Wondering what Wi-Fi 6 is? It’s the latest wireless standard, which was updated in 2019 and has since become a standard for next-gen devices. Almost every new phone, computer and television supports Wi-Fi 6, including gaming consoles like the PlayStation 5.
Having Wi-Fi 6 internet in your smart home is the best way to get the fastest speeds and newest features, but you need a compatible wireless router to do that.
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There are a bunch of great options for $100 or less, and right now you can score deals on some of our favorite routers for 2022. Check out our list of the best Wi-Fi 6 router deals below.
Amazon
TP-Link AX1800 Wi-Fi 6 router with Alexa: $80
Save $20
Jun 2022
This tops our list of best Wi-Fi 6 routers for 2022 for many reasons, and right now, you can save $20 when you buy it on Amazon. The regular price is $100, but you can get it now for $80. This router is great for small- to medium-sized homes.
$80 at Amazon$106 at WalmartGet Price AlertsYou’re receiving price alerts for TP-Link Archer AX21
Best Buy
Netgear AX1800 Wi-Fi 6 router: $120
Save $20
Perfect for small to medium homes up to 1,500 square feet, this modem offers speeds up to 1.8Gbps. It can connect up to 20 different devices at once and boasts a quad-core 1.5GHz processor. It’s originally $140, but you can save $20 on this router at Best Buy.
$140 at Best Buy$140 at Target$140 at CrutchfieldYou’re receiving price alerts for Netgear AX1800 Wi-Fi 6 router: $120
Amazon
Netgear 4-stream AX1800 Wi-Fi 6 router: $60
Save $90
Another great deal by Netgear, this wireless router is a version of the AX1800. It offers 1.8Gbps speeds and works with any internet provider. You can keep all connected devices secure with antivirus, antimalware and data theft protection with Netgear Armor and Smart Parental Controls.
$70 at AmazonGet Price AlertsYou’re receiving price alerts for Netgear 4-stream AX1800 Wi-Fi 6 router: $60
Amazon
Amazon Eero 6 Plus mesh Wi-Fi 6 router: $111
Save $28
Voted one of our favorite Wi-Fi 6 routers for 2022, the Eero can cover a lot of space for those living in a multistory home. Right now, you can save 20% on the router when you order it on Amazon. It offers support for full-width 160MHz channels, allowing the system to move data twice as efficiently to compatible devices.
$90 at Amazon
Walmart
Netgear Nighthawk AX4200 Wi-Fi 6 router: $127
Save $20
The Netgear Nighthawk looks pretty intimidating, and that’s because it delivers speeds up to 4.2Gbps speeds. It also has a 1.5GHz triple-core processor for superior performance when you’re streaming multimedia across several devices at once. This router is ideal for large homes.
This tri-band router delivers speeds up to 10.8 Gbps while using 12-streams to connect more devices and simultaneously reducing network congestion. It comes equipped with next-level antivirus and robust parental controls, minimizes Wi-Fi interference and increases battery life for mobile devices.
$247 at Best Buy
Best Buy
Asus ROG Rapture GT-AX6000 Dual-Band Wi-Fi 6 Router: $352
Save $48
With speeds of up to 11,000 Mbps, this router delivers interruption-free connectivity throughout intense games and binge-watching sessions. Built-in network security defends against potential breaches. This router is ideal for large homes and smart home devices. You can connect all your wireless devices while enjoying a 2.5 Gbps gaming port for maximum speeds.
$352 at Best Buy
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If you don’t want voice control, you don’t have to have it: All the speakers here will work just fine without it, either because they lack mics or you can physically shut them off. Either way, you don’t need to spend very much. A fantastic “dumb” multiroom speaker like the Ikea Symfonisk Bookshelf starts at $120. There are a number of standards though, and if you’re filling a house with them you want to make sure they’ll work together. So, to make sense of it all, keep reading for the best Wi-Fi speakers for your needs.
Sarah Tew/CNET
Sonos One
Best speaker overall, best AirPlay speaker
Oct 2021
At $220, and with both Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant as well as excellent sound quality, the Sonos One is the smart speaker to get and will please any music fan. Pair this compact speaker with another Sonos One and Apple AirPlay 2 for a flexible, high-quality some theater speaker system which responds to voice commands for less than the price of the Play:5. Don’t want voice control? Get the Sonos One SL — it’s virtually identical, but lacks the microphones.
