You might not have heard of ELAC’s minimalist Bluetooth speaker before, but you should

ELAC isn't really a household name here in the UK. But the German firm has a long history – it's celebrating its 100th anniversary, as it happens. Its powered speakers have often attracted glowing reviews, and now the brand has launched a portable Bluetooth speaker using its audio expertise.

The ELAC Nava 100 comes in two colours – black and a collectable cream edition that was made in collaboration with the New York fashion brand Adsum. Both models have identical specifications.

It's fairly small – just 150mm x 78mm x 128mm – and weighs 1.4kg, making it lightweight too. But still sports a three-inch full-range driver inside with dual passive radiators, so it should deliver decent low-end thump.

ELAC Nava 100: key features and pricing

The Nava 100 has USB-C fast charging and promises up to 15 hours of play time at 25% volume, or six hours when you're maxing it out.

The internal amplifier puts out 10W RMS, and the speaker has a frequency response of 55Hz to 19.6kHz and sound pressure of 95dB.

The Bluetooth module has Bluetooth 5.3 and the speaker can be paired with another model in a stereo setup.

The ELAC Nava 100 has an RRP of £199 / $229 (about €229 / AU$399), which puts it in a similar price bracket to our current favourite Bluetooth speaker, the Beosound A1 3rd Generation.

The Beosound speaker has started to be discounted, bringing it down to around £250, while the audiophile Audio Pro P5 is currently selling for around £130. Both of those speakers are considerably more powerful than the Nava 100, at 60W and 55W respectively.

However, while this is an exceptionally crowded and competitive market sector, something as good-looking as the Nava 100 could well cut though amongst other impressive Bluetooth speakers. It's certainly an interesting and stylish alternative to some of the better-known Bluetooth brands.