Anker buying guide: How to choose the right Soundcore speaker, power bank and Nebula projector
The brand is renowned for its affordable accessories but has plenty more to offer
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Your support makes all the difference.When Chinese accessories manufacturer Anker started selling third-party laptop chargers in 2011, it was just another no-name brand peppered across Amazon’s marketplace. How times have changed.
Since then, Anker founder and former Google software engineer Steven Yang has taken the brand from strength to strength, undoubtably becoming one of the world’s favourite third-party accessory manufacturers, thanks in large part to those robust power banks it offers. To date, the company has sold roughly 50 million products, is valued at over $1bn, and has a loyal fan following right across the web.
Anker doesn’t just sell laptop chargers and power banks anymore. The company is flogging everything from portable projectors, speakers and headphones to smart home equipment, gadgets for your car and cables for every consumer’s want and need.
The brand has gained a solid reputation for its affordable yet high-quality products, churning out accessories that are consistently updated and redesigned in terms of look, power and speed. Many of their accessories even come with a lifetime warranty, so even if your lightning cable stops working after a few years, chances are you’ll be able to get it replaced.
But with more than 500 bits of Anker tech to wade through, you might be struggling to separate your Soundcores from your Powercores and your Nebulas. Don’t fret, we’ll walk you through each of Anker’s greatest hits and which products you should be looking to buy.
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You can trust our independent round-ups. We may earn commission from some of the retailers, but we never allow this to influence selections, which are formed from real-world testing and expert advice. This revenue helps to fund journalism acrossThe Independent.
Anker speakers
Anker has an impressive line-up of speakers that it has been slowly building up and improving ever since 2014. A couple of years ago, Anker spun its audio arm of products – including speakers – into its very own brand called Soundcore. There are a few main categories of Soundcore speakers: those for the home, those designed to be brought to parties and those designed for portability.
The Soundcore motion+ (£99, Amazon.co.uk) is a speaker best suited to home audio. It’s packed with two ultra-high-frequency tweeters for deep bass, and a passive radiator which helps to control the frequency range. It boasts a lengthy 12-hour battery life, too. The Soundcore flare 2, however, is our pick for both portability and party-pumping sound.
IndyBest’s best Anker speaker buy: Anker Soundcore flare 2: £64.99, Amazon.co.uk
The Anker Soundcore Flare 2 is the company’s flagship portable speaker. It’s one of our favourite budget devices, and it doesn’t sound or feel as cheap as its price tag would have you assume.
In our round-up of the best Bluetooth speakers, our reviewer said that “it’s a good weight, the design is well-considered and ergonomic, and the beat-driven light show works admirably well “. The device is also conveniently waterproof.
Our tester also added that there’s a “bass button on the back,” which is a “nice touch to swap between heavy and lighter modes, and has the always-fun on and off noises”. Read our full review of the Anker Soundcore Flare 2 to get all our thoughts on the device.
Anker power banks and Anker wireless chargers
Power banks and portable chargers are where Anker built all of its grassroot fanaticism. Its catalogue of power banks stretches from wallet-sized to pocket-sized and beyond. There’s the popular tiny cylindrical lipstick-sized 3,350mAh Powercore+ mini (£15.99, Anker.com), and the considerably slim Powercore III elite (£119.99, Amazon.co.uk) with its massive 25,600mAh battery capacity – enough to charge a laptop.
Anker even has enormous power stations like the powerhouse power bank (£339.99, Amazon.co.uk) that has a capacity of 434 watts an hour. It’s perfect for charging multiple devices at outdoor events when you have little access to physical power outlets.
Anker powercore 20,100: £34.99, Amazon.co.uk
Our favourite has to be the Anker Powercore 20,100 power bank. It’s slim enough to fit in a deep jacket pocket or be thrown into a handbag, yet still packs a punch in terms of battery capacity. It holds a juicy 20,000mAh, which was enough to get us through a week-long camping trip with no power outlet in sight. Your mileage may vary, but Anker says that it can charge an iPhone 8 seven times, a Samsung Galaxy S8 five times and an iPad mini twice. Best of all is its high-speed charging, delivering the fastest possible charge every time. You can view our round-up of the best portable chargers and power banks for more of our top picks.
Anker earbuds and Anker headphones
Anker offers up a number of entry-level headphones and earbuds under its Soundcore brand. Of all of the Anker products, the true wireless Soundcore liberty air 2 Pro (£129.99, Amazon.co.uk) is probably the most similar in terms of features to Apple’s Airpods. They’ve got active noise cancellation and have a massive 26 hours of listening time. There are also six noise-cancelling microphones inside the earbuds. The liberty air 2 pro are just a fraction of the cost of the Airpods pro (£249, Amazon.co.uk), although they don’t have a transparency mode.
If you’re in the market for a cheap pair of over-ear headphones, you might want to take a look at Anker’s soundcore life Q30 headphones (£79.99, Amazon.co.uk). They feature noise cancelling technology that uses the in-built microphones to filter out 95 per cent of sound, a transparency mode, 40 hours of playback and four hours on a five-minute charge.
Anker projectors
Like the Soundcore brand, Anker has also split its series of portable projectors into its own brand known as Nebula. And with the pandemic shutting down cinemas for much of 2020, it’s little wonder why home cinema and portable projectors have been so popular. Nebula has a range of portable projectors. We’re big fans of the capsule and the Mars projectors – the latter providing a much better sound but the same crisp picture quality as the capsule. They both feature in our round-up of the best portable projectors.
Nebula also has the cosmos (£799.99, Amazon.co.uk) and cosmos max (£1399.99, Amazon.co.uk) projectors – which offer up 1080p resolution and 4K UHD respectively. Cosmos upscales the picture quality when it detects that you are watching non-HDR content.
IndyBest’s best portable projector buy: Anker Nebula capsule II: £789.99, Amazon.co.uk
The Anker Nebula capsule II is our pick for the brand’s portable projectors. It’s as small as a soft drinks can, offering up both wired and wireless connections. In our round-up of the best portable speakers, our reviewer said that “Anker’s offering walks the path that all portable projectors should follow in the” future”.
It’s only 720p and lasts a good three hours, but this is the standard for most mini portable projectors. Given its size, that’s a pretty remarkable feat. “One of the key selling points is how easy the capsule is to use, avoiding the issues many people have to face when setting up a projector in multiple locations,” our tested adds. “This projector keystones (changing the dimensions of content to fit the screen) automatically, and has an Android operating system-built In.”
If you’re looking to see what Anker’s competition looks like, why not have a read of our review of the best portable chargers and power banks or our best portable projectors round-up?