Bang & Olufsen Beosound Stage Soundbar Review

The Bang & Olufsen Beosound Stage is a high-end 3.0 setup from 2020. It's the manufacturer's first soundbar, and its premium, minimalist design is similar in look and feel to their other audio products. It uses a unique speaker arrangement so that it can be wall-mounted or placed on a table, and doesn't have a subwoofer. The Beosound Stage competes with the Sonos Beam, the Sonos Playbar, and the LG GX Soundbar.

The Bang & Olufsen Beosound Stage Soundbar has a very sleek, minimalist look. Our test unit has a silver aluminum casing around its sides and it sits on a black plastic base. Its drivers are covered with a tight black fabric that can get dusty or dirty. If you prefer your soundbar to better match your decor, it comes in a few different color variations that look similarly stylish.

This setup doesn't have a subwoofer.

The Bang & Olufsen Beosound Stage doesn't have satellites.

The Bang & Olufsen Beosound Stage is very large. It most likely won't fit between the legs of a 55" TV. On the upside, it shouldn't obstruct the screen, unless your TV sits flush to the table.

This setup doesn't have a subwoofer.

There are no satellites in the Bang & Olufsen Beosound Stage's setup.

The back of this soundbar has one opening for the inputs as well as the power cable. The manufacturer includes two round collars with grooves so that you can slide and align them with the rear openings of the bar to wall-mount them. However, you need to purchase wall-appropriate screws for the collars separately.

There's no subwoofer in this setup.

There are no satellites in the Bang & Olufsen Beosound Stage's setup.

This soundbar has a great build quality. While the bar has a plastic base, there's thick aluminum casing covering its top sides. The speakers are protected by a tight fabric, but it's prone to collecting dust or ripping. You can also use this bar in two different orientations.

• Safety document
• Power cable
• HDMI cable
• 2x Wall-mount collars
• 2x Felt pads
• 2x Cable guide
• Wall template

The Bang & Olufsen Beosound Stage's stereo frequency response is alright. When you set up this soundbar using the app, you have to confirm the bar's orientation to ensure an optimal setting. If you have the bar flat on the table, audio sounds more restrained than when wall-mounted. However, as it doesn't have a subwoofer, it struggles to produce deep thump and rumbles. While it also sounds a bit boxy overall, its mid-range is fairly neutral, which is well-suited for vocal-centric content.

The Bang & Olufsen Beosound Stage's stereo soundstage is good. The soundstage sounds a little bit wider than the bar itself, but the bar doesn't do any tricks to make it wider. Its focus is good, and objects seem to come from accurate, pinpoint locations rather than a generalized area.

This soundbar has good stereo dynamics. It can get loud, and there are minimal compression artifacts at max volume, particularly in the bass-range. However, this shouldn't be too noticeable to most listeners.

The Bang & Olufsen Beosound Stage's total harmonic distortion performance is decent. Distortion falls within good limits at a normal listening volume, which results in clear and pure sound. However, there's a bit of a jump in distortion at max volume. It can be hard to hear with real-life content, though.

The Bang & Olufsen Beosound Stage Soundbar is a 3.0 setup with an excellent center channel performance. Its dedicated center speaker produces clear and accurate vocal content in movies or TV shows.

The Bang & Olufsen Beosound Stage has a poor surround performance. As a 3.0 setup, it downmixes surround content into stereo, which doesn't produce the most accurate or clear representation of surround objects in the soundstage. It doesn't sound very immersive as these objects are perceived as coming from in front, rather than from the sides or behind you.

The Bang & Olufsen Beosound Stage Soundbar has an okay height performance. When placed on a table, it uses its up-firing speakers on the bar to bounce sound off of your ceiling to give you the impression of height. However, the localization of objects sounds diffused and it won't sound as real as discrete localization produced by down-firing speakers. If you wall-mount this soundbar, it may shift its localization to phantom, front-firing speakers, due to the orientation.

This soundbar has mediocre sound enhancement features. It has five EQ presets: 'TV' which doubles as a dialogue enhancement feature, 'Music', 'Movie', 'Night Listening' (which is an auto-volume/night mode), and 'None'. There's also a virtual surround feature called 'Virtualize', but we don't currently test this feature. There's also a graphic EQ so you can fine-tune its sound. However, it lacks a room correction feature to automatically calibrate itself to the room it's placed in.

This soundbar has a few physical inputs. It has two Ethernet ports: one is for an ethernet connection and the other is for a VLAN connection mainly for LG C9 Series TVs. Using the VLAN connection gives you integrated control of your compatible TV using the Beoremote One. There's also an AUX port if you want to listen to audio from older devices.

The Bang & Olufsen Beosound Stage Soundbar has an ARC port that supports most audio formats. Although it supports eARC, it only supports Dolby formats and not DTS. Its lack of a dedicated subwoofer also seems to affect its ability to play 5.1 PCM files due to the missing channel.

This soundbar has good support via its Full HDMI In port. While it supports Dolby content like Dolby Atmos, it can't play DTS. Its lack of a dedicated subwoofer also seems to affect its ability to play 5.1 PCM files due to the missing channel.

The Bang & Olufsen Beosound Stage doesn't have an Optical In port.

Update 03/18/2021: There was a mistake in our methodology where we measured the latency using every second frame (eg. 120fps). We now re-evaluated the footage using every frame at 240fps for more accurate results.

The Bang & Olufsen Beosound Stage has outstanding wireless playback connectivity. You can stream audio to it using a variety of different connectivity options including Bluetooth and Wi-Fi. You can also use Chromecast built-in and Apple AirPlay 2, which is handy if you want to stream audio from your smartphone.

The Bang & Olufsen Beosound Stage can passthrough the highest quality signals, and when connected between your PC and TV, text looks clear and crisp on your screen.

This soundbar doesn't have a subwoofer.

The Bang & Olufsen Beosound Stage Soundbar doesn't have any satellites.

Update 04/06/2021: This soundbar doesn't have an alphanumeric display, and it only has two lights. As a result, we updated the results for 'Display' from 'Yes' to 'No'.

The interface consists of two lights located on the right side of the soundbar's base. The power light is white. The second light indicates your wireless connectivity status and changes color depending on the wireless input.

This bar has four touch-sensitive controls. You can adjust the volume, skip tracks forward and backward, play or pause, and use Bluetooth. There's also two physical buttons in the middle of the bar that allow the bar to go into standby mode or reset it back to factory settings.

This soundbar doesn't have a remote.

This soundbar uses the Bang & Olufsen app as its controller. In order to use the app, you have to set it up with the Google Home app first. Once you've done this, you get access to all of its controls. You can select EQ presets or use its graphic EQ, toggle upmixing from two channels to three, activate a surround effect, and even control the dynamics of your signal. Using this app, you can also enable the in-app remote for an LG C9 Series TV.

When you turn off the soundbar, it goes into standby mode. If you want to wake it up, you can send a file for it to play. You can also use your TV remote to control the bar's volume, mute audio, and turn it on/standby.