In what has been a difficult month for overheating audio products, Anker is the latest manufacturer to be asking known purchasers to return items. As PCMag reports, the Chinese tech manufacturer is recalling its Soundcore and PowerConf Bluetooth Speakers after receiving 33 complaints of the lithium-ion batteries within them overheating and, in some cases, causing smoke or even small fires.
Do you own an affected model?
First off, the speakers were sold exclusively on Amazon in 2023. The affected models are: A3102016, A3302011 and A3302031 and they are priced between $28 and $130, according to the US-based Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC).
As first reported by The Verge, the CPSC confirms that Anker and Amazon have contacted all known buyers, and the affected speakers can be identified by an SN code printed on the underneath of each speaker. To check whether your device or devices are potentially hazardous, you can type the SN code on Anker’s website. Anker has said it will offer free replacement speakers to those affected.
According to the report, approximately 69,000 of these speakers were sold in the US, and an additional 9,764 were sold in Canada. Anyone who owns a recalled speaker is advised to stop using it immediately, make sure it’s switched off, and to disconnect it from any chargers or external power sources.
It Seems to Be a Common Problem
This is not the first instance of smoking batteries in portable audio equipment we’ve spotted this month. Just a few weeks ago, Audio-Technica was forced to warn customers that certain batches of its inexpensive 2024 earbuds had a similar overheating issue (and actually, a couple of years ago the company had a similar issue, publishing a product safety notice for its ATH-CK3TW earbuds due to another overheating problem with its charging case).
Anker and Audio-Technica are not alone here either. On November 28, Belkin also had to issue a recall notice for its BoostCharge Pro (model number BPD005) power bank, adding that the model could pose a fire risk due to a manufacturing defect that’s now known to cause overheating.
But back to Anker, and the company’s products (which are often backed by proprietary temperature control tech, such as Anker ActiveShield 2.0) are otherwise 100% non-combustible, right? Well, no. The company makes some of the best power banks that PCMag reports testing, but it seems to have had increasing issues with manufacturing defects this year – with another recall hitting three more of its backup batteries for smartphones in September 2024.
And that’s not all. Back in June, Anker announced that it was recalling its popular 321 Power Bank, the Soundcore A3102 speaker and A3302 speakerphone, due to potential fire hazards from those lithium-ion batteries.
Obviously these cases are rare given the hundreds of excellent Bluetooth speakers, earbuds, power banks, and in fact tech in general on the market in 2024. We just hope none of these particular companies starts advertising ‘red hot sales’ or ‘smoking deals’ any time soon…
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