Hi I’m Gidon from thetechnologyman.com. The LG XBOOM Go PL5 sits in the middle of
the new range of speakers from LG. It’s a substantial step up both in size and sound
from the PL2 I looked at a few weeks ago, but still compact and a fair bit smaller than
the largest PL7 I’ll be looking at separately. All three speakers share the same design and
they all have their audio tuned by Meridian like their predecessors, the PK series I looked
at last year. It has up to 18 hours of battery life, IPX5
water resistance, and USB-C charging. It can be paired with multiple speakers, has LED
lighting that will synchronize to the beat of your music and an accompanying app to customise
and control it. It’s currently around £100 or $125, but
check the links down below for the latest prices since they seem to vary hugely.
I’ll be running through its features before comparing how it sounds to two of its rivals:
the JBL Flip 4 and the Anker Soundcore Boost - both similar in size. I’ll also compare
it to last year’s LG PK5 and its two siblings the PL2 and PL7, so let’s take a closer
look. Overview
Inside the box you get the speaker itself, a white USB-A to USB-C charging cable and
an instruction manual. There’s no 3.5mm auxiliary cable.
Although a fair bit larger than the LG PL2, this is still a compact speaker and much smaller
than last year’s PK5. It measures 201mm x 79 mm X 79 mm and weighs 627g - almost half
the weight of the PK5 but heavier than the JBL and Anker speaker.
Like all the LG speakers I’ve tested, it’s very well made, with a matte grey finish that
doesn’t attract fingerprints. There’s no creaking however hard you twist or squeeze
it. The rounded design is more contemporary than the PK5 and is carried through the whole
PL series of speakers. The front, plain speaker grille is surrounded
by dual passive radiators which both have multicoloured LED lighting.
The top of the speaker houses the controls. There’s the battery status LED which is
missing on the PL2, the power button and Bluetooth pairing buttons both with their status LEDs,
volume controls and the pause | play button. A double press skips forward a track and a
triple press skips back. The button also answers and ends phone calls.
Finally there’s the Sound Boost button with its accompanying LED, which is on by default.
Like the PL2 there’s a raised dimple over the volume up button which is useful for feeling
the main controls without having to look at the speaker.
The back of the speaker has the embossed XBOOM branding and a rubber flap concealing the
Multi mode and Dual mode pairing buttons with their status LEDs for pairing multiple speakers,
a button to cycle lighting modes or switch the LED lighting off, the reset button, the
USB-C charging port and the 3.5mm audio-in port. This flap needs to be fully seated to
maintain its IPX5 water resistance rating. The bottom of the speaker has a small flat
base with four tiny rubber feet to dampen any vibrations. It’s more stable than the
PL2, but can still roll if you don’t place it down carefully.
To charge the speaker you need to use a USB-A to USB-C cable like the one supplied - a dual
ended USB-C cable won’t work. The battery status LED lights red whilst charging
and then turns green before turning off once fully charged. The integrated 3900mAh or 14.8Wh
battery takes up to 4 hours to charge from completely flat, charging at a decent 1.5A.
I did get a high frequency hum charging the speaker. It’s not particularly loud, but
noticeable in a quiet room. The battery status LED shows the charge status
briefly when you turn the speaker on. You can check the status any time with a 2 second
press of the power button with the speaker on or using your phone.
When you turn the speaker on with a single press of the power button for the first time
the Bluetooth LED will flash. Connect to LG-PL5(XX) in your Bluetooth device settings. The Bluetooth
LED goes steady. You can pair to a maximum of two devices simultaneously.
To pair to a second device press and hold the Bluetooth pairing button for 2 seconds
until its LED starts flashing and connect your second device.
If you have a second PL5 speaker you can press the Dual button on both speakers to set them
up as a stereo pair. You can use the Multi mode button to pair multiple PL5 and PL7 speakers.
There won’t be any stereo separation but you can theoretically pair up to 100 speakers.
I couldn’t try out the Dual mode but used the Multi mode to pair the PL5 to a PL7. The
process is a little more complicated than it needs to be. You have to press the Multi
mode button on both speakers, but you need to choose which speaker will be the master
speaker you’ll connect to from your phone. In this case the PL5 is the master speaker.
The first LED above the multi-mode button indicates the speaker is the master or Main
speaker. On the PL7 in this case, you need to press the Multi mode button twice to make
this speaker the slave. The second LED will light up to indicate the PL7 is the Other
speaker; in LG’s parlance. The lighting mode is set by the Main speaker,
but I found the volume isn’t synchronized between speakers and controlling the volume
from my phone only affected the Main speaker. I had to adjust the volume manually on the
second speaker. This multi-mode feature only works with the
PL5 and PL7 and not the PL2 or last year’s PK series which is disappointing.
There is an accompanying LG XBOOM app which is finally also available on iOS - the app
was only available on Android with the PK series. This app should make pairing speakers
easier, but since the PL5’s latest firmware update the link icon for pairing speakers
is missing. There’s no EQ customisation either, but
you can check the battery level, turn Sound Boost on and off and configure the lighting.
