Bose Lifestyle Ultra Speaker review: Upfiring output gives a genuine edge

In a world with a zillion home speaker options already available, what's the trick to standing out? If you're Bose, then it's down to a couple of factors – with its new Lifestyle Ultra Speaker bringing not only style, but a distinctive additional channel.

The LS Ultra Speaker (as it's known for short) has a built-in upfiring output as part of its arsenal, offering additional height to its soundstage. That's something you won't find in a Sonos Era 100, for example, providing a key point of distinction.

This is a wired-only speaker for the home, however, with Wi-Fi, various casting options, and Bluetooth providing myriad ways to get your music on board. However, it's not a multi-functional moveable device such as the Sonos Play, despite carrying the same asking price.

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Does all that equate to enough for the Bose Lifestyle Ultra Speaker to set itself apart from the competition as the ultimate small-scale home speaker? As a solo option it's a compelling choice among its peers, with some caveats, as I'll address in this review.

Price & Availability

You can buy the Bose LS Ultra Speaker right now, with the recommended price set at £299 / $299 / AU$549. That's for either the Black or White Smoke finishes.

There's also a special edition version, called Driftwood Sand, priced at £349 / $349. Which, as the name hints at, adds a real wood base and a marbled sand-colour finish.

If you wind back to when the Sonos Era 100 was launched – more than three years ago at the time of writing – then its original price was £249 / $249 / AU$399. It's since dropped, plus a cheaper 'SL' version has been launched. Nonetheless, Bose is positioned with that core competitor in mind.

The Sonos Play, meanwhile, is like-for-like priced, keeping competition as tough as ever. Brand allegiance – however applicable – may therefore play a big part in your purchase incentive here.

Design & Setup

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On the assumption you buy a single, standalone LS Ultra Speaker – I'll cover stereo pairing issues and home theatre successes separately in a section down page – then setting it up is an absolute doddle.

Simply plug in, load up the refreshed Bose app, and you'll get a step-by-step walkthrough. It'll educate you about the on-body controls and how they function, before leaving you to make personalised sound adjustments should you wish.

The on-body controls are a real highlight of this design. Up top – and akin to a smaller version of what you'll find on Bose's LS Ultra Soundbar – is a control 'wheel', which you can spin your finger around to adjust volume, akin to an old iPod control. It doesn't have any moving parts, it's just a nicely recessed, touch-sensitive design.

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As an object, I really like this Bose speaker's style. It's well finished, brings a 'floating' material shield to its frontage to add visual interest, while that exposed, round upfiring speaker is clearly visible on the top panel.

There are no flashy displays to distract, with only two LED dots illuminating as required: a (multi-coloured) one to the front, above the protruding Bose logo, to reflect status; another up top to signify whether the microphone is muted – so Alexa can't listen and react. It's pared back nicely.

Sound Quality

For a speaker of such diminutive size – the LS Ultra measures only 12cm wide (although it's not a cylinder, with a 16.7cm depth) – this Bose has a fair stab at audio bigger than its chassis would suggest.

It sits just 18.5cm from a surface – think of that like an adult's palm with fingers casually extended – which is near-identical to the Sonos Era 100. I've been testing the two side-by-side to gain additional context in how the Bose sounds by comparison.

What's very apparent from the off is how the Bose's additional height channel succeeds in projecting sound upwards and outwards, creating this much taller soundstage. This composition really does give the Bose an edge that's a joy – wherever it's set up for you to listen.

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Bass delivery is tight and well-shaped, too, which is to its credit. It's not nearly as bass-driven as the Sonos by comparison, but that product has a 'looser' sense to its low-end – as if it's less controlled and more warbly. Which you prefer will be a case of preference, though, noting there's simply less low-end from the Bose.

The Sonos is also inherently louder overall. The Bose isn't quiet, per se, but doesn't deliver quite the same wallop as the Era, as I've found in my A-B testing. Driving the Bose beyond 80% volume and it loses cohesion, too, lacking balanced dynamics when stretched and eventually pushing into distortion.

