We Linked 150 of Ikea’s $10 Speakers to Make a Wall of Sound
Wired collaborated with Ikea to test the limits of their Bluetooth speaker chaining technology by linking 150 units together. The experiment successfully created a 'wall of sound' and demonstrated that the consumer-grade hardware could handle large-scale synchronization without technical failure.
Why it matters
This serves as a stress test for consumer-grade wireless audio technology, proving that simple Bluetooth devices can scale beyond their intended use cases.
Now, because it’s highly unlikely any one household will ever own more than a handful of mini Bluetooth speakers, this is one of those consumer-tech statements that rarely gets tested. So we asked the good folks at Älmhult in Ikea headquarters if they’d let us do just this. To our surprise, Ikea not only agreed, but it also upped the ante, saying it might be possible to link up to 150 without breaking the connection, so that’s exactly how many it sent us. “No one has ever tried this, though,” an Ikea spokesperson said. “We haven’t.”
Get smarter about the news
Sign up free for a feed built around what you actually care about, Dive Deeper research on any story, and the full text of every article.
Create free accountAlready have an account? Sign in