Bose’s excellent SoundLink Flex Bluetooth speaker sells for around $150 and sometimes goes on sale for less. The Soundcore Motion 300 is Anker’s answer to that Bose speaker. Around the same size as the Bose, it doesn’t sound quite as good, but it sounds impressive for its compact size and costs only $80 — or $65 as part of an early-bird presale of the speaker, which ships in early October. I’ve been testing the speaker over the last few days.

Like the SoundLink Flex, the Motion 300 can be laid down flat with its speaker firing up toward the ceiling (or sky) or propped up as shown in the photo above. It’s IPX7 waterproof and delivers up to 13 hours of audio at moderate volume levels. There’s also support for Sony’s LDAC audio codec for Android and other devices that support Bluetooth wireless streaming with LDAC. 

Read more: Best BluetoothSpeakers of 2023

The speaker has a bass boost button that does amp up the low end a bit. But I actually thought the speaker sounded a bit better without the bass boost engaged, because it seemed slightly overdriven with the boost on. The bass just doesn’t sound that tight at higher volumes. That’s where the Bose does better.

But aside from that small downside, the Soundcore Motion 300 is a very good mini Bluetooth speaker and a good value, particularly at $65. It’s available in three colors.