I cannot believe how difficult it is to find a Bluetooth speaker without battery in today’s market. Almost every single product advertises battery life and portability. Sure being able to carry our speaker to various places can be beneficial in some use cases and I am sure there is a big market for this. However, surely some people still use Bluetooth speaker at single location at home without ever needing to bring it in travel situations? Or maybe we have other speakers for travel and just want a nice speaker that always sits at the same place at home, powered directly from wall plug?

One might argue that there Bluetooth speaker with battery can also be left at the same location, and theoretically we can keep the charging cable on at all times. These are true. But just like other electronics products with built-in rechargeable battery, the lifetime of the product is tied to the life of the battery. I have an old Bose Bluetooth speaker with bad battery that goes totally out of battery every few weeks, even with the charging cable always attached. When it happen, I had to detach the charger and leave the speaker unused for a couple of days, then I have 50% chance of reviving it when I plug the charger back. If it works, I have a working Bluetooth speaker again. If not, repeat the couple of days waiting. The speaker component itself is still perfectly fine, but the product as a while becomes unusable, or incredibly annoying to use when it fails.

After a few days of reading through various products and reviews, I realised that the only products in today’s market that would meet my criteria are the new category of “smart” speakers. Most plain Bluetooth speakers either come with built-in battery, or when they do require always-on AC power, their size is way beyond what I need for my use case. Alas, so I went with smart speakers, even though I do not need the smart features at all.

My experiment started a while ago with Amazon Echo Dot and then Amazon Echo Pop. They are both decent speakers for their sizes, but the fact that it always announce when a device is connected via Bluetooth annoys me. I do not understand why they do not even let users to turn that off. After trying to live with it for a few months, I decided it was time to go back to see what other options are available in the market.

Surprisingly, my choice went to Google Nest Mini. I knew this product since its first generation, but somehow mistakenly assume that this product will only do music streaming via Wifi. As soon as I realised that Nest Mini can also play music from my phone via Bluetooth, I decided to try this speaker as my first new gadget in 2024.

I like the overall design of Google Nest Mini. It looks simple without unnecessary details. The material feels nice. It does seem that it will gather dust quickly, but I suppose I can live with that. At the top there is 4 LED indicators that will show volume or various other states of the device. Volume can be adjusted by touching the left and right spot on the top. There is no visible button, only touch-sensitive area.

Initial setup was quite easy. I do not even need a new app because I already use Google Home app for my Nest Wifi and Nest Max. After some connection steps, the speaker is ready to use and can be easily paired to my phone. Turning off the mic changes the LED colour to orange, which gives it a much better look compared to Amazon Echo that turns its light red when mic is turned off.

To be fair, Google Nest Mini also makes some sound when a device is connected via Bluetooth. But the sound is a simple chime instead of Amazon Echo’s vocal announcement. That is another win for Google’s smart speaker.

What about the sound quality? It is really decent for a speaker of that size, ideal for small rooms. You will not hear a mind blowing bass, for sure, but you will hear clear sound with reasonable details and balance. To top off, it sounds good even at low volume, which makes it a perfect bedside speaker for white noise. Increasing the volume up to around 70% was still ok, but the sound quality gets worse on higher volume.

Nice little speaker that does what I need it to. Of course it can listen to “Ok Google” commands as well, but I turn it off because I simply need a Bluetooth speaker without built-in battery. Happy to recommend if it fits your use case.