I fixed it 😐 JBL Live Beam 3 Review (Updated)
What to Expect?
The core experience of the JBL Live Beam 3 isn’t so different from its spiritual ancestor, the Tour Pro 2, but it does include multipoint pairing, a lower price, and Hi-Res certified, allowing you to stream over LDAC codec on Android. All very important improvements. But compared to everything else in the market, what really set the JBL Live Beam 3 apart from the rest of the competition are two important elements.
The first is the charging case’s screen, which can very effectively replace your phone as the main control device. It has all the features you need like music controls, volume adjustments, ANC toggles and even the ability to change EQ presets on the fly. You can control all of that without even taking out your phone and opening the JBL app, making it super convenient.
Also, you can receive phone notifications directly on the case, making it much more useful than the regular ones, that are little more than dumb chargers.
Secondly, these earbuds are easily the most customisable and one of the most feature rich earbuds you can buy. That’s where the app comes in. The app allows you to set the wallpaper of this screen and customise the EQ, the controls, as well as the Personify sound calibrator which gives you a special tuning based on your unique ear sensitivity measurements.
For example, the app tells me that I’m less sensitive to the 500hz region, especially on the right side, so it compensates accordingly. After the adjustments, I do feel a bit more vibrance in the mids.
A generous 10-band graphic EQ is also available, if you’re more fussy about sound. You can expand your soundstage with Spatial Audio modes and add reverb depending on the content. And if you’re a purist, you can switch them into Hi-Res mode, which streams audio over LDAC on Android.
Beyond that, there are also a range of phone call settings to try. The Live Beam 3 is very feature rich, with so many ways to customise them that you could spend a good couple of hours just playing with the settings.
BUT, it’s not perfect yet. I’m going to talk about its sound quality, mic pickup, active noise cancelling, and some things which can be better, which we are going to explore in this article.
Private Call Mode Demo
As I mentioned, the app has a few settings pertaining to phone calls that changes the way both the caller and recipient sounds like. There’s also a Private Call mode that turns one earbud into a dedicated mic, so you can whisper into it and keep that convo private.
👉 Have a listen to the Private Call mode demo.
Microphones Test
Tested without any special settings, its mic pickup is above average for sure. It does pretty well at reducing the background noise, and my voice is also well filtered, but it struggles with wind noise. You can still hear flapping noises. But without all these external factors, my voice sounded loud and legible.
👉 Have a listen to the mic pickup samples.
(Mic tested in both quiet and noisy conditions using some loud cafe noise and wind noise from a fan.)
Active Noise Cancelling with Samples
For active noise cancelling, we have Adaptive Noise cancelling mode which adapts to different levels of ambient noise. At its maximum settings with adaptive mode turned off, it effectively cancels lower register noise, and does well in the mid range vocal frequencies, so it can deal with the noisy background like rumble of public transport and human chatter in crowded cafe.
It’s not the most powerful noise cancelling I’ve heard in a pair of earbuds. For example, it doesn’t deal with human chatter as effectively as the Bose QC Ultra or even the Galaxy Buds3 Pro. But most people won’t have any complaints about how effective it is at delivering silence.
🎧 Listen to the samples recorded under the same noisy conditions as before.
Transparency Mode
There are two modes of Transparency, Ambient mode and Talkthough.
Ambient mode sounds quite natural and transparent in the highs, but it doesn’t pick up my own voice, so when I’m speaking to someone, it feels unnatural because my own voice sounds muffled. Talkthrough is a little better because it does pickup and amplify more vocal range sounds, and it also fades out the audio you were listening.
Overall, both modes are useful for awareness and soaking in the ambience, but Talkthrough mode is better for short verbal exchanges.
Sound Quality?
Do I like its sound? I think it’s decent, but it can be improved. With EQ turned off, its default sound settings lean a little more bass heavy with a rather upper mids-centric tuning. The highs between 7-17kHz are quite dark, which makes winds, strings and percussions sound rather dark, and details in the background don’t shine so bright. Some people may prefer this type of tuning because it’s more non-fatiguing and smooth, but if you want more vibrance, you can try the Club setting for a more exciting v-shaped curve.
Personally, I prefer my custom “Aaron X” setting which adds more bass, more LFE, more crispness and sizzle. Of course, after doing Personify, to cover all blind spots.
🎧 Let’s listen to the sound quality samples.
That’s the beauty of the Live Beam 3, it’s very responsive to EQ, unlike other earbuds which don’t give you much leeway. I do have to say that the volume on these is a bit lower compared to most others.
To reach the same level I normally get at 50-60% volume, I need to push these to at least 70%. In LDAC mode, you do get higher res streaming of uncompressed audio, and in that sense it’s a cleaner sound, but you may lose some benefits of certain custom sound settings. This matters only for Android users because only on Android can you stream over LDAC codec.
So we know that the JBL Live Beam 3 sounds decent, has great noise cancelling, and is extremely feature rich and customisable. The case is also very useful. But, there are a few issues.
Issues
What can be better is the UX. It’s… not smooth. When I’m using just one earbud, sometimes it still thinks it’s in single-earbud mode, so there is no noise cancelling, you can only toggle between ambient mode off and on, and the transparency only works on one side. The other earbud is totally unresponsive.
No big deal, just put the buds back in the case, taket them out and it’s fixed.
The JBL app, while improved after some updates, but it still feels a bit sluggish. And finally, the controls can be better. You’re only allowed to choose specific controls for each side, like music controls, volume, or noise canceling toggles.
Thus, if you set volume controls on the left bud and music controls on the right, you don’t have ANC toggle controls at all, unless you use the case or the app. A bit inconvenient. So the UX can be polished a little more.
Conclusion
That being said, the JBL Live Beam 3 do have great performance with extremely customisable sound, it’s thick and juicy with features, and the case is super useful. All very compelling reasons to go for it. Check in the Amazon link below for its latest price.
Check latest price:
JBL Live Beam 3 - https://amzn.to/3Z9Uika
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