Product & Company History

If you venture into a professional recording studio, film set, or media room, there is a good chance you will happen upon a product made by Sennheiser. Established in 1945 by Dr. Fritz Sennheiser, they were able to quickly grow their business, utilizing Dr. Sennheiser's knowledge and skills he gained in his prior scientific career to respond to the growing demand for microphones and measuring devices. Throughout the years, Sennheiser pushed the limits, creating new microphones, the world's first open-back headphones, and much more. In 2000, they released the MKH 800 microphone, which was the first studio condenser mic to cover the entire frequency range of the new digital formats with just one transducer system. Many innovative products later, Sennheiser released their first soundbar, the AMBEO, an incredibly popular and powerful system.

It’s easy to see Sennheiser has proven themselves as a leader in the audio industry. When they released the AMBEO soundbar, we reviewed it, and it definitely blew us away. At the time, there was simply nothing like it that provided such an immersive experience within a soundbar. Recently, Sennheiser has expanded its soundbar options with the AMBEO Plus and the AMBEO Wireless Sub to connect to the soundbars.

There was still a missing piece for many people in the soundbar market. Something with a sleek and compact footprint to fill a small room with immersive sound and not take up too much space. Sennheiser has now filled this gap with their new Sennheiser AMBEO Mini. Yes, you can now get the Sennheiser audiophile-grade sound in an extremely small package and more affordable price that will be a perfect fit for almost any smaller media room or office. Let’s look deeper inside the new Sennheiser AMBEO Mini and why we think it might just be the best soundbar in its class.

Design & Build Quality

The Sennheiser Soundbar Mini comes in around 27 inches in length, 4 inches deep, and 2.5 inches tall and weighs about 7 pounds. That certainly is Mini!

Inside the soundbar, you have two woofers that are 4” Cellulose Cone drivers facing upwards and four 1.6” (40mm) Cellulose Cone Full Range drivers with two facing forward and two angled to the sides. Six class D amps provide 250 watts of power and produce a frequency response of 43Hz - 20Khz (33dB). This is all processed by a Quad Core 1.8GhZ SOC processor.

In the box, you’ll get the soundbar Mini, remote control, high-speed HDMI cable, manual, and a power cord.

And this soundbar truly is sleek and minimal looking. We set it up in a home office setting below a 55” TV, which looked great. It is the perfect height to fit on a credenza below a TV without blocking any of the screen. Simply plugging in the power cable and an HDMI cable to our TV, we were instantly up and running. The soundbar feels and looks professional. On the top are white touch-sensitive buttons clearly labeled to switch the input, change the volume, connect to bluetooth, and mute the microphone. This is also where the four microphone holes are for calibration.

For such a small soundbar, it feels pretty heavy at seven pounds. We’ve actually never felt or seen a soundbar at this size that is built so well. The look is very similar to the Sennheiser AMBEO Plus, its bigger brother, except there isn’t a grill on the top since there are no up-firing speakers. Just because it is a small soundbar, does not mean they skipped a beat regarding its build quality. It is just top-notch!

Is the AMBEO Mini for you? An easy way to decide if you need to step up to the Plus or Max is to measure your room. If you have 250 square feet or less, go with the Mini. If you have around 350 square feet or less, go with the Plus. And if you have 450 square feet, go with the Max. And remember, when you add a wireless subwoofer, these numbers will actually go up in size due to the sub taking strain off of the soundbar itself. If you need more help choosing a specific model, our team of soundbar experts is only a call, chat, or email away at audioadvice.com.

Features & Technology

AMBEO Virtualization

The AMBEO Mini utilizes the same virtualization technology found in the AMBEO Max and Plus soundbars. Sennheiser has spent many years collaborating with the Fraunhofer IIS Institute, one of the world’s leading application-oriented research organizations. For over 30 years, Fraunhofer IIS has helped shape the audio and media standards and technologies of audio coding and moving picture production. In fact, the Fraunhofer Society, under the lead of Karlheinz Brandenburg, is largely credited with first developing the MP3 coding format for digital audio. They then co-developed AAC and HE-AAC formats and continue to explore the latest and greatest formats within media. It’s safe to say that they know their stuff!

Utilizing Fraunhofer's “upHear Immersive Audio Virtualizer” post-processing technology and combining that with Sennheiser proprietary AMBEO virtualization technology allows all of their soundbars, including the new Mini, to deliver extremely immersive and convincing sound from one compact device. This is actually quite a feat, seeing that the Mini only has 6 total drivers but can virtualize a 7.1.4 setup. The AMBEO visualization tech uses advanced algorithms to create a 3D sound field with authentic surround and height effects.

Dolby Atmos®, DTS:X, MPEG-G, & 360 Reality Audio

At Audio Advice, we believe the best way to experience Dolby Atmos or DTS:X sound is with dedicated in-ceiling speakers or on-wall speakers that are perfectly positioned within Dolby spec. To do this, you’ll need to cut holes in your ceiling, run wire through your walls, and set everything up correctly to have the best possible experience. Our Home Theater Design Tool tool can give you a taste of what that looks like and how complex it could be for a beginner or someone with a small space.

