Going camping this summer? Then why not check out the Lava BrightSounds Portable Speaker to take away with you on your adventure? To be honest, that’s the only use we could see for it. It doesn’t work like your traditional smart bulbs controlled with a mobile phone app, but the dimmable light built into the speaker works wonders in low lighting conditions.

The Lava BrightSounds Portable Speaker is actually quite large. Three quarters of it is taken up by the light housing, a soft plastic surround which can give off a warm glow, and quite surprisingly, extremely bright white light. The top is the place for the speaker which fires off music in all directions thanks to its wrap around style. It houses a five watt full range speaker driver to blast its music.

The rubberised handle offers comfortable carrying, very much like an old school oil lamp to light the way you’re walking.

The speaker has two ways to connect to it. The first is a standard 3.5mm auxilary port for direct plugin or Bluetooth for mobile phones. The Bluetooth works extremely well. We weren’t disappointed with the sound quality coming from the speaker. There was a lack of bass but it was still sharp and crisp. The missing bass was expected as most portable speakers can;t handle the lower frequencies. It wasn’t enough to put us off this product. We cranked up the speaker to full volume and didn’t notice any distortion which tells me it’s a good quality speaker inside.

We’ve had the speaker on constant test for two days and found the built-in lithium battery to last that long before having to charge it via USB again. A great feature if you’re stuck out in the woods with no power.

The speaker is also IPX4 water resistant which doesn’t allow you to fully submerge it, but it’s enough to keep it protected from rainfall and splashes.

You can also use it for handsfree calling using it as a speaker for phone calls so it doesn’t interrupt any kind of Bluetooth connection. The quality from phone calls was actually very good.

Whether you’ll be camping in the woods, partying at a festival or even on the beach,  the Lava BrightSound is a decent addition to your travelling kit and for £29.99 from Amazon, it’s a complete bargain.