I just upgraded from my TV's built-in speakers with this $99 soundbar — and I'm never going back

The Sony HT-S100F is one of the cheapest soundbars I’ve ever laid eyes on, let alone tested. $99 for a soundbar feels almost too good to be true. Other super-budget soundbars I’ve tested have failed to reach the astronomical heights promised by their marketing.

However, the Sony HT-S100F’s promises aren’t broken. No, it’s not one of the best soundbars for complete home theater setups, but it’s probably the best budget option I’ve ever seen. The 2 channel soundbar is simple and easy to use, and that’s all it’s trying to be. No lofty claims of Dolby Atmos or incredible bass. Just clean, balanced, easy listening.

On those fronts, the Sony HT-S100F excels. It brings to life anything you’re watching, but it performs best with TV and dialogue-heavy movies (think comedies rather than blockbuster action films). Could it be a worthy upgrade from your default TV speakers? Find out in this Sony HT-S100F review.

Sony HT-S100F soundbar review: Cheat sheet

• What is it? A budget soundbar without surround sound
• Who is it for? Want a step up from your TV speakers but don’t want to commit to a $500 setup? The HT-S100F is for you.
• What does it cost? $99 / £99
• What do we like? For the price, the sound quality is fantastic
• What don’t we like? It can’t hold its own against multi-channel setups

Sony HT-S100F soundbar review: Specs

Sony HT-S100F soundbar review: Price & availability

In the U.S., the soundbar is called Sony HT-S100F and is $99 from Amazon. Its MSRP is listed as $129, but it regularly retails for under the $100 mark. In the U.K., it goes by the name Sony HT-SF150 and it’s £99 from Amazon.

This is a blinding price for a soundbar: most decent soundbars start at $200. One of the best affordable soundbars I’ve tested is the Samsung HW-B650 at $249. If you’re on a serious budget, though, the Sony HT-S100F is a great starting point. Its sound is much more balanced and layered than the tinny, lackluster $99 Majority Elias.

Sony HT-S100F soundbar review: Design & controls

• Simple design, with an outer mesh casing
• High-quality remote for switching between modes
• Touch controls not massively reliable

As with most soundbars, there’s nothing remarkable or unattractive about the Sony HT-S100F. It’s 35 inches long, with five icons on the top and a ‘Sony’ logo. The front of the soundbar has a mesh covering over the two speakers, which is unassuming and wouldn’t look out of place on any TV stand.

It’s worth noting that the power cord is pretty short, so you’ll need a plug on the right-hand side of the soundbar.

The five icons on top are touch responsive, but they’re not massively reliable so I found myself gravitating towards the remote. The remote is quite light, but it’s constructed well, and isn’t flimsy at all. The buttons have a nice amount of press, so you don’t accidentally activate the wrong setting.

Unfortunately, the Bluetooth button isn’t on the remote, so you have to press the on-bar buttons to hook up wirelessly. You need to press the power, input, and volume down buttons for over 10 seconds to enter Bluetooth pairing mode: who’s got time for that? Why isn’t there a Bluetooth pairing button on the remote?

Other than entering Bluetooth pairing mode, the Sony HT-S100F is easy to control thanks to the handy remote.

Sony HT-S100F soundbar review: Features & setup

• Cinema, night, music, standard, voice, and auto mode
• Easy setup, minimal wires
• No independent bass + treble increase or decrease

Setting up the Sony HT-S100F soundbar was incredibly easy: simply plug the power cord and the HDMI cable. The soundbar automatically connected when I turned on the TV, but a few times I had to manually turn it on with the remote.

However, this didn’t occur often enough to be really annoying. I’d happily put up with turning on the soundbar manually to get this sound quality at under $100.

As with most soundbars I’ve tested, there’s a range of sound modes: Auto Sound, Standard, Cinema, Music, Voice, and Night. I found Auto Sound and Voice to be best, but I’ll get into that fully later. Cinema mode increases the bass for more immersive movies. Voice performs as you’d expect — it improves dialogue clarity. Standard doesn’t change much, and Night reduces bass to prevent waking up neighbors.

I kept mine on Auto Sound, which, again, might not impress movie buffs who love a wide dynamic range, but did the trick for casual TV viewing.

As you’d expect on a soundbar of this price, there aren’t really any more features. It doesn’t have smart home integration, but if you’ve got a smart TV, you can use it with your TV’s features.

Sony HT-S100F soundbar review: Sound quality

• Great bass for no sub
• Not as much nuance as I’d like
• Clear dialogue

I tested all of the aforementioned listening modes (Auto Sound, Standard, Cinema, Music, Voice, Night) by watching 4K Blu-Ray DVDs and TV on Netflix.