$219 at Audio AdviceGet Price AlertsYou’re receiving price alerts for Sonos One (Gen 2, Black)
Sarah Tew/CNET
Ikea Wi-Fi Symfonisk Bookshelf
Best budget speaker
For $120 there’s a number of excellent smart speakers to choose from, including the Amazon Echo, Nest Audio and HomePod Mini, but the Symfonisk is bigger than all of them. Bigger cabinets usually mean bigger sound. While this speaker is best as part of a Sonos surround sound system, it also makes a great kids’ room or garage speaker.
Sonos One is the best sounding smart speaker you can…
1:44
Sarah Tew/CNET
JBL Playlist 150
Best for Android users
Google may offer a lot of speakers, including the Nest Audio, but the one that was truly great with music — the Home Max — has been discontinued. It’s surprising then that the list of affordable-yet-good-sounding Chromecast built-in speakers can be counted on the fingers on one hand. And of those, the JBL Playlist is the best I’ve heard, with a generously sized speaker and enough volume to fill a typical room. It also has Bluetooth and an auxiliary input to expand its flexibility. It may not be “smart”, but if you want a system that can be controlled via an existing Google Assistant speaker, this is the one to get.
$180 at AmazonGet Price AlertsYou’re receiving price alerts for JBL Playlist (Black)
Sarah Tew/CNET
Amazon Echo Studio
The best sounding Amazon Echo
The Echo Studio comes from the house of Amazon – the creator of Alexa. It is easy to set up and is loud enough to fill a room with sound. With thumping bass, clear sound and good highs, this is easily the best Amazon Echo. You can use Alexa to stream songs from Amazon Music, Apple Music, Spotify, Pandora, Tidal and more.
$200 at Amazon$200 at TargetGet Price Alerts$200 at Best BuyYou’re receiving price alerts for Amazon Echo Studio
David Carnoy/CNET
Sonos Roam
Best portable speaker
The Sonos Roam is a portable Bluetooth speaker on steroids — it can be used out-and-about or it can be used as part of a Sonos multiroom system. It’s affordable (for Sonos, that is) and it sounds better than other products of its type. It also comes with a choice of voice assistant to make choosing a song even simpler.
$179 at Sonos, Inc.$179 at TargetGet Price Alerts$150 at Best BuyYou’re receiving price alerts for Sonos Roam
We also tested
JBL Link Portable ($180): The Link Portable is a larger-size competitor to the Sonos, being both Wi-Fi and Bluetooth compatible, and it can play louder and with weightier bass. In his review of the Sonos Roam, reviewer David Carnoy says he preferred the sound and build quality of the Sonos and would buy it over the JBL.
Bose Home Speaker 300 ($259): If you’re after a responsive smart speaker, the Bose Home Speaker 300 is both snappy in operation and lovely to look at. In terms of audio quality, however, it doesn’t measure up to its competitor, the cheaper Sonos One. In addition, the onboard Bose Music multiroom system is not compatible with existing SoundTouch products. The 300 appears to be out of production but is still available at many places. Read CNET’s review of the Bose Home Speaker 300.
Bowers and Wilkins Formation Flex ($500): A smaller brother to the flashy Formation Wedge, the Flex is still quite stylish and boasts an open-hearted sonic signature. There’s plenty of competition at this level though, including the Sonos Five, which is capable of a much bigger, party-ready performance. Read CNET’s first take on the Formation range.
The Sonos Move
David Carnoy/CNET
Sonos Move ($399): If you want a wireless speaker model that’s (kinda) portable and water resistant, the Sonos Move offers great sound in a very large box. If you need to power a tailgate or large party this would be great, but for most people the Sonos Roam is both cheaper and more pocketable. Read CNET”s review of the Sonos Move.
Sony SRS-RA5000 ($598): Where are people supposed to put large speakers like the Sony SRS-RA5000 and the McIntosh RS150? A dressing table — like, a really big one? The Sony is over a foot tall but adding to its potential awkwardness is its 360-degree playback, making the “best” place to put it at the center of a room. The sound is fine, but if you want to hear 3D audio, the Amazon Echo Studio is a quarter of the price. Read CNET’s first take on the on the Sony SRS-RA5000
McIntosh RS150 ($1,200): The massive McIntosh RS150 has some great things going for it — namely Chromecast built-in, Roon Ready and Spotify Connect capabilities. Nonetheless, the sound wasn’t as clear as I’d expected and the unit offers no EQ controls to compensate. In addition, while the previous RS100 had the fabled McIntosh blue meter this update misses a trick by replacing it with LEDs. The competitive Naim Mu-so Qb is more compact and offers excellent performance for the same price.
How does CNET test Wi-Fi speakers?
