We rarely review speakers that top out over $1,000, so why are we checking out Sennheiser's $2,499.95 Ambeo Soundbar? Curiosity, for one—this is the company's first and only soundbar, so to come out of the gate with an offering that costs twice as much as some of our top picks is a bold move. But more than that, the Ambeo is marketed as the all-in-one solution you've been waiting for, with 13 drivers, 5.1.4 audio, and no need for surround speakers. We've heard claims like this before, though the products rarely astound as promised. But when a trusted brand comes out with a $2,500 behemoth that claims to do it all, we're more than willing to kick the tires. So does the Ambeo justify its insanely high price? Yes and no. The sound quality is top-notch and the immersive audio modes are impressive, but we'd still like to see a dedicated subwoofer.

Design and Setup

Measuring 5.3 by 49.8 by 6.7 inches (HWD, with rubber feet installed) and weighing nearly 41 pounds, the Ambeo is perhaps the heaviest soundbar we've reviewed—if not, it's in the running. You will need a sturdy surface for this speaker, or you'll need to buy the mounting kit, which is an extra $60.

A cloth grille wraps around the front and angled side panels, and there's an LED readout at the center of the front panel, along with a light-up Ambeo logo to the right. Up top, there's more grille on either far end, and a central panel with controls for mute, volume up/down, Ambeo (for switching between modes), a multifunction button (that controls playback and track navigation), source, and power, as well as an NFC pairing zone.

There's a recessed panel at the back of the speaker, with connections for the included power cable, USB, Ethernet, HDMI ARC out, three HDMI inputs (an HDMI cable is included), an optical input (no cable included), a subwoofer pre output, and a stereo RCA input (no cable included). A rubber loop is connected to the back to conveniently gather all the cables into one bundle.

The included remote measures roughly 6.3 by 1.5 by 0.6 inches. It has controls for power, Ambeo (switches between various 3D modes), mute, multifunction (controls Bluetooth and Chromecast playback, as well as track navigation depending on how many times you tap it), dedicated volume buttons, source buttons, and six sound mode buttons: Movie, Music, News, Sports, Neutral, and Night. The speaker supports Bluetooth and Wi-Fi audio streaming, with built-in Chromecast support.

The setup process is a bit involved. The soundbar ships with a calibration mic, which is necessary to help measure the acoustics of your room in order for the various Ambeo modes to work properly. You place the mic roughly where you'll be sitting when listening, at ear level (the mic has a stand that enables this), and connect it to the bar using the long mic cable. Over the course of a few minutes, the speaker uses a series of loud tones to measure the room, and adjusts the Ambeo setting accordingly.

The Sennheiser Smart Control app provides extra functionality. Once paired, you can adjust every listening mode to taste using the in-app EQ, and it also describes the sound signature for each mode—Night mode, for instance, tones down frequencies that might disturb housemates or neighbors late at night. It also enables Chromecast playback by connection to the Google Home app.

Performance

Internally, a 500-watt amplifier delivers power to six 4-inch long-throw cellulose sandwich cone woofers, five 1-inch aluminum dome tweeters, and two 3.5-inch full-range, top-firing drivers. These drivers combine for a frequency range of 30Hz to 20kHz. The speaker supports Dolby Atmos, DTS:X, and MPEG-H, and the Ambeo feature takes stereo or 5.1 audio signals and converts them to what Sennhieser calls "3D sound experiences."

We checked out multiple films in Movie and Netural modes. Aside from the various audio modes, there are three 3D Ambeo modes that can also be applied—Light, Standard, and Boost. It can also be turned off.

In Movie mode, with Light Ambeo and no EQ adjustments, we watched Blade Runner 2049's crash scene, in which Ryan Gosling falls from the sky in something that looks like a flying military-grade Lamborghini. It features multiple explosions, and the Ambeo Soundbar doesn't disappoint, delivering powerful bass depth, crisp highs, and a stereo field that may not feel like real surround, but absolutely throws audio around the room in a directional manner.

