How to Adjust Volume on JBL Charge 4

There are a few ways for how to adjust volume on JBL Charge 4 BT speaker. These depend on the app(s) you’re playing from mostly. Indeed many apps offer volume adjustment controls. But this speaker has two buttons for volume control as well. Find these (the + and -) buttons on its top side. Note though, that you cannot set volume with the JBL Connect app.

We assume that you have paired your Charge 4 with your mobile device.

How to Adjust Volume on JBL Charge 4 Bluetooth Speaker

You can adjust the volume without using any apps, doing it this way, as follows.

1. Lay Out the Speaker such that you See the Button Controls

See the button panel on the top of the speaker shown next. There are six buttons here. These include the Connect, Volume DOWN (-), Power, Bluetooth, Volume UP (+), and the Play / Pause button at the right center of the speaker.

Picture of the JBL Charge 4 power bank speaker, top view, showing the Volume DOWN and UP buttons circled. — JBL Charge 4 power bank speaker, top view, showing the Volume DOWN and UP buttons circled.

2. Set Volume by Pressing the – and + Buttons

Press the (-) button at the left center of the speaker to reduce the volume. Tap the (+) button at the right center of the speaker to raise the volume.

3. Done

How to Adjust Volume on JBL Charge 4 Bluetooth Speaker with Siri Voice Commands on iOS

How to adjust volume on JBL Charge 3 Bluetooth speaker. Picture of Siri prompting for voice command screen on iOS device. — How to adjust volume on JBL Charge 3 Bluetooth speaker. Siri prompting for voice command screen on iOS device.

Unfortunately, unlike the Charge 3, the JBL Charge 4 does not let you to activate Siri by pressing its Play / Pause button, when paired with an iOS device (iPhone, iPad, or iPod Touch). But you can get still Siri’s attention by the usual means on the iOS device (by pressing and holding the Home button, or by calling out ‘Hey Siri’). This works even when your device is paired with the Charge 4. But be sure to speak into the device’s microphone, not to the Charge 4, for best results.

Command Siri to Adjust Volume

Next is an example of giving Siri a voice command to set the volume to half (50 percent).

Picture of Siri changing volume to half (50 percent). Showing the screen when that happens. — Siri changing volume to half (50 percent). Showing the screen when that happens.

Press that button to wake Siri up. Hold it in until she responds. Then ask her to raise and lower the volume as follows.

Siri Responds

Next is an example of Siri responding to a voice command to set the volume to FULL (100 percent).

Screenshot of Siri changing volume to full (100 percent). Showing iOS screen when that happens.. — Siri changing volume to full (100 percent). Showing iOS screen when that happens..

Siri Volume Setting Commands Summary

Siri currently understands one scale for volume adjustment: 0-100 percent. Example commands follow. Say these after you’ve pressed the Home button to tell her to listen.

Set volume 0 [muted].
Volume 0.
Set volume 10 [Ten percent].
Set volume 10 percent.
Volume 10.
Set volume 76 percent.
Volume 76.
Set volume 100 [One hundred percent, full volume].

There are also shortcut commands for minimum and maximum volume setting, as in:

Mute. [Sets the volume to zero percent, minimum, muted state.]
Half volume. [Adjusts volume to fifty percent, or half of full.]
Set volume full. [Sets speaker volume to maximum, 100 percent.]
Set volume max. [Sets speaker volume to maximum, 100 percent.]
Volume half. [Adjusts volume to fifty percent, or half of full.]
Volume minimum. [Sets the volume to zero percent, minimum, muted state.]

How to Adjust Volume on JBL Charge 4 Bluetooth Speaker on BT Source Device

You can adjust volume with the controls on the paired device. Further, you can do the same with paired Android devices as well. But we find that volume adjustments on the speaker do not change the volume setting on our Samsung Galaxy J7 Sky Phone Pro. For this phone, the volume buttons on the speaker seemed to adjust the volume of the amplifiers on the speaker itself, and not the phone volume. We discovered distortion in the speaker, with its volume set to half while the phone volume was at full (100 percent). So, just be aware of this so you can avoid “over driving” the Charge 4 with your Android device.

In this demo though, we’re playing YouTube content on an iPad Air 2, and streaming to the Charge 4 via the streaming Bluetooth connection.

1. Begin Playing a Music Source

Start streaming an internet radio station, a song from YouTube or Spotify, or an Audible book. In this demo, we streamed YouTube audio, as shown next.

2. Use your Source Device’s Volume Control Buttons to Adjust the Volume of the JBL Charge 4 Bluetooth Speaker

See this done in the next picture.

Picture of the YouTube app on iOS, as seen during adjusting the volume while playing a video. — YouTube app on iOS, as seen during adjusting the volume while playing a video.

Note the pink arrowed volume setter square with a speaker inside of it in the last picture.

Also note that the volume change you hear on this BT speaker lags by a quarter second or so. Why? Because of the latency (delay) of the commands going across the Bluetooth airwaves to the speaker.

Finally, we’re not covering here how to set volume for individual apps. So, we leave to the reader figuring out how to do this.