can be playing the same music or different music from each other. I love the idea of having music playing in the kitchen and the dining room and being able to move around with the same music playing in each room on different devices in perfect sync.As well as Google Chromecast and Apple Airplay, the Beosound Level has a Bluetooth receiver built-in for streaming audio without the need to log onto the wireless network. I did try using the Bluetooth connection as a speakerphone, but it wasn’t playing ball. I think the Beosound Level would look rather nice as a speakerphone on a desk as well as being used to play music. Maybe that’s a feature that could work with a future firmware update as the microphone is already there waiting to be used. But if you want to activate the Google Voice Assistant to fetch content, or link other compatible wireless audio components to play in unified groups, you’ll need to link your Level to the Google Home app on your phone or tablet. Voice-integrated play pals include Spotify, Apple Music, Pandora, Deezer, YouTube Music, and TuneIn. The Beosound Level lets you move with your music in new ways at home, without ever compromising on sound quality. Any room. Any position. Any moment.

Bang and Olufsen Beosound Level review: a premium

The battery-operable Beosound Level proves you can take it with you—at least in this life. Its beautiful design will have your heirs fighting over who gets it when you’re gone. They say you can never be too rich or too thin. This view from the top shows the Level to be the slimmest of them all. Unlike most wireless speakers, B&O has designed the Beosound Level to have a user-replaceable ... [+] battery and an electronics module that can be completely replaced when wireless technologies evolve. B&O

Level up your audio

Finally, we can say nice things about the Beosound Level! As you can imagine for a speaker that costs more than a month's rent in London, Bang and Olufsen ensures that you’re getting fantastic sounds from the Beosound Level. For better—and worse—I discovered the Level’s top panel touch controls to be extra sensitive. A proximity sensor lights up the panel as you approach, which responds best with very light taps and swipes across the panel. Lay a finger down too long on one of its four station/command presets and Google Assistant will spout “Want to reprogram?” Wrap your palm around the touch strip as you’re toting the Level and whoops, you might inadvertently instigate a reboot.