JBL Pulse 2 Review

Sound Quality

If there was one thing that we loved about the first generation Pulse is its clarity of reproducing sound and it only gets better with the Pulse 2. Thanks to its dual passive bass radiators the lows now have more oomph and together with its crystal clear sound, they combine for an auditory experience that we (and everyone else who heard it) enjoyed.

Even though the speaker has dual-firing bass radiators on opposite ends doesn’t mean it always has to be played on its side since a built-in sensor detects the orientation and adjusts accordingly. This means the speaker could switch up where to throw the sound: on both sides or just upward when it’s standing up.

Battery Life

The Pulse 2 packs a 6000mAh battery which is a significant jump from the previous 4000mAh. Claimed by JBL to have a 10-hour battery life, it was able to last only 5 hours and 17 minutes of continuous music playback.

This is somewhat understandable, though, as we were streaming music using Bluetooth with about 75% volume and LED light show on. With those happening all at the same time, lasting more than 5 hours isn’t bad at all whether I was in my room, at a friend’s house party, or outside on a beach.

Conclusion

The Pulse 2 is another winner from JBL and is fitting to be called a successor. Overall, they improved the strengths of the original Pulse (LED lights, build quality, sound reproduction), further tweaked its weakness (better bass), and added new features to make it more appealing to consumers (splash-proof, JBL Prism, JBL Connect app).

It ditched some of the old features like NFC which was a nice touch, so we’re a bit sad to see it go. Also, putting in additional hardware in the form of the JBL Prism, to us, could be gimmicky as we didn’t use it that much during our time with the device. This only added a fair chunk to the price tag of the speaker and we see it only as a way to impress people who see the Pulse 2 for the first time. We’re not sure, but it could be what the company was gunning for since this is a party speaker anyway.

As someone who bought the original Pulse, would I buy the Pulse 2 for myself again? Yes.

The JBL Pulse 2 has an SRP of Php9,995USD 170INR 14,439EUR 162CNY 1,240 and are available locally in the following stores:

JBL Sound Gallery – B3 Bonifacio High Street (beside TGIFriday’s and Happy Lemon), 799-9344
JBL Acoustical Space – 4th Floor SM Megamall Cyberzone, 919-6012
JBL Digital Dreams – 4th Floor SM North EDSA Annex, 738-2554
JBL / Harman Kardon – Level 3 Mindanao Wing TriNoma
JBL / Harman Kardon – 3rd Floor Fairview Terraces

JBL Pulse 2 specs:
Dual external passive bass radiators
Transducer: 2x 45mm
Frequency response: 85Hz – 20kHz
Bluetooth 4.1
Splash-proof body
6000mAh battery
84.2 x 194.4 x 84.2mm
775 grams

What we liked about it:

• More robust build
• Splashproof
• Better lights than Pulse
• Clear sound reproduction
• Mids are exceptional
• Loud volume
• More powerful bass than Pulse

What we didn’t like:

• No NFC
• Color sensor could be gimmicky