BolaButty Review

Our BolaButty Experience

We pulled the BolaButty and immediately paired it with our phones. There were no surprises here; we simply turned it on, put it in pairing mode, found it in our Bluetooth settings, and were ready to go in less than a minute. We oohed and ahhed over the party lights

Things went downhill from there. We started playing music and were met with a flat and small-sounding version of our go-to playlist. If we had to compare, we'd say it sounds muffled and processed like a miniature car stereo from the 90s.

The BolaButty has an aux port, so you can switch DJs without pausing to pair a new device.   Credit: Matt Lighthart

This speaker has straightforward controls, though the buttons need a hard press to activate.   Credit: Matt Lighthart

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Analysis and Test Results

Sound Quality

Overall, the music that comes from the BolaButty sounds like it's coming from inside a box. The sound profile is muddled, rather than detailed, and vocals sometimes sound like the lead singer is standing a bit to far from the mic. Our tester noted that listening “felt like the sonic equivalent of a squint.” It's also very compressed, so it takes songs with a punchy impactful base and makes them sound dull.

The bass sounds muddy and muffled in drum-heavy tracks like “Back in Black” by AC/DC, almost like it was coming from underwater. While it has more power than most smaller speakers we tested, the clarity is far worse. The lows become way too thumpy for our ears to handle, and when cranked up to the highest volume, it sounded like the speaker could blow any second.

The BolaButty has an unpleasant, manufactured sound.   Credit: Matt Lighthart

This speaker sounds almost no better than an iPhone.   Credit: Matt Lighthart

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The mids and trebles are just as disappointing. The high notes often sounded harsh and piercing if the volume was too loud (and this speaker doesn't get very loud to begin with). We noticed this mostly when listening to rock or husky music. When listening to Jessie Murph's “Easy Sunday Living”, we had to turn the volume down to keep the hi-hats from sounding like a hissing mess. Murph's raspy vocals were forward in the mix but felt piercing rather than gently guiding the track, especially when she started belting the chorus.

The BolaButty claims to have immersive sound, but we could mostly hear it from the front of the speaker, with just a bit coming out of the sides and the back. Unfortunately, even with this spread, the soundstage is still flat. Where some speakers can make you feel like you're sitting center stage in front of your favorite band, the BolaButty sounds small and boxed in. Literally like the music is coming from inside a box. Texturally, it also sounds simplistic and lacks detail.

The lanyard is long, which is good for carrying by hand. But, when we use a carabiner to clip it to a backpack it tends to swing around.   Credit: Matt Lighthart

It's easy to carry the BolaButty from room to room.   Credit: Matt Lighthart

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Portability

The BolaButty weighs 0.9 lbs, making it one of the lighter compact speakers we tested, though not the lightest.

About the size of a bottle, the BolaButty easily fits in a side pocket.   Credit: Matt Lighthart

The long lanyard on the BolaButty is also good for hanging it up high.   Credit: Matt Lighthart

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It's about the size of two soda cans stacked on top of one another. In other words, small enough to toss in your backpack or tote bag before heading to the park. It will even fit in the water bottle cage on your bike.

Volume

The BolaButty is one of the quietest speakers we tested at 83.3 decibels. For reference, that's about as loud as a phone speaker gets. But as you know from earlier in this article, the sound quality is about the same as a phone speaker too, and the louder this speaker gets, the worse it sounds. It can feel like listening to a vintage radio. If that's your thing, cool, but we'll stick with more modern hi-fi options.

With a lower max volume, it's one of the few speakers we could turn all the way up without totally hurting our eardrums, though at its loudest, this speaker sounds like it's rumbling to its deathbed. It's better enjoyed at 60%-80% volume. It also doesn't have the same carrying power as a lot of the speakers we tested, and it didn't manage to do much beyond make some background noise when we played it during a dinner party with friends.

Drop Test

The BolaButty is not a buy-it-for-life speaker. We performed intentional drop tests by knocking it off the edge of our desk. Other speakers were able to take this 3-foot drop multiple times with barely a scratch. But the BolaButty has hard plastic bumpers that cracked easily when it hit the floor. And the damage reach the internal tech too; the speaker was badly distorted and unusable afterward.

Assuming you don't drop the speaker, it still has subpar water resistance compared to others. Rated at IPX5, it can withstand some light splashes, but not submersion, and the charging port needs to be closed when it's near water. It is not rated for dust protection.

Battery

An extra long battery life is the BolaButty's strong point. We measured it at an incredible 60 hours 46 minutes. We were able to stretch the battery for several weeks between charging if we listening for just a couple of hours a day.

Ease of Use

While it was easy to pair, this unit occasionally had a spotty connection, even when it was nearby. It also automatically disconnects at 86 feet away. This is about half the range of other speakers, but it is plenty for you to move around in a smaller home and backyard. It's not as great for listening in large outdoor spaces, and the connectivity may be even spottier if there are many walls between your phone and the speaker.

This speaker does not have many extras. We were disappointed to find that it doesn't have a dedicated app, it can't connect to multiple phones at once, and we couldn't adjust the sound profile, which is a very common feature even on budget speakers.