The next best way to experience one of these immersive formats is with up-firing speakers. This can be done with speakers that sit on top of your tower speakers or drivers inside soundbars that are angled up and then bounce off your ceiling and back down to your listening area. The Sennheiser Max soundbar and many other flagship soundbars use this technology to simulate a 3D soundscape in your room.

However, you need a room that is good for this application. You will need a flat ceiling that is around 10 feet tall and has no obstructions for the sound to bounce perfectly back down to you and create a convincing surround sound effect. Instead of using the up-firing speaker method in this soundbar, Sennheiser utilizes its AMBEO virtualization technology with advanced algorithms to process the digital signal to create the sensation of overhead and surround sound.

We are happy to see that the Mini supports all the big 3D sound brands like Dolby Atmos, DTS:X, MPEG-H Audio, and Sony’s 360 Reality Audio as well. At Audio Advice, we typically stick to Dolby Atmos as it's the most widely available format on the market today. However, if you haven’t heard of MPEG-H yet, it’s a really cool format that has recently gained popularity for some of its unique features and controls. We won’t go into too much detail here, as finding content for it in North America isn’t the easiest to do, but just know that any of the Sennheiser soundbars models will have you covered when it comes to 3D sound formats even if the standard changes down the line.

Automated Self-Calibration, Adaptive Preset, & Upmixing

At Audio Advice, we are huge fans of room calibration. When you can fine-tune a product to your specific environment, chances are that you will have a much better sound experience. The AMBEO Mini makes this extremely easy by letting you run a room calibration test that uses an algorithm to learn the reflective characteristics of your room and then decide on the best sound allocation and positioning of the 7.1.4 phantom speakers. The bar has 4 built-in far-field high-precision microphones that listen to the test tones and do the calculations and adjustments for you.

To make things work even better, Sennheiser included a feature called “Adaptive mode,” which scans the content you watch in real-time to adjust the sound for the best playback quality. If you want to make the adjustments yourself, you choose from a list of presets (Music, Movie, News, Neutral, or Sports) or even fine-tune the EQ yourself directly in the app.

In addition, AMBEO virtualization can upmix and render any stereo or 5.1 content into a full 7.1.4 mix to make your movies come to life and fill your room even more. You’ll also get voice enhancement options that you can toggle on to make voices sound more prominent. This is a great feature if you always wonder what the characters are saying in a movie because their dialogue seems drowned out by the rest of the soundtrack. Night Mode is another feature you can activate in the app to reduce the noise of those big action scenes and not disturb your neighbors or partner in the next room. And since we did our testing in a home office environment, this mode actually came in handy to avoid disturbing the rest of the house while testing out the race scene in Ready Player One.

Control

We see many people placing the Sennheiser Mini in a living room, bonus room, office, or even a bedroom. We love that it has Alexa built-in and OK Google, and you can easily just ask for it to play your favorite song in the morning or ask what the weather will be like tomorrow. In addition, you will have control from the buttons on the top of the soundbar, with the remote control, the app on your smartphone, or even using a web interface!

I/O

On the back of the soundbar, you’ll find a standard C8 power input (cable included), a USB input, a small reset button, a setup button, and one single HDMI (2.1) eARC input. That’s it. Simple and elegant. While we do always wish to have more than one HDMI input, for the use cases we see this soundbar being used in, you probably won’t need one anyways.

We would have really loved to have an ethernet port and a subwoofer-out option. For those of you who don’t have stable WiFi, an ethernet is a great option to have. Although there is a wireless subwoofer option that we will discuss next, a wired subwoofer option is always great to have for more flexibility in subwoofer options.

Wireless Subwoofer

By adding a subwoofer to your soundbar setup, you can enjoy a much more dynamic and balanced sound. The subwoofer can handle the low-frequency sounds, freeing up the soundbar to focus on delivering effortless, clear mids and highs.

Sennheiser has the perfect solution for a subwoofer that is wireless and pairs up nicely with any of their soundbars. The AMBEO sub has a long throw 8” woofer inside with a 350W class D amplifier. It’s a closed enclosure for deep and dry bass down to 27Hz. It also has room calibration, only needs a power cable, and you can connect up to four of them wirelessly to a Sennheiser soundbar at once. By adding this sub to the Mini, you can fill a larger room much more easily and create a much more powerful and dynamic sound overall. It’s our opinion that if adding the sub is within your budget, it’s a good option, as it can be used with any of the Sennheiser sound bars. So, if you decide to upgrade later down the line, you’ll still have an awesome subwoofer to pair with your new soundbar.

To learn more about subwoofer placement and calibration, check out our in-depth guides here:

Wireless Connectivity

In terms of wireless connectivity, the Mini has Bluetooth (5.0), WiFi, built-in Alexa and Google Chromecast, Apple Airplay 2, Spotify Connect, Tidal Connect, and some licensed streaming services like TuneIn, Deezer, iHeartRadio that are accessible via virtual assistants. Apple Airplay 2 and Google Chromecast allow you to sync up multiple devices and play them simultaneously to enjoy music in multiple rooms at once.

