When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. These key factors will help you find the best speakers for your needs and budget. From sound quality to connectivity, the right features in PC speakers can make all the difference in how you enjoy your music, movies and games. Here we highlight five important features to look for that will help you make an informed choice. It's important to focus on sound quality to identify the best computer speakers for your needs.

The video for "A Barely Lit Path," the first single from "Again," Daniel Lopatin's tenth album as Oneohtrix Point Never, takes place on a dark road in a shadowy forest. Two CPR dummies wearing turquoise jumpsuits are strapped into a self-driving car. On the floor, there's an artificial-intelligence manual, a book about understanding computers, and a copy of "Erewhon," the 1872 satirical novel that imagines a future in which machines achieve consciousness. The dummies play chess; they nap. Their rubbery fingers reach across the seat for each other. At some point, the road gets rough and the dummies start flopping around. A Stop button is affixed to the gearshift, but it's just out of reach. One of the dummies starts to cry.

These Phission speakers are plasticky, have plasticky cables, and sound plasticky. But the fact is that they don't suck. By that I mean that cheap can often mean an inexpensive bare-bones product that is nonetheless perfectly serviceable. But in the case of the Phission 2.1 USB speakers, cheap describes the very essence of the product. The so-called subwoofer weighs virtually nothing while the two satellites weigh even less. It's as plastic as it gets.

You can find better rivals for just a few dollars more, but if you've got an extremely tight budget, these will do well enough for movies, music, and calls. Run a search for computer speakers under $20, and you'll find plenty of options--but not many will give you much bang for your buck. A rare exception is the Creative Pebble, one of our current top picks for budget PC speakers, but most cheap speakers are unremarkable offerings tied to unknown brands. Meanwhile, Cyber Acoustics keeps steadily producing extremely affordable, if basic, speakers. You won't brag about to friends about buying a set, but they perform well for their price.

They may be small, but the Audioengine A2 speakers feel reassuringly solid and well-made. The elegant design and matte satin black finish blend in easily on any desktop, or you can opt to stand out with a glossy red or white exterior. The left speaker has a volume dial that also clicks on the power and there's a pairing button for Bluetooth connections, but no remote is included. There's no separate subwoofer, either, though there is an output should you want to add one. The cabling is good quality and generous enough to allow for a sit-stand desk. We were instantly blown away by the power and punch of these speakers. Tested second to last, the jump in class was immediately obvious.

Scientists have found that robotic vacuum cleaners could allow snoopers to remotely listen in to household conversations, despite not being fitted with microphones. US experts found they can perform a remote eavesdropping attack on a Xiaomi Roborock robot cleaner by remotely accessing its Lidar readings – which helps these cleaners to avoid bumping into furniture. Lidar is a method for measuring distances by illuminating the target with laser beams and measuring their reflection with a sensor. But Lidar can also capture sound signals by obtaining reflections off of objects in the home, like a rubbish bin, that vibrate due to nearby sound sources, such as a person talking. A hacker could repurpose a vacuum's Lidar sensor to sense acoustic signals in the environment, remotely harvest the Lidar data from the cloud and process the raw signal with deep learning techniques to extract audio information.

This post was done in partnership with Wirecutter. When readers choose to buy Wirecutter's independently chosen editorial picks, Wirecutter and Engadget may earn affiliate commissions. Read Wirecutter's continuously updated list of deals here. We tend to only see a few sales a year on these, and this matches the best price we've seen. The CR3 speakers are the top pick in our review of computer speakers.

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By and large, the PC has stuck to 3.5mm input dual-speaker systems, occasionally with a subwoofer included. But for some reason the soundbar hasn't made its way to desktop PCs, even as it's become a hit with everyone else. Razer sort-of made an attempt with its Leviathan a few years ago, but even that was more geared towards the living room. So Creative isn't stretching the truth too far when it calls its new Sound BlasterX Katana the first "Under-Monitor Audio System." Sure, you could still use it in your living room--it's got all the necessary inputs, and it gets damn loud (more on that later). The Katana is meant for desks though.