JLab - Pop Party Speaker - Black

Excellent little speaker for this price range. Sound is good. The JLab app on the phone is impressive. The settings to customize the light colors and patterns was very well done. Only purchased 1 speaker so can't comment on pairing multiple speakers together, but the ability to connect up to 100 speakers is pretty cool. The built in strap seems to be durable, and the speaker also has a strong magnet so it can easily just stick to a metal surface as well. My only complaint is that it has only a single button that has multi functionality(power on/off, play/pause, etc; depending how many times or how long you press it) versus having a separate play/pause button, next song button, volume button, etc. Still deserves a 5 star rating despite only having a single physical button. Uses the USB C charging so it's pretty easy to find a compatible charging cable. Haven't used it for a continuous 8 hours, but battery claims seem to be accurate. Definitely happy with this purchase.

Use it when doing car work or outside work!!! Loud but not too loud to get on neighbors nerves. Sticks to the fridge when not in use.

The JLAB Pop Party speaker is a small Bluetooth enabled wireless speaker. It is meant to be as portable as possible and not break the bank. At this price point it is certainly worth a look. I have owned quite a few JLAB products, and I have yet to use one that I wouldn’t buy again, so hopefully that trend continues with the Pop Party. Design The Pop Party is a compact 5W Bluetooth speaker that measures in around 4”x3”x1.75” – which is small enough for me to toss in my pocket. The speaker firm mesh grill on the front with the JLAB logo while the back carries the single passive radiator. The speaker has a cool rubber loop that slots in to a groove on top of the speaker for easy attaching and removal. The back of the speaker also has 2 decently strong magnets that are rubberized so they won’t cause any scratches. The front has a white border of glossy plastic, which is where the lightshow comes from. This plastic ring lights up completely and has 6 different LED sequence modes included a rainbow RGB wave, and a mode the bounces the light with the beat of the song. You can also toggle the light off for better battery life. The battery has an 8hr capacity, but it is cut to 5 if the LEDs are on. Around the bottom edge is the single button for the device as well as the charging port cover. Charging is done via USB-C, and the package includes a cable if you needed one. The single button is thankfully multi-functional but it can’t control everything. Volume controls are handled on your playback device (phone). However, the button can play/pause with one press, and skip to the next track with a 2sec hold. A double press cycles through the LED modes and a triple press cycles through the EQ’s. The EQ’s are JLAB Signature, Balanced, Bass Boost, and Custom. If you happen to pick up a second (or more) you can press 5x to sync the Pop Party speakers to each other. If you download the JLAB app you can modify these controls and change their defaults, which is really nice. Inside the app is also where you can modify the custom EQ to your liking. You can also modify the lighting settings – speed and brightness for each setting are available to mess with. The specs on the speaker are a little muddy. The JLAB website lists an IP55 rating (some water and dust resistance). Best Buy’s website lists it as IPX5 which is just light water protection – either way it should hold up to being caught in the rain or splashed by the sink, but it won’t like being submerged. I also can’t tell what version of Bluetooth it is using – I would assume it is a newer standard based on the ability to link 100 Pop Party speakers together. I can also get about 40ft away before I start dropping the connection, so that’s within the range of the newer Bluetooth standards. Sound Sound quality out of this little speaker is a lot better than I would have expected. It gets plenty loud and it has a decent little thump for base. Larger speakers with 2 passive radiators certainly get louder with more bass, but that’s not a guarantee of better sound. The Pop delivers a decent sound experience. Highs are pretty good – they can’t get really crisp because of the single speaker setup, but they sound good. Mids are in the same boat, but again don’t come off sounding bad at all. Honestly it’s a good sounding little speaker. Again, at this price point it is really punching above its weight class. Overall I think the JLAB Pop Party is an awesome little speaker. It has great sound for its price. Battery life is solid at 8hrs, and even 5hrs with the lights on isn’t too bad. I am a fan of the RGB LED’s, so I think it looks pretty cool. The magnetic feet are great – I have stuck it to the side of my fridge while cooking dinner and stuck it to my metal outdoor table for a firepit night. Its nice know that it won’t go rolling away like my pill-shaped speakers like to. Honestly if you want or need a little speaker to keep around, the Pop Party won’t disappoint you.

