Despite seemingly endless generations of new phones, there’s always pressure to push the envelope. That can mean bigger screens, bigger cameras, or better/faster chips with beefier battery life, but one area that has remained mostly immune to the urge to make everything BIG is speakers. Though if there’s one thing you should never do in the world of gadgets, it’s never say never.
If Xiaomi’s new phone, the Redmi K90 Pro Max, is any indication, speakers could wind up getting blown up in the same way that camera bumps have. In a post on Weibo, Xiaomi recently showcased a new speaker setup on its phone, which is being tuned by none other than Bose, and boy, is this thing beefy. First of all, the Bose-tuned setup is 2.1, which, yes, means there aren’t just two speakers in there, but there’s also a subwoofer. In Xiaomi’s words, there are two “super-linear” speakers and an “extra-large woofer.”
I have no idea what a speaker system of that magnitude on a phone like this sounds like, but if I had to guess… it’s loud. The fact that Bose is doing the tuning here does give me some faith that it won’t just be loud; it’ll also sound decent. But that’s hard to say without hearing it for myself. Another interesting thing, outside of just how big the sound system is, is where exactly the speaker system is located. The main components seem to be housed in the camera bump, which is significant in that Xiaomi seems to be suggesting that the speakers are just as important as the phone’s ability to take pictures. Camera bumps, after all, are now important real estate to house components other than image sensors and lenses.
For some people (a very niche audience, I suspect), that equal importance may actually be true. There are, believe it or not, some people who like to game on their phones, and if you’re deep in a Genshin Impact session with a mobile controller attached for a better gaming experience, why not use a device that goes the extra mile to give you big sound as well as big performance and a nice, high-refresh screen? Whether this will work with a mobile gaming controller depends on which one you’re using because some might actually cover the speaker system up.
Are most people using their phones that way? No. Most definitely not. But I guess for the people that are, a 2.1 Bose-tuned speaker setup makes sense. One thing that I absolutely do not want to see under any circumstance is any of you using this ridiculous speaker system to blast Instagram Reels and TikTok on your phone in public.
Even if nothing comes from Xiaomi’s Redmi K90 Pro Max experiment with big subwoofers on a phone, it’s significant for Bose to enter the phone fray, and speakers are clearly one area that hasn’t been as saturated with upgrades. A part of me welcomes a world where playing external audio on a phone sounds closer to a portable Bluetooth speaker, but the other part shivers to think of how annoying that could actually be in practice. Either way, it looks like subwoofers are coming to phones whether we’re ready to use them respectfully or not. If a phone with a big-ass speaker system appeals to you, the K90 Pro Max is set to launch on Oct. 23.