JBL - Flip 4

i dont dislike anything, i was just giving a benchmark for the kind of size i wanted. i think a while ago ichad a flip 4 and there wasnt much you could do in the app, but i havent had a speaker for quite some time. so maybe theres some new stuff i havent checked out. would you reccomend a flip?

In 2025, you're not getting something that last years. To put on perspective I still daily drive a JBL Charge 1. And prefer it over my Flip 4 that's battery decided to kick the bucket after 3 years and had to replace 2x and my brother's Flip 6. There's even the Xtreme 4 still having battery issues. You want something to last get an older speaker find a way to replace the battery with Lithium Solid State batteries and add fans and Sensitive speakers. In short DIY as if a part breaks then you can replace that part.

I have owned the JBL flip 4 and 6. The Flip 4 was miles ahead of the 6. The sound signature has changed a bit. The Flip 4 developed battery issues after 3 years. It still works when plugged in.

JBL Flip 4 JBL Xtreme 3 SONY Ult Field 7 The performance overall in each one, has been more than satisfactory.

Get the 4 bro if u gonna be paying retail

That’s wild. My JBL flip 4 died after 5 years and expanded inside the damn thing. I couldn’t get it out. So I had to recycle it and replace it. 😆

i bought a JBL flip 4 in 2017, and used it to listen to music / announce my presence to motorists / deter unwanted interactions while i was cycling (we're not litigating that choice here, i'm just providing context). the flip series is almost the perfect size to fit into a bike water cage. _**almost.**_ needless to say, she's taken multiple tumbles over thousands of miles, year-round. "dozens" would not be an understatement. almost all of them just bouncing off onto asphalt, at-speed. i once hit a sharp bridge lip and the flip bounced off of a bridge beam into a ravine. luckily it was easy to find because i could hear it echoing up through the creek water when i bumped the volume up to max lol in 2020, i took the Flip 4 back into bestbuy to swap it for a fresh replacement, because it had a no-questions-asked warranty attached to it, back when those were still cheap. it still worked fine, the battery still lasted as long as it did when i bought it as far as i could tell, but the ruggedized outer shell had no shortage of scrapes and the speaker meah had a fair number of tears from taking a few too many headlong cartwheels across the bike path at 20-odd mph. by then, they only had Flip 5's, so that's what i queued up for the swap. I expected the associate to take the old 4, but they didn't. i walked out with both. i bequeethed the battle-hardened Flip 4 unto my younger sibling's commuter bike and took the fresh Flip 5 as my own. Both of them are still going strong to this day. the 4 is approaching 10 years old. My sibling also subjects the speaker to much more perilous outdoorsing than i ever did. Despite a storied history of battle scars, sticker residue, DIY speaker mesh darning--and being so thoroughly sunbleached that it's now roughly the shade of grey the toddler is wearing in this pic you used--it still works. my aib has felt no desire to replace it. My Flip 5 is also still going strong, but she is generally subjected to much less danger on any given day lol i'd say get a used Flip 4 in this particular use-case. 1, because it's used, so if it wnds up failing the toddler test it's not a huge loss. and 2, i genuinely believe one of the reasons that my/my sibling's Flip 4 has survived so long is because JBL had the presence of mind to include a ruggedized silicone port cover that shields the charging port and the aux cable from debris and mousture/liquid. if i hadn't gotten it for basically 20$, i never would have traded it for a Flip 5 (i would have just gone and found another 4), because the 5's ports are fully exposed to the elements at all times. so you have to be a bit more tedious with it. whereas whenever the Flip 4 took a dive into silty/muddy runoff water, i was always reasonably confident that the delicate parts were still undamaged and dry. and i was never disappointed on that front~ hope that personal appraisal helps!

Original boombox and flip 4.

I wouldn’t have expected it from looking at it but I have to throw another vote in for the JBL Flip 4 that another commenter suggested. I’ve had mine 5+ years now and it has been through the wringer and is still kicking! Hard to say for certain on the toddler aspect.. my youngest was in early elementary by the time I got it. While kid roughness was one of the situations it has come out of victorious, sometimes toddlers manage mind blowing magic that brings destruction to the most unbelievable things.

Well even on my jbl flip 4 the rubber sides already worn off and breaks.