This is a hand sized party pack. As shown in my image below, it is smaller than a dollar bill in length, but this thing packs a punch for its size. Then you have the LED patterns, which you can mostly customize through the JLab app, that really make it like a little palm sized party. Then, to top it off even more, if you have more than one, apparently up to 100, you can sync them to the same device. I can only imagine how wild that would end up sounding with that many. I have two and having stereo speakers wherever you want them is fun. It has a small rubber loop on the top that can be partially detached so you can loop it around items, like the handlebars of your bicycle. It has rubber pads on the bottom so it doesn’t slide off of most surfaces and it is magnetic, so you can stick it to the fridge or something. However, the magnet isn’t all that strong, so I wouldn’t trust it on anything moving. The passive subwoofer on the bottom does make for different sounds depending on the material it is sitting on, like putting it on a metal trash can was interesting. However, through the app is where you can tweak the sound even better with the predefined EQ settings or custom. There is only 1 button on this speaker which is kind of a disadvantage. Since there is no volume rocker, the speaker relies on the source for volume control. So, if you do have multiple speakers, you can’t just turn one down. You can however change that single button for three different functions based on the number of taps. By default it is play/pause for 1, cycle lights for 2 and cycle EQ presets for 3 taps. Holding it will power it off/on and even longer for pairing. You can change the button to control track or volume, but tapping the button multiple times to step the volume of the Bluetooth source just makes you rather find your phone and turn it down there. With multiple speakers, each speaker has its own controls, but only the main one controls the source as the commands of the other only affects it, till the source is changed again, like volume. The battery life is about 5 hours with the lights on, but you can continue playing while it is plugged up. This time can be extended if you leave the lights off and it varies pending volume and cast a bit. While casting, you can assign speakers to be Left, Right or “Stereo”, but it is just a single speaker, so it is just playing both channels in one. You can also choose to sync the lights, so all speakers show the same patterns, or let them all do their own. The lights patterns are synced, but the actual effect will have its own timing per speaker. As for the lighting, you can change a fair bit of the colors, but there are some that will inject their own color regardless of your choices. Something that might change with future firmware or software updates, so make sure it is up to date through the app. This is only rated IP55, so it is safe enough for casual splashes from rain, or by the pool side. It would probably be fine even if dropped in water and recovered. However, not really meant to be submerged in water. Overall, this is a fun little speaker with a lot of sound for its size. Using the app to customize it and getting additional speakers really amps it up.

I've had a speaker of this size for quite a while that I've used and I was definitely due for an upgrade. Thankfully Jlab had just what I was looking for. Specifically, that was a decent speaker at a good price with a USB-C port that sounds larger than its size and has good connectivity with the Bluetooth and great battery life. This pop party speaker hits all those marks and then some. I noticed there is pads on the speaker looking side of it to have it sitting on a table or something to give it some air gap for bass, so while in use I noticed it sounds way better when you have it either sitting on a desk or up against the wall. In my pictures I'm included I show that I am using it while I wash dishes and I have it on a hook to where that speaker sits against the wall and it actually vibrates it so much with the bass that it makes it sound REALLY good like its a big big speaker but its small enough to be in your pocket. This is just one of the tricks ive found while in use When you first pair it it's as simple as selecting it in your bluetooth device list on your phone or other device and the volume is always controlled by your device not on the speaker. After the first pairing you can hold the power button for about eight seconds to pair with another device. The strap can be slid out horizontally so you can put it around your belt loop or a cabinet handle or anything else you can think of that fits. The app has really cool options in there for animations for the lighting which has LEDs around the perimeter that are RGB, there is a three preset EQ or you can set it to your custom once. You can sync this with up to 100 other Jlab speakers lol which is wild. If you do this you can select left or right channel to make it into a surround sound type situation. There is also options for battery saver and to power off after a certain amount of time along with turning the lights off when the battery gets to a certain percentage, all kinds of things. Mainly the thing I care about though is the fact that it sounds great, can sound better on a wooden surface to vibrate, gets loud, has good controls, great connection for long range and the battery lasts a comparable amount of time to any other one out there (hours and hours) and I have no complaints. This is an excellent value for the money.