For the past year or so, I’ve been trying out different digital assistants. I love the voice activated speakers that you can install around the house that integrate the assistants as a feature. It’s wonderful to be able to ask Siri or Alexa to turn off lights around the house or asking Google about the weather, calendar, or to play a game. The voice-activated speakers with digital assistant have become a staple around our house and a very welcome addition. So, when I started looking at this new line of JBL speakers, I was very excited to see that Google was included. JBL is a quality name when it comes to speakers. It’s sometimes left behind other consumer brands because they focus a lot of professional users, but this speaker, the Link 300, is a really nice example of a classy, quality speaker. For starters, it’s a standard Bluetooth speaker with a traditional set-up. When you turn it on, it automatically enters Bluetooth pairing mode and for me, it appears immediately in my Bluetooth device menu on my iPhone. I tapped on the device name and was connected. In subsequent uses, I’ve noticed a bit of a delay in connecting, but no more than I usually do with Bluetooth speakers. One nice feature of the Link 300 is that it will also connect via WiFi, which does have a stronger connection than Bluetooth. I found the sound to be of similar quality for either type of connection, but the delay was much less when connected to the WiFi than the Bluetooth. I love the look of this speaker. It’s a sleek black speaker and is about the size of a child-size football. It fits nicely on our coffee table and because it’s such a classic design, it blends in with the rest of our décor. Even though it's voice-activated, the speaker also has tactile controls on the top of it. You can play/pause music or increase/decrease the volume using the +/- buttons. One thing I want to point out is that within my collection of smart devices is a Google Home speaker. While the speaker works very well and the microphone is sensitive enough to pick up commands from our TV, it’s meant more for the Google Assistant than the speaker. JBL designed the speaker first and added in the assistant. This makes for a higher quality speaker. There are full bass sound and clear, crisp treble. Even without the Google Assistant built-in, this is a very nice speaker that would make a welcome addition to any home or office. Even though the price of this speaker is a bit higher than others in its class, I think you really get what you pay for. Set up is simple and you get a very capable digital assistant.

The market for smart speakers that control home automation or do other tricks is growing and becoming more saturated. While the Home is a competent device, I never warmed to it from a sound perspective. I loved the power of Google Assistant, but in the Home, it was hampered by a speaker setup that wasn't as good as competitors. Enter the JBL LINK 300... this bad boy is designed more like the new Home Max. It supports Wifi and Bluetooth connectivity, but don't go thinking you can Aux in - the LINK 300 only supports Wifi for streaming / Assistant requests and Bluetooth for streaming / casting. Compared to the Home, Echo, etc - this thing is a beast. It's big. There's other smaller speakers in the LINK family that I'm sure offer battery life - but the LINK 300 requires a plug in all the time, just like a Home or Echo. I've found the responsiveness of the voice recognition to be very good. I've been at the other end of the room and simply saying, "OK Google" and this thing hears me. Set up is handled just like other Google smart devices, using the Google Home App. It was pretty easy to add it to my existing Google device setup. If you're an avid user of Google's products, then the JBL LINK 300 is a great speaker. If you're an iPhone user, be prepared to be using the Bluetooth functionality a lot. Compared to the other Google products, the reason I like the LINK 300 better is that it's JBL - a company that has been in the business of making speakers for years. The reason for the 4-star rating is the lack of Aux input, battery option and the overall clunky setup of adding smart home devices to my Google setup - I know this is more of a ding on Google, but since JBL is partnering with Google, they take the hit too.

The JBL Link 300 Speaker sounds great and because it has the Google voice assistant built-in, is easy to use. It really packs a punch with clear highs and deep lows for its size. Like most Google-enabled home speakers, it can also connect to phones and tablets as a bluetooth speaker. There are six (6) access buttons on top of the speaker to supplement the voice-enabled commands. Here is where my first small complaint about this speaker comes in: the button that initiates the Google Voice Commands has a nice indent and is easy to find by touch alone. This is great at night or in low-light conditions when you want push a button but are not looking at the top of the speaker. All other buttons are flush to the top surface of the speaker and have no tactile indication of where they are or what they do. In other words, these other buttons (volume up/down, play/pause, mute, etc.) are really only usable in normal room lighting and when looking directly at the top of the speaker; you can’t really feel for them. My preference would be to at least have a raised dot on each so you can feel for the Voice button’s indent and then count the dots to either side to determine where the buttons are and what they do; first dot to the right of the Voice button is volume down, next over is volume up, etc… My next small complaint is that there is a white WiFi icon on the front that stays on 100% of the time when the speaker is plugged in and connected to WiFi. While this is nice to know when the speaker is disconnected (by the color change of the icon, etc.), it also is a bright glowing LED at night - not great when you’re trying to sleep. It would be nice if that LED would turn on when the speaker first connects to WiFi and again when commands are initiated but then turn off until there is a status change. Aside from these two small nits, the speaker sounds great, is compact and attractive. It does exactly what you’d expect it to do; be a (mostly) unobtrusive access point for the Google Assistant and a nice speaker for music playback.

This JBL Link 300 is incredible classy device that delivers clear and signature sound with crispy bass.Design is sleek and you are free to stream music drom your own library vis BT or wifi, Google assistant is a huge addition and handy assistant that can control your music and any smart devices such Philips Hue lights.

I already owned a Google Home and recently acquired a Google Home Mini, so I knew going into using the JBL Link 300 I was going to be a fan of the built-in Google Assistant. It's a great-sounding speaker and will fill the role of a normal Google Home if you're looking for something that sounds better, but don't want to go all the way up to the Google Home Max. In the box you will get the speaker, manuals, and a power adapter. The photos on JBL's website make it look like this doesn't have to be plugged in, but it does need to be powered off of an outlet. Setup is extremely simple with the Google Home app - if you've setup a regular Google Home or Google Home Mini this is exactly the same process and doesn't take more than a few minutes. On the speaker itself you get an array of buttons across the top of it. They're decently large and well separated, but besides the plastic Google Assistant button in the middle, the other buttons are all underneath the same layer of rubber. They're actually pretty easy to press, but it's tough to know whether or not you've pressed them by feel. I'm kind of split on the design on this thing. I like the understated look; it's the kind of thing you can put up on a shelf and it won't stick out like a sore thumb. At the same time the oval shape seems a bit odd to me. There's also an always on LED on the front of it. Using the speaker is, again, just like using a Google Home. You can Chromecast to it with Spotify, Google Music, etc. You can also play music by voice and control other Chromecasts and speakers through it. The sound quality is a big improvement over the regular Google Home and easily fills our entire living room with sound. The built-in microphones seem to function just as well as the Google Home as well. The speaker also had Bluetooth as well, but no 3.5mm jack. If you're already in the Amazon Echo camp then this is probably a tougher sell, but if you already use a Chromecast or Google Home then this is a really nice home speaker.