The whole world’s a soundstage: Marshall Woburn III review

From rock and roll to heavy metal and everything in between, Marshall has cemented themselves as the company behind some of the best speakers and amplifiers known to man. The design of the Marshall Woburn 3 harks back to those huge walls of Marshall amps that have been the backdrop to guitar music for decades.

But it’s not just an iconic image. The Bletchley-based company is most famous for its signature sound - loud, immersive, and full of ear-splitting mid-range.

And that’s exactly what this latest iteration of its Woburn home speaker promises over its predecessor (the Woburn 2), with an extra pair of cones to help fill the tonal gap between bass and treble, and a wider soundstage for true room-filling volume.

You also get an HDMI Arc input so the Woburn 3 can double up as a televisionor home cinema speaker too, increasing its usability and adding another outlet for its incredible sound.

Verdict: a weighty purchase both physically and monetarily, but one that elevates whatever type of music you like listening to from background noise to an all-encompassing event. It’s easy to set up, visually enhances the room you put it in, and has a build quality and attention to detail that would shame a luxury car maker. I liked it, a lot.

Using the Marshall Woburn 3

You can select between a 3.5mm input, a pair of RCAs, or an HDMI cable using a small button on the brass control panel. This also doubles as the Bluetooth connection button, which is likely to be the most common method of streaming, and this model has the upgraded Bluetooth 5.2 logic over the Woburn 2’s 5.0.

This means immediate and drama-free connection, plus over-the-air updates, which the speaker did as soon as I connected to it. Marshall says the Woburn 3 also features hardware for low-energy audio, the next generation of Bluetooth tech, and is ready to adopt this as it becomes more common. Again, via an OTA update.

In theory, this means lots of clever things including the ability to mesh several speakers together for delay-free stereo sound. I’m very excited by this, if only because I love the idea of stacking a dozen on top of each other and pretending I’m at a Slayer gig.

There’s a new speaker array in the Woburn 3, which features a three-way driver system (Woburn 1 and 2 only were only two-way) including a 90w sub with a rear port, two 15w mids and two 15w tweeters. This is supposed to give a richer, more even tone and help the Woburn 3 project further into the corners of your room.

Marshall Woburn 3: what’s the story with the design?

I’m loathed to describe the Woburn as “retro” because in reality there isn’t a huge amount of difference in look between a brand-new Marshall guitar amp and an old one. Like a Porsche 911, the designers have found a style they like and have stuck with it.

There is definitely a nostalgic quality to the chunky on/off switch though, which flicks back and forth with mechanical satisfaction that puts you straight into Jimi Hendrix’s shoes every time you use it. The details are exquisite too, with a fine knurling pattern and spiral engraving on top that I only noticed when photographing it. I’ve never been so excited by a switch before.

If you’ve owned or used a Marshall amp then the potentiometer knobs for the volume, bass and treble will be instantly familiar too - they look and feel brilliant, although there isn’t a hard stop at either end of the rotation, they spin indefinitely.

That’s because, like the on/off switch, you can control these settings via the Marshall app (the speaker goes into standby mode after a period of inactivity) in order to shape the sound it makes without getting up from your chair. Also, because they’re mounted on the top of the speaker, depending on the placement you might find it easier to use the app than the physical controls.

Although quick and easy to set up, the app lacks a bit of control in the form of a multi-band graphic EQ; you can only adjust bass and treble. Thing is, the Woburn sounds so good out of the box I'm not sure that matters. What is impressive is the room set-up control, which tailors the Woburn to physical obstacles like whether the speaker is on the floor, close to an edge, or positioned in a corner

Although lighter than the Woburn 2, this speaker is still a weighty item, so you might want to think carefully about its placement. It feels solid and built to last - the construction is PVC-free, uses 70% recycled plastic, and vegan-friendly materials.

How does the Woburn 3 perform?

I was expecting the Woburn to sound good when playing guitar-based music, recreating the rich and warm Valvestate tone I'd overdosed on as a teenager while playing in heavy metal bands. One of the reasons I now have quite bad tinnitus.

What I wasn't expecting was how faithfully it would play electronic music, particularly drum and bass. The 90 Watts of bass output should have been a clue really - the Woburn majors in low-end, whether it's a 1970s kick drum or a more modern dance bassline.

There’s also extra depth and timbre to mid-range tones; guitars sound especially brilliant (they couldn’t not, could they?) while vocal reproduction is incredibly realistic. If you close your eyes you can almost imagine the singer in the room with you.

This rich and complex sound fills the space you’re in. Earlier Woburn models were picked up on for being a bit directional, you had to stand in the right spot to get the best from them, but the Woburn 3's sound really follows you around the room.

Marshall claims to have redesigned this new model for that exact purpose - it adapts its tone based on where it's positioned, the size of the room and the volume you're listening to in order to create the best sound possible. Without listening to them back-to-back it's hard to compare but what I can say is that the Woburn 3 certainly fills the corners of my room from its central position along the opposite wall.

Here's what I think is really impressive - this is a very loud speaker, one that I've rarely needed to wind up past 75% for long, but it sounds absolutely superb at a low volume too. Particularly the low-end tones, often the first to die off as the volume decreases.