CNET follows a rigorous, unbiased evaluation process for all of our audio testing. We test Wi-Fi speakers ranging from simple bedside speakers all the way through to high-end systems. Our audio lab includes a Roon server running on a Synology NAS, Google Nest and Amazon Echo speakers, plus both iOS and Android devices. Similar speakers are compared side by side in a living room environment with different styles of music and utilizing multiple streaming platforms when required. We grade the sound quality of each by evaluating clarity, dynamics, bass response and stereo imaging (if applicable). If the speaker comes with a proprietary app we will compare that to other competitive controllers.
Wi-Fi Speaker FAQs
Is Bluetooth better than Wi-Fi?
Both of them can be termed as wireless speaker system. Wi-Fi delivers the same basic convenience as Bluetooth: using your phone’s Wi-Fi connection to play music over an external speaker or sound system. Just like speakers that use Bluetooth connectivity, it can work with a subscription music service app such as Spotify (via Spotify Connect) or Apple Music, a radio service like Pandora or TuneIn, or your own music collection. Here are the best reasons to get a streaming Wi-Fi speaker:
A Wi-Fi speaker sounds better than a Bluetooth speaker due to its higher bandwidth.
Wi-Fi has better range.
Wi-Fi doesn’t take over your phone’s audio channel — so you can take a call without interrupting the song, for example.
It also works great for multiroom audio, allowing playback from multiple speakers all over the house via your Wi-Fi network, all controlled by a single phone app.
How do multiroom speakers work?
Mutliroom enables users to play from one or multiple speakers anywhere in the house at once, with most systems able to support up to a dozen or more different zones. If you want to play a song in “house party mode,” for example, where it blasts from multiple speakers throughout the house simultaneously, all of those speakers have to share the same ecosystem. For Sonos and other proprietary systems, all of those speakers will have to be Sonos (or connected to a Sonos device). For Chromecast, all of the speakers regardless of brand, will need to be Chromecast-compatible. And so on.
How do I connect my WiFi to my music?
Most speakers come with a dedicated companion app for iOS and Android which is used for both setting up and controlling your system. It goes without saying that you’ll need a internet connection to use a Wi-Fi speaker and most speakers support at least 2.4GHz connections or even 5Ghz. Check your documentation for the name of the app you need and make sure you also have your Wi-Fi password handy. Most apps use a simple step-by-step process and you should be listening to music in a matter of minutes.
What are the different Wi-Fi music standards?
When you buy a Wi-Fi speaker, you’re also investing in an ecosystem — a family of products and apps that work together, but don’t always work with other ecosystems. Here’s a look at the major Wi-Fi systems out there today.
Sonos: It’s kind of expensive and a little exclusive, but Sonos still offers some of the best home speaker hardware available. The company is moving away from the megalithic single app in favor of supporting third-party music services natively (Spotify Connect, Apple AirPlay 2). Considering the exacting sound quality and the bomb-proof build, Sonos is still the premium Wi-Fi system to get. The release of Ikea’s Symfonisk range also makes the system more affordable.
Apple AirPlay/AirPlay 2: The reach of Apple’s AirPlay 2 will continue to grow alongside its Music streaming service — with its most intriguing feature being multiroom — but there are plenty of speakers out there that still support the original AirPlay. Great for iPhone users.
Built-in Chromecast: For the cost of entry and ease of use and setup, Chromecast built-in is our current favorite Wi-Fi music system. There are no new apps to learn — just press Cast in a compatible app and music will play out of your speaker(s) of choice.
Amazon Multi Room Music: The speaker market has been upended by Amazon’s Echo speaker family, which combines wireless audio with voice control and home automation. MRM has been slow to take off, however, in part because third-party device support is scarce.
There are a number of other Wi-Fi systems, some open and some specific to the single manufacturer. These include: Yamaha MusicCast, Denon HEOS, Bowers and Wilkins Formation, Bose Music and Bluesound.
Most Wi-Fi speaker products support streaming services such as Pandora and Spotify, but double-check first to be sure. Is your music stored in iTunes, Google Play Music or Amazon Music? You’ll still be fine with a Sonos (for instance), but other products may support as many platforms.
Just like sound bars, the sweet spot for Wi-Fi speakers are at the budget end. In this case, it’s under $200.
Sure, paying up to $500 will get you a bigger cabinet and better sound, but at that point you are probably better off with a sound bar or stereo system. And plenty of options cost less than $200, but the ones we’ve heard just don’t sound as good. If you’re shopping in that range, you might as well get a Bluetooth speaker.
