Amazon Echo Sub review: No more bass complaints

Price: Rs 12,999
Rating: ****1/2

Specifications: 100 Watt Class D digital amplifier, 50 – 200Hz adaptive low-pass filter, 4 litre sealed chamber with 6-inch down-firing subwoofer, 100-240 volt universal voltage (auto switching, internal power supply), WiFi n (supports 2.4 & 5Ghz networks), 4.2kg


Pros: Adds deep, thumping bass to your existing Echo speaker, quick setup, universal voltage, wireless design

Cons: Expensive, can’t be paired with two different types of Echo speakers in 2.1 setup

One of more frequent complaints about Amazon’s Echo speakers is that they can’t match the fidelity of larger sound systems. You may even get a couple of them and use them in a multi-room setup but there’s one important piece of the audio puzzle that will still elude you: bass.

Amazon solved this problem with the Echo Sub, a standalone Echo speaker that only produces bass frequencies. It’s designed to be paired with an existing Echo or Echo Plus. You can set it up as a 1.1 system (paired with one Echo) or as a 2.1 system (pair it with two similar Echo speakers for a stereo effect). Setting it up is just like adding a speaker to your Amazon account and creating a multi-room system. In any case, the Amazon Alexa app will guide you through the setup process which just takes a couple of minutes.


The Sub itself is a large unit designed to placed on the ground. Since it only needs a power supply, you can place it somewhere hidden, like under a table or behind a sofa. In that sense, it is a ‘wireless’ sub-woofer. Inside it is a 100 watt digital amplifier and a 6-inch, high excursion, down-firing sub-woofer that instantly fills the room with deep bass.

It is significantly larger and heavier than a typical Echo speaker: 8-inches high, 8.3-inches across and 4.2 kg. This is for good reason too. It needs the large enclosure for the sub-woofer and the weight keeps it firmly planted when it’s pushing out large quantities of air. Since the Sub is not designed to be a standalone unit, there are no controls for volume on it — it increases/decreases volume in tandem with the Echo speaker it’s paired to. However, you can fine tune the audio by going into the device settings on the app.

Overall, adding the Sub is a massive improvement to the audio quality. It stays perfectly synced with the speaker you paired it with. The only couple of downsides are the price (add Rs 12,999 to the price of an Echo) and that it takes half a second extra to respond when you change tracks or ask Alexa to execute a command (which is normal for a multi-room speaker setup).