Tronsmart Force review

The Tronsmart Force is an outdoor-focused Bluetooth speaker that offers big sound, long battery life and booming bass for less than £70/$60. It’s entering a market full of impressive Bluetooth speakers, but we think Tronsmart’s latest offering has enough on offer to tempt consumers away from more established brands.

We’ve spent some time jamming to tunes using the Tronsmart Force Bluetooth speaker, and here’s what we think.

Pricing and availability

The Tronsmart Force Bluetooth speaker is a wallet-friendly option for consumers at £69.99 in the UK and $59.99 in the US via Amazon. That’s great value for money, especially when you consider the relatively high-end features on offer from the speaker, including IPX7 waterproofing, microSD card support and a 40W output.

It’s more expensive than the likes of the £49.99 Aukley Eclipse, one of our favourite budget Bluetooth speaker right now, but can it offer a more impressive audio experience? Carry on reading to find out.

Robust design

The Tronsmart Force is a Bluetooth speaker built for the outdoors, sporting a robust rectangular design with a grippy rubber surround and a black metal grille on the front and rear of the device.

Even if you do have to put the speaker in a bag or rucksack, it’s relatively small when you consider the 40W output on offer. Measuring in at 204 x 64 x 80mm and weighing 780g, it’s admittedly not as portable as some outdoor speakers on the market, but the robust design, long battery life and impressive audio on offer from the Tronsmart Force makes the extra bulk worth it.

It also boasts IPX7 dust and water resistance, meaning it should survive a dunk in the pool for up to 30 minutes without any lasting damage. It’s also shockproof, and should survive a drop or two.

The outdoors-y design doesn’t mean it skimps on smarts either; you can access Siri or Google Assistant (based on your OS) with a tap of the power button, and there’s a number of ways to use it too. Alongside Bluetooth 5.0 and NFC support, the Tronsmart Force sports a 3.5mm jack for non-Bluetooth devices and a microSD card slot for standalone music playback.

Decent battery life

The outdoor focus of the portable speaker also translates to decent battery life, because where would you find a power source at the beach? The good news is that it lasts around 15 hours on a single charge, thanks to the combination of two 3300mAh batteries, and a 3hr charge time isn’t too bad either.

Interestingly, it also features a USB-C port for fast charging purposes.

Great audio for the price

Most importantly, the Tronsmart Pulse provides great audio – especially for the sub-£70/$60 pricetag. The portable speaker features dual passive radiators alongside two 20W drivers for a total output of 40W, and it packs a punch too. Those passive radiators work hard to produce well-rounded bass free of distortion – for the most part anyway.

The speaker offers a built-in EQ with three modes; 3D Stereo, Extra Bass and Standard. 3D Stereo widens the soundscape and produces room-filling audio, while Extra Bass does what it says on the tin – provides booming bass, ideal for party situations.

These two modes perform surprisingly well at low- and mid-volume, but you start to lose that quality as the volume approaches the maximum. It’s at this point that the Standard EQ comes into play, removing all the digital effects and restoring some of that lost quality.

Essentially, the EQ does a good job at low and medium volumes (aka the volume it’ll be used at most of the time) but the enhancements do start to sound distorted and harsh at high volume.

Generally, though, the Tronsmart Pulse provides deep bass, clear mids and crisp highs, although that crispness is sometimes sacrificed in favour of overpowering bass tones. But for the price, you’ll struggle to find something with this much prominence.

Oh, and it can also link up with a second Force speaker to provide stereo output, ideal for larger gatherings.

Verdict

The Tronsmart Force is a great portable speaker built for the outdoors with IPX7 water- and dustproofing and a shock-resistant design, but that doesn’t mean it sacrifices on smarts or audio quality. It offers a combination of Bluetooth 5.0 with NFC, aux-in and the ability to play media via the built-in microSD card slot, and lasts up to 15 hours on a single charge too.

The audio is impressive for the price, with booming bass, clear vocals and enough volume to fill a small-to-medium-sized room. The built-in EQ does a surprisingly good job at producing 3D audio and widening the soundscape, although you do begin to lose the clarity at high volume.

All that for less than £70/$60? That’s not bad.