JBL Flip 7 vs JBL Flip 6 | Flip 7 is 2 Times Louder than the Flip 6

JBL Flip 7 and Flip 6 comparison isn’t as straightforward as comparing the Charge 6 and Flip 7. This is because between Flip 7 and Charge 6, the JBL Charge 6 is much bigger and we can immediately say that bigger is more expensive with better sound quality, in this case. However, between JBL Flip 7 and Flip 6, both have a similar size, so we need to look deeper to answer tough questions. Check out the detailed Charge 6 vs Charge 5 comparison. In this article, I will be answering many questions like what are the upgrades on the new JBL Flip 7, should you upgrade to the new Flip 7, should you buy the Flip 7 instead of Flip 6 or should you check out some other speakers from Soundcore, Earfun, Tribit and others ..?

Inside-the-box

The old JBL Flip 6 had something really useful that the new JBL Flip 7 doesn’t have anymore in the box, which is the charging cable. The Flip 6 comes with a USB Type-C to Type-A cable vs no charging cable with the Flip 7’s box. Good thing though, the new Flip 7 has a carabiner included in the box. The speaker is placed securely inside the box in both cases. Flip 7 has that pushlock carrying strap vs Flip 6 has the carrying rope sling already attached. Both the Flip 7 and Flip 6 have typical standard JBL packaging. You will get a quick start guide and some other paperwork in both. Check out the JBL Flip 7 and Flip 6 manuals. Also, check out the offers from shopping site Amazon.com for the JBL Flip 7 and JBL Flip 6 speakers.

Design and Build

In terms of carrying mechanism, the new Flip 7 has a proper upgrade. Flip 7 has an interchangeable pushlock mechanism vs the old Flip 6’s carrying rope sling. So you can swap the removable pushlock carrying strap with the included carabiner on the new Flip 7 speaker. You have added clipping options with the Flip 7, which is very good to have on the go. The carabiner probably can’t be used as a bottle opener. On the contrary, the Flip 6 has a rope sling for carrying around. So the new Flip 7 is more advanced for carrying.

The overall shape of the speaker hasn’t changed much with this new version. The sides of the Flip 7 are a bit different looking from the Flip 6’s design. If you look closely, the layout of the buttons and ports is changed. However, one of the most interesting design changes is the new look of the passive radiators. Flip 7’s new passive radiator has the same look as the JBL Charge 6. This new look is very cool and bold vs the old Flip 6 passive radiator had a more professional look. I really like how the new passive radiators are designed.

So, the design is same as JBL signature design with some noteworthy improvements like the new pushlock mechanism and new passive radiator design. In terms of build, it’s a typical high-quality build with quality materials as expected from JBL. Only the Flip 7 is drop-proof, more about this in the features section. Both Flip 7 and Flip 6 have the same high quality build. Overall, some good design/build improvements for better usability.

Hardware Upgrades

The USB Type-C port on the new JBL Flip 7 speaker can do lossless audio, which the old Flip 6 could not do. So you can use the Flip 7 via a wired connection, but you cannot do wired playback using the Flip 6 speaker. Both speakers have a very similar driver configuration, which is a 1-woofer and 1-tweeter design. This setup plays stereo tracks in a mono configuration. So you will hear 1-channel mono music, 2 passive radiators on the sides.

The JBL Flip 7 is rated at 35 watts RMS vs Flip 6’s 30 watts. There is way less official technical specification available for the Flip 6. So we don’t know the power rating of each driver on the Flip 6. However, on the Flip 7, the woofer is rated at RMS 25 watts and the tweeter is RMS 10 watts, making a total of RMS 35 watts. So, on paper, the old Flip 6 is only 5 watts less than Flip 7. This doesn’t make sense as the Flip 7 gets twice louder. Flip 6’s official battery info is not available, more about the battery upgrade is in the battery section.

Sound Quality Check

The JBL Flip 7 has a high-quality 45 x 80 mm woofer and a 16 mm tweeter. The driver dimensions for JBL Flip 6 are not officially available. However, information about the frequency response range is officially available. As declared in the official specs, the new JBL Flip 7 can produce 60 Hz - 20 kHz faithfully vs JBL Flip 6’s 63 Hz - 20 kHz. So, the Flip 7 goes slightly lower than Flip 6, this translates to slightly deeper bass.

At lower volumes, the new Flip 7 sounds pretty bass-heavy. It has significantly more punch than the Flip 6. The mid-bass on the Flip 7 is more punchy and sounds slightly deeper. For below 50% volume, a lower level listening, the bass kick may sound a little bit too powerful. If the Flip 7 sounds very bass-heavy, then use the custom EQ to tone it down. None of them can produce sub-bass like below 60 Hz, even if there is slight sub-bass going on, you will not hear or feel it. The high-end is slightly more refined on the new Flip 7. A little bit more clarity and shimmer on the high-end, which helps for the heavy bass at low volumes.

The old Flip 6 sounds more balanced. It seems like the bass at around 75 Hz and the very higher high-end after 10 kHz are less pushed on the Flip 6 speaker. But with this new Flip 7, it sounds like there is less energy at around 4 to 8 kHz region. Overall, sounds like a v-shaped sound signature at lower levels. The high-end sounds slightly more thin, open and airy, but less harsh and sharp. It sounds cleaner but loses some details and definition at the lower treble area. On the other hand, the Flip 6 sounds more natural. The new Flip 7 has more potential but it’s not an obvious win for low level as some might prefer the Flip 6.

The story turns in Flip 7’s favour as you go up on the volume scale. The Flip 7 starts to sound more balanced at around 50 to 80% volume. At around 80% the Flip 6 starts to fall apart and start sounding harsh and tinny with limited bass. The new Flip 7 is still listenable at around 80% volume, 80% on the Flip 7 is like same loud as 100% on the Flip 6. Below 60%, both have around the same loudness. As an example, 50% on both can be perceived as equally loud because the Flip 7 has more energy in the bass and Flip 6 has more energy in the lower treble. Both kinda sound not so pleasant at maximum 100% volume.

