SMART SPEAKERS
1 HOT BUY
Sonos One £199 / stuff.tv/SonosOne
Making an amazing speaker was an easy job for the multiroom champs, but getting Amazon’s Alexa voice assistant to dance along in time with it… well, that wasn’t such a simple task. But the One is now an altogether more well-rounded device than it was at launch, supporting Spotify with voice control as well as Amazon Music and TuneIn Radio, while the early Alexa hiccups seem to have been fixed by a series of software updates. It also has an improved processor in its 2019 ‘Gen 2’ form.
Stuff says ★★★★★
Sonos’s Alexa-powered speaker remains a class apart from the competition
Amazon Echo Dot £25 / stuff.tv/EchoDot The massive price difference means that, for many people, the 3rd-gen Dot is a better bet than the full-size Echo. The only downside is its poor-quality speaker, but the 3.5mm audio output will solve that problem for most.
Stuff says ★★★★★
One of the best bargains in tech right now
Google Home Max £199 / stuff.tv/HomeMax If you want a smart speaker that can blow the doors off a party, this is the best you can get right now. All the smarts of the basic Home speaker are here, naturally, and the larger drivers offer much more powerful bass.
Stuff says ★★★★★
A smart speaker that’s ready to party
Apple HomePod ★★★★★ £279 / stuff.tv/HomePod For Apple Music users who want a high-end smart speaker, this is a cracking choice.
Amazon Echo ★★★★I £60 / stuff.tv/AmazonEcho Nothing else in this price range looks quite as good or gets the job done quite as well.
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