Sounding off: how does the Marshall Woburn 3 stack up against our punishing playlist?

Resident audiophile Will Lobley and I have been assembling a benchmark playlist to fully stretch the performance of music tech we review. I say that, I basically borrowed his selection and added some Queen and a film soundtrack.

These Things Will Come To Be by DJ Seinfeld

The punchy drum track really cuts through the atmospheric synth, while the mid-to-low bass tones are recreated with impressive warmth whether the volume is low or high, and high percussive parts punctuate with a crispness like broken glass. The spaciousness of this song is no doubt best enjoyed on a pair of headphonesbut the Woburn does a brilliant job of filling a room with sound, so it kind of feels like you're surrounded by it anyway.

Hey Boy Hey Girl by The Chemical Brothers

An immensely complex and layered track. In other words, there's a lot going on all at the same time and this can be hard to replicate without distortion on anything other than a massive PA system in Ibiza. Within that hot alphabet soup, different instruments and riffs are repeatedly brought to the surface and showcased as the track progresses. The isolated guitar track that first appears at about two minutes has never sounded so warm and defined.

Entombment of a Machine by Job For A Cowboy

An absolute wall of noise with an enormous vocal range to contend with, from guttural to banshee-like, faithfully reproduced by the Woburn with haunting accuracy. There's a pace to this track that doesn't give much time for speakers to recover and the result can be one big mushy mess, especially at high volume, but the Woburn remains admirably in control.

Money For Nothing by Dire Straits

I've listened to this song a lot - Brothers in Arms lived rent-free in my Dad's car stereo - but Mark Knopfler's intro guitar riff following the drum crescendo has never given me goosebumps like this before. It sounds like he's in the room! There's something just-right about classic rock projected through a Marshall, isn't there?

Dreams by Fleetwood Mac

I chose this for the intense bass riff that can easily overload lesser speakers, and Stevie Nicks's soaring vocals. For a laid-back track, there's plenty going on here and it all comes together in the chorus. While I've always loved the snare drum tone, I'd not noticed how brilliant the toms sound in the few subtle rolls you get later on in the track.

Somebody to Love by Queen

While we're on the subject of vocal range - this is always a challenge for a small speaker to create a rounded sound simply because Freddie seems to have been recorded at twice the volume of everyone else (that's not a complaint) until about halfway through. Usually, this means constant fiddling with the volume but the Woburn's tone is so balanced and the vocals so rich it's hard not to just spin it up to 11.

The Ring Goes South by Howard Shore

The closest thing to a classical track in my playlist and one full of subtlety before an overwhelming brass section threatens to push speaker cones into overdrive. Not here though, just a satisfying ramp-up in volume that left me feeling capable of scaling Mount Doom myself.

Any downsides?

Extremely few, and even then, you’ll think I’m clutching at straws. First up – there’s no carrying handle like my old guitar amp had. I should point out this is not supposed to be a portable speaker, and in fact, Marshall does make portable speakers with straps, but hear me out.

This thing sounds so incredible I want to be able to take it places and let other people listen to it. The lack of a handle makes for cleaner lines, granted, but it’s also awkward to hold. Also, probably a niche point, but could Marshall have included a guitar jack input?

Perhaps the more reasonable complaint is its shape. Marshall’s somewhat belligerent commitment to making rectangular speaker boxes that look like guitar amps means it’s not the ideal shape for going under a TV (there’s a reason sound bars are long and thin) so unless you’ve got a lot of space it’s likely you’ll have to position it off to one side.

The addition of an HDMI input so you can use this as a TV speaker is a brilliant idea and further enhances its use case around the home. But only if your TV cabinet can handle it. Although you could always buy a Marshall Acton instead.

We don’t tend to throw perfect scores around at whatsthebest.co.uk and arguably, the perfect product doesn’t exist, and if it does, then the review wouldn’t have a 200-word section detailing its downsides.

But I can’t help but love the Woburn 3. More accurately I suppose, I love music, and a high-quality speaker like this Marshall unlocks all sorts of nuance you don’t usually get to hear – subtle emotions in a singer’s voice, the gradual decay of a sustained guitar note, the feeling of a kick drum in your chest. It’s a bit like going from a black and white TV to 4K colour.

Where this particular speaker really excels though is its ability to provide those sensations without needing to be turned up to 11. This means you can enjoy it whenever you want, whether you live in a converted barn or a terraced house, you can still be enveloped in sound.

I also really like looking at it, probably because it unlocks some nostalgic notion of playing guitar with my friends as a teenager. If you’re going to take up a load of space in your room with a speaker, why not pick one that visually enhances your surroundings?

How the product was tested

I connected my phone to the Woburn 3 initially and streamed music via Bluetooth. Then I moved it into my home office and swapped my phone for my laptop. Now I can still stream music to it but also take work calls and watch YouTube videos on my lunch break. I reckon during my 7.5-hour working day, the Woburn 3 is playing something for seven of those.

Adam Binnie is the Affiliate Operations Editor and reviewer for WhatsTheBest, specialising in bikes, fitness, cars, parenting and cooking.

Subscribe to the What’s The Best Newsletter to keep up to date with more of the latest reviews and recommendations from the What’s The Best team.