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Fender’s Portable Speaker Is Made For Musicians - But It Lacks An App

Fender’s new ELIE 6 is part-speaker, part-amp—but it’s missing something crucial. WIRED’s Ryan Waniata put his musical skills to the test to try it.

Released on 04/11/2026

Transcript

[gentle guitar music]

There are a lot

of Bluetooth speakers out there these days,

but Fender's new ELIE lineup is something

a little different.

This is the, I'm gonna call it ELIE 6 Speaker.

It starts off with three different drivers,

which you don't often see in a speaker this size,

including a mid-range, a tweeter,

and under here, there is a woofer,

and that gives it a big, powerful sound.

There's good detail, nice body in the mid-range,

but even more interesting,

as you see at the back here, is an XLR

or quarter-inch input, which lets you put in a microphone,

an instrument, or even a line-in from another musical device

so you can sort of blend your Bluetooth audio

with your instruments,

and you know, it sort of lives up to the Fender name

as an Amplifier slash Speaker.

It's really fun to do that.

So far, I've connected a couple of guitars,

and played along with my music,

and this isn't

the first amplifier-style Bluetooth speaker that we've seen.

And one thing it is missing is any kind of plugins.

There's no real dedicated app for plugins,

so you're not gonna be able to get a bunch

of different kinds of distortion

like some other speakers I've seen like this.

But I really like what it's doing.

It's very simplified, and it's also really well made.

You see this nice handle with this sort of groove,

vinyl grip on top.

There's a nice little woodblock here.

Overall, it's a nice package.

I also like the battery life,

which is rated at about 18 hours.

If you're playing it a little louder, I got somewhere

around 16 hours, but still good battery life, good sound,

and real versatility.

It makes the speaker a lot of fun,

and it stands out when compared

to other speakers in the space.

[gentle guitar music]