There's some sub-bass missing here, however. If you're seeking truly deep thunder, you'll likely want to add in a subwoofer. The deep bass you get from the Ambeo Soundbar is more centered in the lows and low-mids, so ambient drones in film scores pack more bass response and get more attention than, say, the explosions in this scene. Regardless, there's no denying the experience is immersive, and dialing the Ambeo mode up to Boost can really enhance the spatial experience.

When the Death Star explodes in Stars Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, the insane rumble from its explosion is not as powerful as it would be with a subwoofer, but the roars of spaceships screaming by pack some serious bass depth. The Ambeo feature provides an excellent widening of the spatial experience, and the low frequencies are nicely represented, the highs are crisp, and the overall experience is truly immersive. Dialogue is never obscured, and things never sound thin. All that said—and even when you boost the bass EQ in the app—the sub-like depth for serious rumble isn't quite there. It's why the soundbar has a subwoofer out, but some will find this hard to accept given the high price, and the fact that Sennheiser doesn't make one.

Musically, the soundbar delivers an excellent experience. With Ambeo off and the speaker in Music and Neutral modes, we got some wonderful sounds out of the system. On tracks with intense sub-bass content, like The Knife's "Silent Shout," the bass depth is powerful, but again, the speaker is missing that truly thunderous low-end. That said, it delivers a balanced, crisp, and full sound signature. At more moderate volumes, the bass response is richer than at top volumes, when DSP (digital signal processing) kicks in noticeably and thins out the lows to prevent distortion.

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Bill Callahan's "Drover," a track with far less deep bass in the mix, gives us a better sense of the Ambeo Soundbar's general sound signature. The drums get a solid, accurate bass depth here—not thunderous, but full and round, as they are meant to sound. Callahan's baritone vocals have a rich low-mid presence that is nicely matched with crisp high-mids and highs, which also benefit the acoustic strums and higher-register percussive hits. Ambeo mode should be off for music, by the way—when it's on, it's like a bizarre reverb/delay gets added to the mix, and it's not really what the feature is for.

On Jay-Z and Kanye West's "No Church in the Wild," the kick drum loop gets a perfect amount of high-mid presence, allowing its attack to retain its punchiness, while the loop's sustain gets some extra low-frequency boosting. The sub-bass synth hits that punctuate the beat are, again, delivered with less oomph than you'd get if a subwoofer were present. The vocals on this track are delivered with excellent clarity, and the track feels ideally balanced—it's certainly not light on bass presence, it's just light on sub-bass depth.

Orchestral tracks, like the opening scene in John Adams' The Gospel According to the Other Mary, sound majestic through the Ambeo Soundbar. The lower-register instrumentation is pushed forward in the mix somewhat, but never in a way that threatens to overwhelm the balance. The higher-register brass, strings, and vocals still retain their crisp presence. The bass depth here feels natural, and articulate—this is a room-filling, wonderful sound, and a reminder that 3D audio is nice, but an excellent stereo recording through superiors drivers is hard to beat.

Conclusions

The Ambeo Soundbar delivers a magnificent listening experience, and Sennheiser went deep on controls, combining sound modes with customizable EQ, and an overlaying of Ambeo 3D modes. But it's hard to get past the price. Even if it included a subwoofer, $2,500 would give us pause. That the system can benefit from a subwoofer, and that Sennheiser doesn't make one specifically for it (or at all), makes it feel like a piece of the puzzle is missing. Thus, no matter how excellent the driver array is, and how solid the Ambeo effects are, ultimately the price feels too high.

In the expensive soundbar realm, we like the $1,200 Bowers & Wilkins Formation Bar (but it also needs a subwoofer to sound its best), while for far less, we like the $600 2.1 LG SL10YG, the $400 Sonos Beam, and the $500 2.1 JBL Bar 3.1. None of these match the overall quality of the Ambeo, but the 2.1 options do produce rumble that the Ambeo can't on its own.

Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar Specs

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