The Flip 2 JBL Bluetooth speaker by Harman Kardon is a low to medium power, hand-held unit with enough RMS watts to fill a typical size room with pretty full sounding tunes.
But what do the watts a wireless speaker has, tell us about how good it is? Firstly, the watt is a measure of how much power the speaker uses and pumps out. Plus, this metric is a telling comparison measure. Why? Because generally, speakers with more watts of audio tend to play louder than those with less.
While they do cost more, have bigger, heavier batteries and chargers, along with larger drivers and magnets, they nonetheless offer some big plusses. They have more dynamic range, a deeper bass response, and the models that play in stereo like the Flip 2, offer typically a bigger soundstage and better stereo imaging to listeners.

Thus in general, the more powerful the speaker, the better it sounds, even at lower volume. You get improved clarity due to higher accuracy reproduction of the bass, midrange, and treble parts of the music. Plus, more reserve power likely means less clipping distortion too, even at higher volumes. So, the speaker’s maximum watts output is a primary indicator of speaker quality and performance. And as such, this value is of great interest to audiophiles and novice listeners alike.
In this case, the Flip 2, as a smaller Bluetooth speaker, is a decently loud model for all the bigger it is. Its twelve watts can fill a small to medium size party area with clear and full music. See below for details on its power output.
JBL Flip 2 Watts Details
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- Battery Capacity: 7.4 watt-hours (7.4 volts, 1.0 amp-hours).
- USB Charger Power: 5 watts (5 volts at 1 amp) or greater.
- Power Bank Output Power: Not available on this speaker.
- Recharge Time: 4 hours at the recommended charging current.
- Play Time Per Recharge: Up to 5 hours.
- Total Audio Output Power on AC (RMS): 12 watts (2 x 6 watts).
- Total Peak Audio Power: 16.97 watts.
- Output Power per Channel: 6 watts RMS (two channels in this speaker).
Notes on JBL Flip 2 Watts
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- This speaker may not input enough enough power from a low power USB AC adapter (under 10 watts capacity) to keep the battery from discharging when playing at full volume, depending on what you’re listening to. So it could happen that even with the Flip 2 fed from external power, you could still see the music cut off abruptly. Thus on the (rare) times that this occurs, just stop playing the speaker for an hour or two, to let it build up some reserve battery power while charging. Then, fire it up again for continued party enjoyment.
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References
Revision Log
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- 2022-08-26: First published.