In a NoHo loft in late August, JBL revealed its new Cove whole-home audio system. In this fully staged Manhattan apartment, three Wi-Fi speakers—the M1, P1, and X1—occupied kitchen counters, credenzas, bookshelves, and bedside tables. From Bad Bunny at the sink and Tiësto on the couch to Marvin Gaye by the fireplace and Al Green in some armchairs, Jesse Coyer, Sr. Manager, National Account Sales & Training, HARMAN Consumer Audio, demoed speaker setup and scale. The walkthrough’s throughline was clear: Cove offers expandable multiroom audio without the need for a custom installer or control system.
[Disclosure: JBL provided travel accommodations during the creation of this story.]
According to Coyer, the Cove series is being introduced to JBL’s lineup more as a progression than a pivot. It’s not meant to replace a multi-thousand-dollar separates system, though it could complement one. JBL sees the real competition as setup friction. For someone familiar with a PartyBox (or BandBox), who maybe has some JBL headphones, Cove speakers can be up and running almost as easily as a standard Bluetooth speaker, all through the JBL One app.
After three steps and a couple of minutes on a smartphone to connect the speaker(s) to your home Wi-Fi, you can stream lossless/hi-res audio to them directly with Spotify Connect, TIDAL Connect, Qobuz Connect, Roon, AirPlay 2, and/or Google Cast. The JBL One can mirror native app controls, but you don’t have to live in it; it’s there primarily to group speakers into stereo pairs and/or rooms. When it comes to optimized tuning and distortion-free performance, the speakers use JBL’s proprietary room calibration, Constant Sound Field, and AI Sound Boost platforms, with preset/custom EQ available to overlay on grouped speakers in the app.
First up is the M1, a compact 4.9- x 7.2- x 4.9-inch powered speaker (shown below). Inside, 3 × 0.75-inch soft dome tweeters and 1 × 105 mm 4-inch woofer with rear passive radiator deliver 55 Hz-20 kHz (-6 dB) with punchy JBL Signature sound and solid off-axis dispersion. The speaker can also group with a JBL Bar 300/500/700/1000/1300MK2 Series soundbar to act as a surround channel (furthermore, any signal sent to an MKII soundbar on the network can be broadcast to any Cove speaker).
Stepping up to the P1 (shown below) brings portability and dimensionality. An internal battery provides up to 14 hours of power, and an integrated handle makes the 5.8- x 9.2- x 5.8-inch 7-pound speaker easy to carry (and easy to put back on its charging cradle). Plus, the IP56 rating means the speaker can handle poolside splashes, sudden rain showers, or time on a beach towel. Like the M1, the P1 can be used as rear channels with JBL Bar Series MK2 soundbars, or two can be paired for true channel separation. But the P1 features an additional 0.75-inch upfiring tweeter alongside 3 x 1.25-inch tweeters and 1 x 4-inch woofer with passive radiators, so Atmos content gets added clarity within the 50 Hz – 20 kHz (-6 dB) frequency response. Just make sure your ceiling is low enough for proper reflections in order to get the optimal effect.
Back on the mains, the X1 (shown below) delivers the most expressive performance with 4 x 1.25-inch tweeters, one upfiring, plus dual 3.5 x 4.7-inch woofers with passive radiators, for a 10.2- x 7- x 6.8-inch 3.0.1-channel system and a frequency response of 45 Hz – 20 kHz (-6 dB). The X1 doesn’t pair with soundbars out of the box, but JBL is open to exploring the possibility if customer feedback suggests it’s desired. The X1 is imagined more as its own room-filling entity, with the widest dispersion and deepest bass proven. And two can be paired for an even more immersive soundstage.
This isn’t JBL’s first entry in connected Atmos speakers (that was the more heritage-styled Authentics line, which is phasing out), but it has a more deliberately neutral aesthetic and shares the “power line” design language of the brand’s soundbar series. The endgame is one app, one ecosystem. For instance, the speakers share a feature called Music Follows Me through a Moment button, which can be long-pressed to extend the stream from an active speaker anywhere on the network to the new location, no phone required (you can also assign it an ambient soundscape or Spotify Tap to the button). And, over time, additional features (like independent surround channel levels) may be deployed and more hardware folded in, like a Cove subwoofer and allowing speakers to hand off sound to the Tour M3 headphones late at night.
For those folks who still have some digital files they’d like to play, each Cove speaker supports MP3 via USB-A. In addition, the speakers’ Bluetooth 5.3 protocol supports SBC, AAC, and, most importantly, Auracast, so the Cove speakers can still play music even if the network is down. And if someone has a compatible wireless speaker without Wi-Fi capabilities, it can still connect and play simultaneously with Cove speakers, albeit at a lower resolution than Wi-Fi allows.
Finishing up in our secluded cove, we wandered a few blocks south to the JBL SoHo flagship store, where we looked at various soundbars and Bluetooth speakers that can serve as introductions to, or extensions of, a JBL speaker system. Included in the overview is a look at the logo, with its distinctive exclamation point. While this most certainly represents the energy and excitement of sound, the tapered wedge and dot can also symbolize a horn-loaded speaker backed by a circular magnet structure—the type of intelligibility-focused compression driver that established James Bullough Lansing’s initial business and continues to help define JBL’s direction.
The day concluded with a nightcap at All Blues, a Tokyo-style listening bar centered on a rare JBL Paragon loudspeaker. At 9 feet wide and 850 pounds, it’s a far cry dimensions-wise from the Cove X1. But, at launch in 1957, it was a groundbreaking way to achieve a stable stereo image throughout a room. And it shows how JBL, now in its 80th year, has always innovated to bring directionality and dynamic ease, designed for scale, to home listening.
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