Keep the Bose within a sensible remit, however, and the overall sound is nicely judged, with attention to detail and decent separation that functions well across multiple genres.

And if you want to make adjustments then there's plenty of tweaking that can be done in the app – from simple bass/mid/treble levels, to a height adjustment, all proving effective.

Stereo Pair – A word of caution

When I first tried out Bose's LS Ultra Speaker, I was impressed by the promise of stereo pairing – which I heard for myself and thought sounded far better than a solo product – and even the brand-agnostic take, meaning you could add multiple non-Bose products into your setup and Cast to them.

Problem is: I can't get any of it to work. The Bose app tells me I have a stereo pair with two LS Ultra Speaker units, but it will only play from one speaker at a time. Casting from various audio sources – Spotify, Soundcloud – fails on repeat. I've hard reset the two products five times, but to no avail. My Wi-Fi connection is excellent – showing a consistent 300Mbps down, 100Mbps up at the site of testing – so that's not to blame.

I'm not the only one suffering issues either. A quick Reddit search shows up plenty of frustrated users who can't get their pairings to function correctly. Some speak of sync/timing issues (which I've not experienced at all). It seems, therefore, there are bugs afoot at the time of writing – and I'd strongly recommend not buying two LS Ultra Speaker units for stereo pairing at this time.

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On the flip side of that, I've used my two units in tandem with the excellent LS Ultra Soundbar and LS Ultra Subwoofer, creating a 7.1.4 surround sound system that's worked faultlessly for weeks. That experience, for me, has been a million miles from the stereo pairing frustrations – so I'd wholeheartedly recommend buying for a home theatre setup.

However, I think Bose could address the LS Ultra Speaker's multi-functional use aspect better. When two units are part of a home theatre setup, as shown in the Bose app, you can't simply switch off the rears (well, you can, it's a simple toggle in the app) and then use one elsewhere in your home.

It ought to be more flexible and rapid to adjust from single speaker to stereo to home theatre rears in a flash – even if that feature wasn't used frequently. I, for one, would use a single unit in my office, for example, then move it back into my home theatre setup for one of those special Dolby Atmos movie nights.

Bose Lifestyle Ultra Speaker review: Verdict

Taken from the perspective as a standalone product – as stereo pairing two units has issues in my experience – Bose's Lifestyle Ultra Speaker delivers good looks with well-judged sound.

Its upfiring channel upsell works very well, too, providing a taller and wider soundstage than many a small-scale speaker can muster. Taut bass and a balanced overall mix please, while the app provides an excellent personalisation contorls.

That upfiring output pays dividends if you're going all-out in buying a pair with the LS Ultra Soundbar and LS Ultra Subwoofer – as that home theatre package truly excels. Buy in this format, however, and you're 'locked in' – as the Speaker units effectively become dedicated rears that are too much faff to disconnect and use standalone.

It's impossible to ignore the competition, too. The similarly sized Sonos Era 100 is now far cheaper, delivering a bassier (albeit less controlled) and louder output. The Sonos Play, meanwhile, is priced the same – but doesn't have to be hard-wired to a socket at all times, bringing the versatility that many want.

All in all, then, Bose's Lifestyle Ultra Speaker gets many key components right. It looks stylish. It's got that distinctive upfiring output. The sound is nicely rounded – and easily enhanced further via the app. There's a lot that gives it an edge – but it needs a slightly broader one to really appeal to the masses.

Also Consider

There's been a big rise in powered wireless speakers of late, so don't rule out the Kanto Ren or Ruark MR1 Mk3 products of this world – which are inherently designed to be used in stereo from the off, thus justifying their asking prices.

Otherwise, in the visually like-for-like stakes, there's no denying that Sonos' now older Era 100 will save you some cash yet deliver bigger sound – just minus the upfiring addition that Bose brings to the party.