We’ll go over the ten best ceiling speakers of 2021 in this article, because they’ve gone from being unobtainable accessories seen on MTV Cribs to becoming a tangible reality in recent years.
Unless our job descriptions have required us to design a PA system for business premises or install a home theatre set-up in your bat-cave, best ceiling speakers are probably not something we’ve given much thought to.
Installing best ceiling speakers in your home or office has become a viable way to get awesome indoor audio without sacrificing the floor-space for a free-standing model, thanks to the rapid advancement of audio and electronic technology and the steady reduction in fabrication overheads.
Whether you have a limited floor space or simply want to get rid of tangled wires and bulky bookshelf speakers that detract from your decor, modern best ceiling speakers are a great addition to your sound system.
The Best Ceiling Speakers In Budget
Ceiling speakers usually require ‘back boxes’. Some will already come with best ceiling speakers. Back boxes vastly reduce sound leakage from the back of the best ceiling speakers and truth be told, sound quality will be poor without them.
Polk Audio RC80i
Yamaha NSIC800WH
Now, let’s take a quick look at Yamaha’s latest offering. They’re a pair of 2-way class coaxial speakers at the premium level. They produce excellent audio that is well-rounded and has a seamless crossover, making them one of the best ceiling speakers available today.
An 8-inch blue polypropylene mica cone woofer is paired with a tiny fluid-cooled soft dome tweeter in this dual setup. The cooling increases the tweeter’s efficiency and lifespan by preventing overheating, extending the high-frequency response into ultra-high reals, and ultimately providing the crisp tops required. For aimed dispersion, the tweeter is swivel mounted. They have an excellent crossover, a wide frequency response, high-quality components, and a low impedance.
Micca M-8C
Next, we’ll look at some very low-cost options, which, let’s face it, are the only sensible option for some of us, especially given the fact that we’ll almost certainly need 2, 4, or even 6 or more best ceiling speakers, depending on the size of the room we want to amplify.
The M-8C is a great 2-way class in-ceiling option with a dedicated woofer/tweeter combination in its driver array, giving it a wide frequency response and great flexibility in configuring the audio, whether you’re looking for subtle soundscapes or high impact booming bass. The woofer’s diameter is 8 inches, and it has a high excursion design that allows for maximum dispersion. The tweeter is about an inch in diameter and has a soft but rigid and durable dome that can handle high frequencies with ease.
Acoustic Audio CS-IC83
If you’re looking for a large number of best ceiling speakers, you might not be interested in single speaker models or the 2-packs we’ve already reviewed, so check out this fantastic 5-piece set from Goldwoods Acoustic Audio. They’re around the same price as some of our top contenders’ 2-way models, but these bargain beauties have a 3-way class system setup.
Each speaker has a 3-way passive crossover system with one 8″ woofer, one midrange driver, and one tweeter. For dampening, the woofers are seated in high-grade butyl surrounds, and the cone is made of highly rigid polypropylene with forward-thinking spiders. The 13 tweeters have a soft dome design to cope with the demands of higher frequency registers, and the midrange driver cones are Poly-Mica.
Klipsch CDT-5650-C II
This is the best ceiling speakers, because of their high/low-frequency handling controlled dispersion technology mechanism, the CDT-5650-C II effectively eliminates the need for a fixed location. They have a 6.5″ pivoting ceramic/metallic composite woofer with 360-degree rotation and the ability to shift 15 degrees in any direction, giving you complete control over how you want your sound to be directed.
The 1″ titanium compression driver can pivot 100 degrees, and its high-performance sound is pushed through one of Klipsch’s patented TrackTrix symmetrical horns, which helps to direct sound much more accurately than other tweeters. Klipsch’s tried-and-true Linear Travel Suspension has been added to the tweeter on this upgraded model, further improving the high-end frequency response.
Polk Audio RC65i
These are essentially smaller versions of the RC80i. This one’s dynamic balance woofer is smaller at 6.5″, but it has a wide dispersion design that allows it to fill larger spaces. They have the same basic electrical components and design features, but we’ll just go over them briefly in case you forget.
The cones are made of polymer composites, mineral filled, and have high-quality rubber surrounds to reduce unwanted resonance. The dedicated tweeter is a traditional soft dome tweeter with a swivel mount for easy positioning.
Polk Audio 80 F/X RT
Polk Audio best ceiling speakers literally owns the accessible regions of the audio speaker market, so it’s no surprise that many of their speakers are featured in today’s reviews. We’ll wrap things up with another delectable offering from the fantastic Vanishing series. The price may seem a little high in comparison to Polk’s more accessible models because it is from the upper end of their product lines, but the quality speaks for itself.
It’s a surround-sound model with a woofer and dual tweeters in a 3-way configuration. The main driver has an ultra wide dispersion and is 8 inches in diameter. The pair of tweeters hidden inside each one better manages high-frequency frequencies by dividing the workload for improved performance and clarity. The surrounds are made of a specially formulated blend of high-quality materials, and nearly every part has been fine-tuned to perfectly fit its purpose.
Low-impedance circuitry and advanced crossover enhancements aid in the delegating of frequency signals and the processing of audio to provide a more authentic and natural sounding representation.
Acoustic Audio R191
Yamaha NS-IW280CWH
Polk Audio 255C-RT
Returning to Polk Audio best ceiling speakers for a look at their 255C-RT set, which is an upgrade from the Polk Audio RC80i. They produce a powerful 3-way class central channel speaker. Polk’s renowned Vanishing Series includes this piece. They, too, have Polk’s dynamic balance technology and many of the same components as the RT series, but they’ve been redesigned to take advantage of advances made possible by hours of intensive data collection.
John Hopkins University is a public research university in Baltimore, Maryland. Under a microscope, the vibrating surfaces of tweeters were examined to see how the resonances developed while the cones were moving. They then engineered the best combination of materials and optimal geometry possible under laboratory conditions, aided by laser imaging, to counteract the resonances that are primarily responsible for all high-end distortion.
Conclusion
The best ceiling speakers works in the same way as any other traditional speaker, with the exception that it does not come with a cabinet to house it in. If you’ve read any of our other speaker articles, you’ll know that enclosures play a critical role in enhancing and shaping your audio clarity and optimizing the performance of the drivers inside.
While best ceiling speakers have many advantages over floor standing speakers, and you can’t argue with their understated aesthetics, they do introduce a few engineering challenges for companies to address.