Performance

At Audio Advice, we're dedicated to thoroughly testing soundbars, spending countless hours evaluating their performance. Let's dive into how we set it up and what we heard.

We set the AMBEO Mini up in a home offer room that is about 15 feet wide and 12 feet deep. The AMBEO Mini, without the subwoofer, is recommended for a room that is roughly 250 square feet, so our office setting at around 180 square feet was a perfect spot to do our testing.

We plugged in the soundbar and downloaded the Sennheiser Smart Control app. It will scan for devices and then recognize the new soundbar and walk you through the setup process. It prompted us to connect to WiFi, update the software, ask if we wanted to pair a wireless sub and do a few other small tasks to get started. Then, it ran its system calibration, which took about 3 minutes to complete. Overall, the entire process took about 5 minutes.

Before we get into the testing, it’s important for us to note that the Smart Control app is one of the best we’ve ever used for a soundbar. It was extremely intuitive and has everything you need easily accessible. Your input and volume sit right at the top of the app. You then can engage and disengage the AMBEO virtualization tech, which we recommend you keep on, but it’s nice to be able to turn it off and hear the difference it makes. You then have your selectable audio presets. Below those are toggles to turn on/off Night Mode and Voice Enhancement mode, along with the calibration button. When you dive deeper into the settings section, you can check your WiFi, and Bluetooth, change your subwoofer settings, change your center volume on the soundbar, view what codec is playing, turn off the LEDs on the front of the bar, and so much more. This may seem overwhelming, but trust us, Sennheiser has this all laid out beautifully for you to navigate in the app.

In addition, the remote has a button for each audio preset, a source button, volume buttons, a voice enhancement button, a night mode button, an AMBEO virtualization button, and a play/pause button. It is also a well-built, sleek remote that we found ourselves using quite often during testing.

So, we have an extremely well-built compact soundbar made by a highly reputable company. They’ve included so many great features, a phenomenal app, the ability to add their wireless sub, and more. But how does it actually sound in the real world?

We first tested the AMBEO Demo experiences in the app. There is a demo called Santeria in Dolby Atmos. It has some bells, whistles, and birds making noises in nature. We have to say that this demo experience had us going back to the specs to double-check and see if there were up-firing drivers in this soundbar. The bird calls came from the center while the other nature sounds filled the rest of the room. You could hear sounds way to the left of the speaker and even sounds up high and around you. If you really focus, you can tell that these sounds are not actually above and around you. But that’s not the point. When you start to relax and focus on a movie, you won’t actually analyze where all the sounds are coming from. Instead, you’ll simply appreciate the immersive sound coming from this compact soundbar, which is far superior to any speakers inside your TV. In fact, this soundbar delivers the most convincing 3D bubble of sound we’ve heard without up-firing drivers.

The race scene in Ready Player One is one of our favorite Dolby Atmos tests. We went right to it to see how the Mini performed. First, it was really neat that when we started to play Dolby Atmos content, the bar instantly recognized it and displayed a “Dolby Atmos” logo on the top of the soundbar. This race scene has a lot of sounds flying all over the place and can sound muddy on lower-end speakers. The AMBEO Mini produced a wide soundstage with sound effects happening all the way to the left and right wall. And when we turned it up, even though it’s compact in size, it never felt strained or harsh to our ears. In the scenes before the race, the dialogue was clear and crisp, even without using the Voice Enhancement mode. And when we paired up a single Sennheiser Wireless Sub, it brought every movie scene we watched to another level. For casual movie watching in a bedroom, you can get away without using the sub. But if you want to immerse yourself in sound with a really compact setup, the soundbar Mini and sub combo will definitely leave you with a smile.

We played with many of the settings and overall recommend leaving the AMBEO virtualization on. (Although it was fun to experiment with turning it off and on.) We kept Night Mode off, but it did seem to do a good job at making the louder noises at a lower level. And we found the Center Channel volume to be perfect right where it was. Overall, in a small room like an office or bedroom, it created a fun and convincing experience to watch a movie.

When it came to music, the bar created a lively atmosphere with its rich sound while playing some of our favorite tracks. It was nice to Airplay songs directly from Qobuz and jam out in our office and then easily switch over to our TV to watch a movie.

Overall Recommendation

While not quite the same immersion as a full home theater installation with separate speakers all around the room, the Sennheiser Mini soundbar is an excellent solution to get audiophile-grade sound from a sleek and compact soundbar. We think this will work perfectly in a bedroom or family room where you want something unobtrusive but still sounds really good.

We spend hours in our lab testing many soundbars, and we are confident that you will be impressed with the Sennheiser Mini Soundbar. If you need more help choosing which Sennheiser soundbar is best for you, contact our team of experts to discuss which is best for you.

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Audio Advice has been in the industry since 1978, and throughout the years, we’ve developed a team of professionals who live and breathe all things audio and video. We spend countless hours testing and reviewing every product we sell to be sure it stands up to our extremely high-quality standards. With our state-of-the-art home theater audio lab, we can become product experts and provide our customers with in-depth, honest feedback.

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