Best Soundbar under $500

VIZIO SB3821-C6 38-Inch 2.1 Ch Sound Bar

Built on Cutting Edge Sound Engineering

A 2.1 sound system isn’t exactly the same as a full surround sound speaker system, but they’ll still be more than enough for a fully equipped home theater system. The Vizio SB3821-C6 offers a maximum sensitivity of a full hundred decibels, so it can absolutely fill a room with sound, and the separate subwoofer unit offers a lot of extra oomph to the bass: a choice that really excels with action movies and video games.

Setting up this soundbar won’t be too much of a hassle either. A Bluetooth receiver is built right in, so you can connect to both your monitor and your phone or tablet for easy access to music, movies, and TV shows without cords having to get in the way. The design is worthy of praise too. It bucks ostentatious to create a sleek and stylish – but unassuming – soundbar equipped for a living room of any size.

Sonos Beam Smart TV Sound Bar

A Modular Hub For Your Entertainment Center

15 years after their first speaker debuted, Sonos is still one of the coolest brands in the business. The Sonos Beam soundbar is relatively cheap and sports a modular design that’s intended to connect to other speakers, but it offers some decently heft sound performance all on its own too. But what really sets the Beam apart is how smart it is. A built in Alexa means it can operate as a smart speaker independent of any other source devices in your living room.

The Sonos Beam is one of the smallest soundbars available, but it’s got some weight behind it. The soundscape it creates is immersive and enveloping, with an especially meaningful sense of bass quality. As far as streaming goes, Sonos has done a good job of roping in as many different services as possible. As more and more devices are tied into a single ecosystem, it’s nice to see something more wide open.

TaoTronics Bluetooth Sound Bar Audio

A Cheap Soundbar That’s Not Cheaply Made

TaoTronics is known for one thing above all else: producing cheap headphones and speakers around. This TaoTronics soundbar isn’t the most feature rich soundbar available for under $500, but it is definitely the best value around. This soundbar bears a retail price of well under a hundred bucks but managed to pack in two passive radiators to complement the bass delivered by the four full range drivers.

This soundbar even offers full wireless capabilities, so you can connect over Bluetooth without having to worry about making sure that cables are properly plugged in. The design is pretty slick for such a budget soundbar too – taking a traditionally dark and classy soundbar design and skewing the angles just so to create one of the most attractive soundbar designs we’ve encountered. And if you’d prefer to not connect wirelessly, this soundbar also includes aux, coaxial, optical,and RCA inputs as well.

Yamaha YAS-207BL Sound Bar

Full Sound for a Small Price

The Yamaha YAS-207BL isn’t the lowest budget soundbar on our list, but it does offer what may be the best value today. Its wireless design and Bluetooth support means that hooking up most modern devices are easy, but there’s easy connectivity through HDMI or optical audio as well. But the killer feature here is undoubtedly the inclusion of a separate subwoofer. This is a 2.1 system through and through, and that alone puts it above most of the models on our list in terms of audio fidelity.

It also comes with a few pretty cool features. The virtual surround sound isn’t going to match what you’d find from a true surround speaker setup, but it’s better than any other surround options available in this price range. There’s also a special mode for creating more definition to dialogue and narration and a remote control app for your phone.

Wohome TV Sound Bar

Delivering a 3D Audio Experience

The S9920 came out the gate with a retail price of around $100, but the fact that it comes from a lesser known manufacturer like Wohome means that they had to work harder to earn an audience. This soundbar makes use of the latest Bluetooth 5.0 protocol, and it also includes aux and optical outputs along with cables for wired connections. The sensitivity level is enough to fully fill your room, and there’s even virtual 3D surround sound to create a more immersive living experience.

This soundbar also includes two bass reflex tubes. It’s obviously not the same as having a full 2.1 sound system, but it does add quite a bit more heft to the stereo bass performance. This soundbar comes with a dedicated wireless remote control but also offers built-in controls so you can adjust volume and inputs directly from the soundbar itself.

Samsung HW-R550 2.1 Soundbar

A Sound Bar Tailor Built for Gaming

Samsung proves that they create not just some of the best TVs and phones but some of the best speaker systems too. And while this is a soundbar that will really benefit you if you already own Samsung products (it offers seamless integration with Samsung TVs), it’s a great choice for any home. It comes with a dedicated and separate wireless subwoofer and clutter free wireless connectivity for the main soundbar unit also.

But Samsung’s soundbar comes with some cool features built right in as well, so you won’t have to spend too much time tweaking your settings. A dedicated game mode puts more emphasis on in-game effects so you have more sensory tools when facing down opposition, and the Smart Sound experience creates some finely tuned settings based off of the content that you’re watching or listening to.

BYL Soundbar

Bestisan doesn’t offer the best raw power for a soundbar under $500, but it bears a tag of under $100, and JBL has included some smart features that help shore up some of those unavoidable issues. It uses the latest 5.0 version of Bluetooth for better connectivity with all of your streaming devices and delivers full 360 degree sound. Surround sound this isn’t, but it’s still a whole sight better than most budget stereo soundbars.

And if you like to fine tune your sound to your exact specifications, it’s easy with this soundbar. Built in memory allows you to save a profile exactly the way you want it and cater your sound to suit your preferred listening experiences. And it might not be the most lightweight or compact soundbar that we’ve seen, but the wedge style form factor allows it to comfortably fit underneath even a shorter TV.

Polk Audio Command Sound Bar

Polk is a speaker brand that’s synonymous with quality for most audiophiles, but just because their sound design is so strong doesn’t mean that they truck exclusively in high end luxury speakers. The Polk Audio Command soundbar offers support for both Dolby and DTS surround sound, and the inclusion of an Alexa speaker means that the Polk Audio Command really can serve as the command center for your entire living room or home theater.

This isn’t proprietary either. Support is also available for Fire TV. If you like more talky programs, the voice adjust technology will give you clearer and crisper dialogue without getting crowded out by music or ambient sound. This model from Polk Audio even comes with its own wireless subwoofer – a choice that gives quite a bit of extra juice to the bass levels. And with dual HDMI 2.0a outputs, it’s ready to handle 4K content

Bose SoundTouch 300 Soundbar

A lot of premium manufacturers are imitating the design of the Sonos Beam, but the Bose SoundTouch 300 is perhaps the best of the bunch. It’s fully wireless, incredibly sleek, and stylish in a way that can either take center stage or take a back seat to your other sound system components, and its modular design makes it easy to expand this soundbar with satellite speakers and a subwoofer. For those on a budget of under $500, this is a luxury soundbar, and that really comes through in the audio quality.

Most people who are hooking a soundbar to their TV are going to be listening to a lot of dialogue, and the SoundTouch 300 soundbar can help with that by offering greater clarity and a superb balance between vocals and effects. Then there’s PhaseGuide technology, which offers a smart sonic soundscape that builds off the fundamentals of surround sound.

TCL Alto 7+ 2.1 ChHome Theater Sound Bar

Need a soundbar that can best keep up with the bombastic explosions of your favorite action movies and AAA games? The TCL Alto 7+ is definitely up to the task. This is a 2.1 soundbar system, and there’s a sense of weight to the bass the amplifier delivers that really separates the audio quality of this soundbar from the rest of the herd. And with the drivers devoted solely to the mids and highs, you can count on some exceptional treble sound quality also.

And you won’t have to constantly fine tune the settings either. A number of presets are available, allowing you to seamlessly transition between explosive films and more dialogue driven television without having to perform any tweaks. Everything on this soundbar is fully wireless, so you can stream content directly from your phone and don’t need to worry about a nest of cables building up.