Difference is that the new Flip 7 sounds twice as loud when compared to the Flip 6. From the sound tests, I would argue that probably the quieter Flip 6 is a slightly better listen at maximum volume. However, the Flip 7 is overall way louder at max. At the maximum volume, the Flip 7’s bass doesn’t sound like mid-bass punch anymore, it’s more like upper-bass kick, which makes you feel like the speaker is lacking in bass very badly. Even though the JBL Flip 6 is way less louder at max than Flip 7, at least it doesn’t sound as bass-light as the Flip 7. The mids and highs are over-pushed on Flip 7, sounds very loud and screamy.

At 100% volume on a particular track, the Flip 7 delivers -27.7 LUFS vs the Flip 6 delivers -30.7 LUFS. This means, on average, across the whole frequency spectrum, the new Flip 7 is around 3 dB louder than the Flip 6. This is kinda crazy, it’s like the same loudness as playing 2 units of Flip 6. So, the JBL Flip 7 is twice louder than JBL Flip 6. A 3-dB gain on average is pretty much doubling the loudness. You may not perceive it as doubling the loudness, probably perceived 1.5 times but on paper it's double. So even though it’s not very listenable at max volume, 80% is already loud enough to enjoy the music at higher levels. What it means is, the Flip 7 got more headroom to play with. If you need loudness over quality, take Flip 7.

This loudness advantage on the Flip 7 doesn’t make the Flip 6 outdated. The quality of the sound isn’t much better on the new Flip 7 speaker. Check out this sound test to get an idea for different volume levels. You wouldn’t wanna play these small speakers at max volume. But the main improvement here could be the fact that you will get the same loudness of Flip 6 at 100% when the Flip 7 is at 80%, a lot less stress on the Flip 7. Check out Motion 300 & Bose Flex, they are very good and portable alternatives from budget to expensive.

Features and Battery

The new JBL Flip 7 has support for Auracast technology vs the old JBL Flip 6 has PartyBoost tech for multi-speaker connection. This means you can’t play both Flip 7 and Flip 6 together, but you can play the new Flip 7 with the new Charge 6, as they both support Auracast - not a backward compatibility issue but a technology issue. Flip 6 can be paired with other JBL speakers that are PartyBoost compatible, like the Charge 5. Neither the JBL Flip 6 nor the JBL Flip 7 features NFC pairing, so no quick instantaneous pairing.

JBL Flip 6 is IP67 water and dustproof vs JBL Flip 7 with IP68 water, dust and drop-proof. There is * in IP68* probably indicates that the Flip 7 is also drop-proof from 1 meter onto your concrete floor. The handle strap is a nice new feature. This new Flip 7 has AI sound boost which the Flip 6 didn’t have. Also, only the Flip 7 has the Playtime Boost feature. The Bluetooth version is 5.4 on Flip 7 vs 5.1 on Flip 6, comes with the JBL portable app and the custom 7-band eq in the app for JBL Flip 7 is a huge deal. The Flip 6 has only a 3-band custom eq in the app. Huge eq upgrade on Flip 7 - tinker the bass, mids and highs as you like.

Check out this teardown video that reveals the battery capacity for both speakers. Both use Li-ion battery packs where the JBL Flip 7 has a capacity of 17.43 Wh vs the JBL Flip 6 has a slightly lower capacity at 17.28 Wh. They both come at around equivalent to 3.6 Volts 4800 mAh. Flip 6 offers 12 hours of playback vs Flip 7’s 14 hours of playback at a similar average listening volume, playtime boost feature helps the Flip 7 only. Battery performance on the JBL Flip 7 is not good if you play it at near max volume. Slightly bigger battery, but gets twice louder than Flip 6, battery will run out much more quickly at higher level. JBL Flip 7 doesn’t feel like a battery upgrade. Both need 2.5 hours at 5V / 3A to fully charge.

Conclusion - Not Worthy

This new JBL Flip 7 isn’t anything extraordinary. It’s better than the old Flip 6, but not worth upgrading. Look, if the tuning was something extraordinary, like at lower volumes you could get balanced 50 Hz like bass and at higher volumes it would be able to somehow maintain the balance of mid-bass like 75 Hz without totally falling apart, then the Flip 7 would have been an upgrade in terms of sound quality. Just the crazy loudness sacrificing sound quality isn’t enough because you probably don’t use small speakers for loud listening.

If this was a bigger speaker like the Xtreme 4 or Boombox, the loudness advantage would make more sense. However, if you are looking for a small portable JBL speaker and don’t own a Flip, you can definitely buy the Flip 7, overall it’s a good quality expensive speaker. Also, you can upgrade from Flip 5, but you should not from Flip 6. If you are not stuck with JBL, and a bigger size is okay for you, then you should definitely get the Soundcore Boom 2.

The Boom 2 shines in both aesthetics (RGB lighting) and sound quality. Check the Earfun Uboom X that has incredible sound quality but not appealing look-wise, and also the new Tribit Stormbox Lava is a good speaker. All of these come at around $150, which is same as Flip 7. The old Flip 6 is at $100 now vs Flip 7 at $150, too much to upgrade to a smaller speaker. Based on my research, analyzing reviews and sound tests, I am giving the Flip 7 a 7.0 rating out of 10. Check the official page of JBL Flip 7 and Flip 6 speakers.

Check the JBL Flip 7 vs JBL Flip 6 story

IF you're interested in portable small speakers, check my Soundcore Motion 300 vs Bose Soundlink Flex article. Both did well in a head-to-head.

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