Beats Pill (2024)

With angled drivers, hearty bass response, a capable speakerphone, and a waterproof build, the 2024 edition of the Beats Pill addresses the biggest shortcomings of its predecessor. Best of all, it comes in at a significantly lower price of $149.99. You might be tempted by competing Bluetooth speakers that offer customizable sound and LED light effects, but the Beats Pill earns our Editors' Choice award thanks to its portable, outdoor-ready design, high-quality wired and wireless sound, and seamless compatibility with Apple's product ecosystem.

Design and Features: Sleek and Simple

At roughly 2.8 by 8.6 by 2.8 inches (HWD) and 1.5 pounds, the oblong Pill strongly resembles the original. Beats sells the speaker in Champagne Gold, Matte Black, or Statement Red, the latter two of which I received for testing. The Matte Black edition collects dust easily, though the Statement Red version looks quite striking.

(Credit: Tim Gideon)

The Pill features a metallic front grille with fine perforations and a matte silicone finish around the rest of the enclosure. A removable, color-matched lanyard attaches to the right side, while the bottom has four small feet to keep the speaker stable on flat surfaces.

Internally, the Beats Pill houses a racetrack-style neodymium woofer and a single neodymium tweeter that together produce mono sound. There are no passive bass radiators in the design, and Beats doesn’t share frequency range specs. The drivers sit at an upward angle of 20 degrees (unlike the front-firing drivers of the original), and their arrangement allows for more efficient air displacement than before.

The Pill is compatible with Bluetooth 5.3 and supports the AAC and SBC codecs, but not AptX or other Android-friendly options. If you want better codec support for Android devices, the less powerful Anker Soundcore Motion 300 offers LDAC in addition to AAC. Google Fast Pair is available, but multipoint connectivity is not. The Pill automatically appears on the screen to pair with Apple devices, while Android users must go through the Bluetooth menu.

The control panel is on the top of the speaker. From left to right, there’s a power button, a status LED, a pinhole mic, a multifunction button, and dedicated minus/plus volume controls. Pressing the power button once lights up the battery status LED, while pressing twice summons your mobile device’s voice assistant. Single presses on the middle button handle playback, double presses skip forward a track, and triple presses navigate back a track. The middle button also handles calls. By default, a single press answers a call or mutes one that's already in progress, while a double press ends calls. You can switch the mute and end call commands via the iOS settings page or the Android app. The buttons are easy to operate thanks to their clicky feel and concave indentation, though backlighting would have been helpful for low-light situations.

(Credit: Tim Gideon)

Although the Pill is a mono speaker, you can get stereo sound by pairing two units in Stereo Mode. You can also pair two for louder playback without creating a stereo pair in what Beats calls Amplify Mode. These modes are accessible via the buttons. Press the central button on both speakers simultaneously to engage Amplify Mode. Once in Amplify Mode, press and hold the central and plus buttons on one speaker to enter Stereo Mode (this speaker then becomes the left channel of the stereo pair). To break the connection, simultaneously press and hold the center and minus buttons.

A USB-C port on the rear of the speaker works with the included USB-C-to-USB-C charging cable. The USB-C port supports audio input and can connect directly to iPhones and iPads for wired playback at up to 24-bit/48kHz. Press and hold the power button when you plug the cable in to switch to USB audio.

You can also use the USB-C port to charge external devices. To reverse the charging direction manually, press the power button three times. Beats says that the speaker will automatically charge smaller devices but will determine on a case-by-case basis whether to pull power from or push power to larger devices. If you don’t want the Pill to charge other devices at all, you can turn the charging function off entirely. Beats doesn't specify how much charge the Pill can supply to other devices.

(Credit: Tim Gideon)

Even though the USB-C port is unprotected, the Pill carries an IP67 rating. This means it's dustproof and can survive at depths of up to a meter of fresh water for up to 30 minutes. It doesn't float like the $129.99 Anker Soundcore Boom 2, so just make sure to fish it out eventually.

