Top Soundbars 2023

The Sony HT-A5000 soundbar is satisfactory for mixed usage. This soundbar comes with Sound Field Optimization, which automatically optimizes audio reproduction based on your room's unique acoustics. With this feature on, and its Vertical Surround Engine feature, it has a pretty neutral, though slightly U-shaped sound profile that adds boom in the bass and brightness in the treble. It's suitable for listening to many different types of audio content, and it also supports Dolby Atmos content. Unfortunately, there's a very limited selection of sound customization features available.

The Klipsch Cinema 400 soundbar is fair for mixed usage. Its balanced sound profile makes it suitable for listening to lots of different audio content. Even though it lacks a dedicated center channel, dialogue in TV shows is clear and accurate. You can also use its subwoofer level adjustment to customize its sound. However, it has to downmix surround content into stereo, which doesn't sound as immersive. It also doesn't support Dolby Atmos content.

The Klipsch Cinema 600 Soundbar is good for mixed usage. This 3.1 setup has a pretty neutral sound profile, making it suitable for listening to many different types of content, though the treble adds some brightness to vocals and instruments. Its discrete center makes it a solid choice for vocal-centric content like TV shows. However, there's no Atmos support, and its surround performance is poor.

The Sonos Arc is good for mixed usage. It's a really premium standalone bar that's suitable for everything from music to movies to TV shows. Right out of the box, dialogue is clear and accurate, and instruments are reproduced with fidelity. It supports lots of different audio formats, too, including Dolby Digital and Dolby Atmos. You can always add on a sub and satellites to improve its performance down the line, too.

The Polk Audio Signa S3 comes from a company that specializes in audio. It has better sound quality than some of the bigger soundbars on the market made by bigger companies.

The Sonos Ray soundbar is decent for dialogue-heavy TV shows and podcasts. Its balanced, neutral mids mean that voices reproduce clearly and with detail, and there's a dialogue enhancement mode and a night mode feature to balance out the volume level when you watch TV at night. However, since it's a 2.0 setup, there isn't a discrete center channel to help provide a more clear and real representation of dialogue in the soundstage like you get with more premium models.

Even though the Denon DHT-S517 does a lot of things right, it has a few flaws that keep it from being the best choice.

The Polk MagniFi Mini AX is a convincing ultra-compact immersive soundbar.

The Samsung HW-Q990B soundbar offers the audio imaging power of 11 surround channels and four height channels for sound that truly envelopes you.

The Bose Soundbar 600 is decent for mixed usage. It reproduces dialogue in your favorite TV shows with clarity, along with detailed voices and instruments in many different music genres. With its TrueSpace technology, you enjoy additional height effects, even when you listen to stereo and 5.1 surround content. Aside from its bass and treble adjustments, there aren't a ton of customization tools, though, and you'll need to add on a sub and satellites if you want better bass reproduction and surround sound.