Movies

I watched ‘Top Gun: Maverick’ and ‘Deadpool & Wolverine’ in Cinema mode. In the opening scene of ‘Top Gun: Maverick’, I was really impressed with the level of bass. Considering the HT-S100F has no subwoofer, I wasn’t expecting the bass to be great. However, the bass notes in ‘Danger Zone’ were groovy and didn’t overpower the sounds of the jets taking off.

There was a decent amount of tinniness in the song’s percussion, but I was so focused on the whooshing rope sounds and clear clinking metallic sound effects to care. Of course there’s going to be tinniness in a $99 soundbar — tinniness is a symptom of a cheap center channel. $99 is cheap. For the price, though, the sound quality was pretty awesome.

Later, in the first dogfighting scene, I could hear all the headset dialogue clearly. There was no muffled speech, and I wasn’t straining to hear even over the radio crackling sound effect.

In the majority of the OST, the HT-S100F struggled with bass — it was just the opening scene that was super impressive. Again, you can’t expect subwoofer-quality bass on a $99 soundbar, but for the price, the HT-S100F performed excellently.

Next, I watched ‘Deadpool & Wolverine’. Cringeworthy humor aside, the opening voiceover was clear and audible. Unfortunately, there were a few moments where the soundtrack overpowered dialogue. For example, when the Backstreet Boys came on, and alternately when Fergie played, the music was drowned out a little by the dialogue.

Even so, the sound quality was most definitely superior to the built-in TV speakers. This soundbar isn’t priced as a hi-fi setup: it’s merely a step up from TV sound quality. There’s no Dolby Atmos and the channel setup is minimal; just two center speakers. If you want an immersive, surround soundbar, this isn’t the option for you. You’ll have to spend more to get something like the Sony HT-S2000 ($499), which has a 3.1-channel setup.

TV

To test the HT-S100F for TV, I watched ‘Toxic Town’ on Netflix with the Voice mode enabled. As promised, this mode made dialogue clear without overpowering the sound effects and background music. I could still hear characters pouring cereal and drinking beer without drowning out dialogue.

I switched to Standard mode to compare audio quality. I was immediately shocked by the difference; the speech was quiet and almost inaudible. I had to put ‘Voice’ mode on to get the best sound. As with all soundbars, you need to fiddle with settings to obtain the best results.

Auto Sound is also pretty good: it basically works by choosing the best EQ for whatever you’re watching. I enjoyed watching TV with either Voice mode or Auto Sound over any other setting. Cinematic upped the bass too much, which sounded odd on a soundtrack with little bass.

Voice mode highlighted, you guessed it, voices, and auto sound calibrated itself based on what was playing — kind of like when you see ‘AI dialogue’ modes on other soundbars.

There’s no doubt in my mind that the HT-S100F soundbar is better than TV speakers, but obviously, it’s not going to scratch the surface of hi-fi setups like Sonos Arc Ultra ($999) and JBL Bar 1300X ($1,699). However, for the unbelievably low price of $99, it’s a major upgrade from TV speakers.

It performs best with dialogue-oriented shows like TV and comedy movies; I wouldn’t recommend it for serious cinema fanatics. As with the Bose Smart Soundbar 2024 ($499), it would best suit a TV lover who simply can’t put up with TV speaker quality anymore.

Music

If you have a smart TV with Spotify or Amazon Music (etc) apps, you’ll be able to listen directly from the TV via the Sony HT-S100F soundbar. Or you can connect via Bluetooth, which is what I did.

I listened to ‘Pink Pony Club’ by Chappell Roan in Music EQ mode. The piano-led synth pop track sounded good, but there wasn’t much bass. I played ‘Back on ‘74’ by Jungle next, which, again, seriously lacked bass. I think that’s a given on a 2 channel soundbar, and for $99, can I really complain?

The music playback sounds about as good as on something like the JBL Flip 6 on default EQ. Decent, but wouldn’t impress an audiophile.

Sony HT-S100F soundbar review: Verdict

As you might have guessed, I really like this soundbar. If you’re a serious movie fanatic, I would skip it, though. It likely won’t impress you — there’s not enough bass, and there’s no Dolby Atmos integration. It does have Dolby Audio, but the lack of surround sound wouldn’t be optimal for a serious home theater setup.

However, if you’re a TV buff and you just want to upgrade your TV’s built-in speakers, I don’t think you’ll be able to find anything better at this price point. The HT-S100F performs miles better than the $99 Majority Elias, which is one of the only sub-$100 soundbars I’ve come across with claims of Dolby Atmos.

I think 360° audio at this price point is mostly impossible, but the HT-S100F doesn’t claim to be completely immersive or suitable for home cinema setups. For simple, day-to-day usage, and a stellar upgrade from TV speakers, the Sony HT-S100F is the one.