An Echo Dot 4 clock speaker in front of a JBL Boombox speaker
This post shows how to connect the JBL Boombox Bluetooth speaker to Alexa smart speakers. Since this pairing happens between the JBL and Alexa devices directly, you need not turn Bluetooth on in the mobile device you’re using to set up this connection.
With your JBL Boombox powered OFF (status lamp is dark), run through this routine to connect it to your Alexa Echo, Show, Studio, and Dot models. We use an iPad Air tablet to set this up.
We found the app on the iPad Air as shown in the next shot. In this exercise, the app is in a custom folder that we set up called Smart Speakers, and pointed at by the green arrow.
The app displays its Home screen as we see in the next screenshot.
Find the hamburger item in the lower right corner of the screen. We point at this with the green arrow in the last screenshot.
This brings up the Alexa app’s main menu, as shown in the next screenshot.
The Settings option is pointed at by the green arrow in the last photo.
This brings up the Settings screen, as shown in the next screenshot.
Touching Device Settings brings up the All Devices page, as shown next.
From here, choose which Echo device you wish to pair with your Boombox 1 speaker.
This takes you to the device-specific settings screen for the speaker you chose.
In this demo, we’re pairing from our Thomas’s 2nd Echo Dot 4 speaker to our JBL Boombox, and so, its device specific settings screen looks as follows.
Find the Connect a Device option pointed at by the green arrow in the last screenshot.
This brings up the Setup screen, as we show next.
At this point, your Alexa device scans for nearby Bluetooth devices that are in pairing mode. Here, we selected an Echo Dot 4 earlier. So, this speaker will be the one that scans for BT devices.
Note that our Dot speaker found no devices so far. But it will in the next steps, when we turn on the JBL Boombox and put it in pairing mode.
Bring your speaker close to your Alexa device to pair, and power up that speaker by pressing and releasing the Power button as we show in the next picture.
Put your Bluetooth speaker into pairing mode by pressing and releasing the Pairing button, as illustrated in the next picture.
When you put the speaker into discovery mode, it should then appear in the Alexa app, on the Pair Bluetooth Device… page, as we see next.
Note that if your speaker does not show up on this page at this point, then try moving it very close to the Alexa speaker, closing and restarting the Alexa app, and then repeating steps 3 through 7 along with step 9 above. We usually find that this gets the speaker to appear here as it should.
See the last screenshot above. Our test speaker is there.
Pair to the speaker by tapping its corresponding entry on the Pair Bluetooth Device… screen, we see in the last screenshot above.
Your Alexa speaker then pairs with the JBL Boombox.
The app then takes you back to the Thomas’s 2nd Echo Dot 4 screen, which looks something like the following.
Note that our Bluetooth speaker now shows as connected. Also, the Boombox JBL speaker makes the Speaker Paired sound (the three ascending guitar notes).
This speaker is now connected with your Alexa smart speaker. Its Bluetooth light glows solid white to signal that successful pairing is in effect.
We can now ask Alexa to play music or news, and those programs will come out of the Boombox 1. Be sure though, to speak to the Echo speaker when making requests, and not the Bluetooth speaker. Even though the Boombox is now paired with Alexa, the Echo is still the speaker that hears your voice commands through its internal far field microphones.
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