The Sonos Beam Ultra is here, and after thoroughly reviewing it in our listening rooms, running it head to head with its siblings (the Sonos Beam 2 and Sonos Arc Ultra) and every comparatively priced rival we could get our hands on, we can confirm it’s great.
Offering a room-filling sound, with a much improved tight low-end and added sense of height, the Beam Ultra is a five-star Dolby Atmos soundbar. As we said in our recently published review: “Sonos has struck Dolby Atmos gold yet again.”
We don’t often give praise like that.
But as we discussed its merits as part of this year’s What Hi-Fi? Awards testing, there was one elephant in the room we couldn’t ignore: its price.
I’m not going to give away any spoilers about this year’s Award winners – you’ll have to check back with us on 13th October for that – but, with the Beam Ultra costing £699, it left a hole, which we had been hoping it would plug, gapingly open: that of the cheap soundbar.
Regular readers may remember, only a few short months ago, we were begging Sonos to release a new Beam soundbar. But, sod’s law being the eternal constant it is, when we finally get our wish, the new Beam isn’t the affordable replacement we were hoping for; it's a mid-tier upgrade that sits alongside the Beam 2.
And that's a problem. In the past two years, there has been an outright drought of five-star, affordable, Dolby Atmos soundbars. For clarity, by affordable, we mean units that cost £350/$350 or less.
Jump over to our best Dolby Atmos soundbars buying guide, and you’ll see what I mean. The current small recommendation is the Sonos Beam 2, which came out way back in October 2021. In soundbar years, it should have had its letter from the King by now.
What’s more, despite its age, it still meets our definition of “cheap” only during sales events, such as the fast-approaching Black Friday, when it usually drops from its regular £429 asking price to £349.
Below it, our current recommended cheap Dolby Atmos soundbar, the Sony HT-S2000, came out in 2023, so it is hardly a spring chicken. It also still sits in the upper end of our definition of “affordable”, retailing for £299 at most stores.
On top of that, as our reviewers and I have noted before, it falls afoul of a repeat issue we experience on affordable Atmos units: though it recognises the signal, it struggles to deliver an actual sense of height.
But, despite the two units’ age, we have yet to experience anything better. The only bar to come close was the JBL Bar 300 Mk2, which is great in most ways, but doesn’t have the finesse and musicality to dethrone the Beam 2.
Considering the cost-of-living crisis and the wealth of innovation that has appeared in the mid- and upper-end of the soundbar market over the past half-decade, the lack of new cheap models feels like a missed opportunity. Surely some of the cool stuff we’ve seen on even moderately more expensive models should have trickled down by now?
Hopefully, this will change in the not too distant future. If not, I can’t help but think some companies are missing an open goal.
Not everyone has cash to burn on a new soundbar, and right now even the best options you’ll find for less than £350/$350 are undeniably beginning to feel a little stale and show their age. Buyers on a budget deserve better, at least in my humble opinion.
MORE:
These are the best surround sound systems we have tested
We rank the best cheap TVs
Our picks of the best soundbars