I recently listened to eight Wi-Fi speakers under $200 and most were surprisingly capable. And if your focus is on listening to music rather than the voice of a digital assistant, all sound better than the Google Home or Amazon’s Echo speakers. Of the models I tested, however, only one combined the best of both worlds: excellent sound and voice control. That’s the Sonos One.
But first: Wi-Fi or Bluetooth?
In our comparison of Bluetooth versus Wi-Fi I evaluated various flavors of music streaming methods and found that the Wi-Fi protocol Chromecast, followed by AirPlay, was the best option. But if you need more convincing, here are the pluses and minuses of both Bluetooth and Wi-Fi.
Bluetooth
Good: Convenient, excellent compatibility, doesn’t require a specific app.
Bad: Compressed sound, limited range, calls and alerts interrupt music streaming.
Wi-Fi
Good: Can play in more than one room at once, cost-effective (Chromecast Audio starts at $35), you can turn the phone off and music keeps playing.
Bad: Not very portable, limited to supported apps.
Apple vs. Sonos vs. Google: The best (and worst) Wi-Fi speakers
Which speaker should you get? Not Google or Amazon
Whether you’re building a multiroom system from the ground up or simply want a speaker for your kitchen, the best device is the Sonos One. It offers voice control — with Amazon Alexa now and Google Assistant coming in 2018 — plus the best sound quality of any sub-$200 speaker. It’s great now, and it will only get better.
If you don’t want to be locked into buying Sonos, then the next best option is the JBL Playlist. It may not have the fancy features or build quality, but it works well and sounds very good.
You’ll notice that neither Google Home nor Amazon Echo speakers appear. The main reason is that they just don’t sound very good with music. Everything on the list below blows them out of the water for sound quality. Additionally, while Google Home can be used as part of a multiroom system, the Echo only recently added multiroom capability. There are more established systems for whole-home audio.
This is it, the all-dancing, good-for-everything “smart speaker“. The Sonos One is a new breed of device that incorporates a voice assistant into a multiroom speaker. At $200, there is really nothing else to compete with it. Though the latest Sonos app is a little disappointing, the ability to stream directly from Spotify, Pandora and Tidal means you probably don’t need it anymore anyway.
Not the most polished of products but the JBL Playlist is nevertheless the best value Chromecast built-in speaker on the market today. It bucks the idea that a small box speaker needs to sound like one, and particularly flatters orchestral or acoustic music. Sure, it doesn’t rock as hard as the Sonos, but it’s great for plopping on your kitchen counter and listening to the radio.
While it’s now pretty far behind in terms of features — it doesn’t have voice or Pandora integration, for example — there is still a lot to like about the Bose Soundtouch 10. It has shortcut buttons on top for your favorite playlists or radio stations, which means you don’t need to find your phone to play music. The ability to play via Bluetooth also means your friends can use it without the need to download an app. Most important of all? It sounds really good.
There are number of portable Wi-Fi speakers on the market including the Riva Arena and the Vizio SmartCast Crave Go, but our top pick is the elegant Denon Heos 1. With excellent sound quality, built-in splashproofing and a slick design, the Denon is an excellent value. Yes, adding the $99 battery pushes the Heos over the $200 mark, but the resulting package is so good that I’ll let it slide this time.
If you want to sit and listen to music, then a speaker that radiates 360 degrees is a terrible idea. It’s too much like listening in an elevator to really appeal to audiophiles. But if you want something to provide the soundtrack to your next board game night or dinner party, the Samsung is the way to go.
Play-Fi is one of the oldest — and biggest — of a relatively young field of Wi-Fi speaker conventions. But the majority of its products skew toward the more expensive end with speakers like the Definitive Technology W Studio sound bar and the Wren V5US tabletop. The Polk Omni S2 is one of a couple of more-affordable Play-Fi speakers, and it offers genuinely engaging sound quality.
A little more plasticky and arcane to set up than its competitors, the Yamaha WX-010 is nonetheless a playful performer and fairly affordable as well. If you already have a MusicCast-capable Yamaha receiver, then adding a WX-010 or two for other rooms makes a lot of sense. In addition, it’s one of the few speakers that’s also AirPlay compatible
Conclusion: Just get the Sonos
Two hundred dollars can buy you a lot these days, and for that money the Sonos One knocks it out of the park in terms of both useful features and amazing sound quality. Even if you don’t want a Sonos-based system, its ability to control either an Alexa or (soon) Google Home setup makes it more useful than any of the others here. It sounds good too, so if you have $200 to spend on a Wi-Fi speaker, you really should just get One.