Beats estimates that the Pill can last roughly 24 hours per charge, but your results will vary based on your typical listening volume level. That's in line with the 24 hours of the Soundcore Boom 2 and the 20 hours of the $179.95 JBL Charge 5. The company claims that 10 minutes of charging will get you 2 hours of playback time and that the speaker can recharge from empty in 2 hours and 30 minutes (assuming you have at least a 45W charger).

App Experience: Better for iOS Than Android

There isn't a Beats app for iOS. Instead, the Pill gets a dedicated section in the iOS settings menu (similar to AirPods). Tapping on this menu reveals a screen with an image of the speaker and a battery life readout. A scrollable menu of tiles follows below.

The first tile allows you to rename the speaker. Further down is a Call Controls section, where you can switch which gesture handles the Mute and End Call functions. The next tile is Show In Find My, which leverages Apple’s Find My tracking network. The Accessibility tile allows you to adjust the tone volume and various other audio options. At the bottom of the screen, you can view the speaker’s model and serial numbers, as well as the firmware version. Finally, you can opt to disconnect or forget the speaker.

(Credit: Beats/PCMag)

The Beats app for Android essentially recreates what you get in the iOS settings menu, but it has a slightly different layout. For example, the tone volume fader is more prominent. The app also has a Product Features guide and an Optimize Your Beats Product option. The latter, which is active by default, allows the Beats app to mute/unmute the speaker, perform firmware updates, and provide battery life notifications. Note that the Add Speaker option merely explains the aforementioned process of pairing two speakers. Finally, you can set the speaker up with Google’s Find My Device feature.

Sound: Bass-Forward, Yet Balanced

Beats eschews the modern trend of including passive bass radiators and instead relies on the strength of its drivers to create the Pill's sound. It’s a refreshing differentiator, and the speaker manages to pack plenty of bass thump for its size. It can sometimes run into challenges, and the lack of an adjustable EQ is a bummer, but the out-of-box sound is better than what many rival speakers in this price range can muster.

(Credit: Tim Gideon)

On tracks with intense sub-bass content, like The Knife’s “Silent Shout,” the Pill delivers solid low-frequency response at moderate to high volumes. The woofer avoids distortion at the maximum volume level, though I sometimes hear low-frequency artifacts. You shouldn't expect earth-shattering bass from a speaker this small, but the Pill still sounds respectable. It outperforms the $179 Sonos Roam 2, for instance, which thins out the lows at high volumes to reduce vibrations.

Unsurprisingly, the Pill can't can't reproduce the sub-bass at the 34-second mark of Kendrick Lamar’s “Loyalty.” These sub-bass notes are simply outside of its frequency range. Even so, the Pill fills out the drum loop with some extra thump, and the various vocals benefit from a high-mid focus that carries well outdoors.

Bill Callahan’s “Drover,” a track with far less deep bass, gives us a better sense of the Pill’s sound signature. The drums are full-bodied and have some thump, even if they aren’t thunderous. Callahan’s baritone vocals really shine thanks to rich, full-bodied low-mids and plenty of high-frequency detail. The acoustic strums and higher-register percussive hits are easy to hear with a bit of extra brightness. The result is a bass-forward but balanced sound signature.

On orchestral tracks, like the opening scene from John Adams’ The Gospel According to the Other Mary, the Pill delivers a rich and bright sound signature that adds a little depth to the lower-register instrumentation. Ultimately, the higher-register brass, strings, and vocals retain their prominence in the mix—they’re naturally crisp in the recording and get a hint of brightness.

The mic array offers excellent intelligibility, and I could clearly understand every word from a voice memo on my iPhone. The signal clarity suffers slightly in noisy environments, but your callers won’t hear any background noises during conversations.

Verdict: A Potent Mix at a Pleasing Price

For $149.99, the Beats Pill provides a stylish, waterproof design, high-quality wired and wireless audio, top-notch compatibility with Apple products, and support for both the Apple and Google Find My features. We wish it had an adjustable EQ, but the excellent, bass-focused sound signature helps it edge past similarly priced competitors to earn our Editors' Choice award for portable Bluetooth speakers. If you want more power, a nine-band EQ, and colorful LEDs, you can upgrade to the Anker Soundcore Boom Plus 2, another Editors' Choice winner, for $100 more.