And you can disable the auto power off features and the audio prompts accompanying turning
the speaker on and off and Bluetooth pairing, as well as updating to the latest firmware.
It’s also possible to configure Multi-play mode which by default is set to Private. It’s
dependent on device and application, but even in this default mode, you should be able to
pause music on one device and start playing on the second paired device. If you turn on
Party mode under Settings | Multi-play mode, you don’t need to pause playback to play
music on another device, allowing two people to control the speaker at the same time.
Sound quality and performance The LG PL5 has stereo 45mm mid-range drivers
with vibrating dual passive radiators and its 20W of output is pretty loud for a compact
speaker, especially with Sound Boost on. The Sound Boost mode not only makes the speaker
louder - but it also makes your music sound brighter too and with a broader range. But
some tracks do start to sound a little harsh. This isn’t a particularly subtle EQ setting
and for a lot of music I preferred it turned off, so it’s worth experimenting. It will
depend a lot on the type of music you listen to.
Overall the speaker has good clarity and the mids in particular sound crisp, even with
tracks with plenty of bass, which it handles pretty well. Tracks with sibilant sounds benefit
from reducing the volume slightly but considering the size of the speaker it’s hard not to
be impressed with how balanced it sounds. To me it sounds richer than the JBL Flip 4,
and has more detail than the Anker Soundcore Boost.
But you can hear for yourself how it sounds with Sound Boost on and off and compared to
the JBL Flip 4, Anker Soundcore Boost, LG PL2, LG PL7 and last year’s LG PK5. Let
me know down below in the comments which is your favourite. I also have full reviews of
many of these speakers playing various tracks, so take a look at the links below or the on-screen
cards if you’re interested. I’ve recorded the sound test with binaural
microphones that capture stereo sound, to try and provide the closest representation
of what I’m hearing. Please listen with headphones for the best experience. Use the
video chapters in the timeline or the timestamps below to skip ahead if you like.
Audio sync playing back YouTube videos even on iOS which is usually a challenge, was good.
There is still a very small delay, but it’s better than most Bluetooth speakers I’ve
tested. Battery life is quoted as a respectable 18
hours - although this is at 50% playback volume, with lighting and Sound Boost off. I still
got at least a full day’s usage usually playing back around 70-80% volume with lighting
on and Sound Boost on at least half of the time.
The speaker uses the latest Bluetooth 5.0 and range was fairly typical, making it to
the end of the next room of my brick built house, around 10 metres away. I didn’t get
any interference issues. Received phone calls sounded good, but the
built in microphone doesn’t have the greatest pickup - significantly worse than the PL2
which is surprising. This mic is also used if you activate your voice assistant with
a two second press of the Play | Pause button, but you’ll need to get quite close for Siri
or the Google Assistant to understand you. Since the PK series, LG appear to have dropped
support for the higher quality aptX codec, but do support the still higher quality AAC
codec. And for the best quality you could always use a 3.5mm cable via the audio-in
port. Like its predecessor the PK5, the speaker
has an IPX5 splash proof rating which held up fine in my tests. But I would have liked
to have seen a higher IPX7 waterproof rating like the JBL Flip 4, for what could be a very
useful travel speaker. Conclusions
The LG XBOOM Go PL5 is a great all-round portable speaker. It sounds good with well balanced
sound, and for its size it’s pretty loud. It has a rich feature set with USB-C charging,
IPX5 water resistance, multi coloured lighting and it supports both stereo mode pairing as
well as multi mode pairing with up to 100 speakers.
It’s retail price is a little expensive but LG often have promotions on their speakers
and if you can pick it for less than £100 or $100 it’s worth serious consideration.
I’ll be reviewing the LG PL7 shortly or they’ll be a link on-screen if that review
is already out, but this is currently a similar price. If you don’t mind its larger size
it has a more full bodied sound, even longer battery life and can charge your USB devices.
The JBL Flip 4 is slightly smaller, has an IPX7 waterproof rating, is usually a little
cheaper and JBL Connect+ is a superior way of connecting multiple speakers. But it doesn’t
sound quite as rich as the PL5 and it uses older micro USB charging.
And the Anker Soundcore Boost is a good budget option. It doesn’t have the clarity of the
LG, but it’s slightly smaller and also has a USB charging port.
I didn’t include the Anker Soundcore Motion+ in the sound test, but at a similar price
it’s also worth considering, if you don’t mind a slightly larger speaker. I’ll include
it in the PL7 sound test. I have detailed reviews of many of the speakers
I’ve discussed, so take a look at the on-screen cards, or the description if you’re interested.
I’d love to know which speaker you preferred the sound of - or if there’s another model
I should take a look at - let me know down below.
And as always, if you have any questions, please ask - I read every comment and will
do my best to respond. I do hope you found this video useful. Please
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