Cute, but not for audiophiles

If you engage with a lot of gaming and gaming-adjacent content on platforms like TikTok and Instagram, there’s a good chance you’ve seen some unboxing videos of the Divoom Ditoo. It has been described as everything from an essential to an essential non-essential, with its capabilities as a clock, a toy, and a Bluetooth speaker on display.

But my question is: is it any good? Regardless of what an influencer asserts, I’m going to have some questions when it comes to a $130 speaker that seems to be more of an aesthetic object than a piece of audio tech. So I tried out the Divoom Ditoo and put it to the test to see how it holds up as a speaker, a pixel art display, and all the rest.

Divoom Ditoo Pixel Art Bluetooth Speaker

The Divoom Ditooo is an adorable speaker with pixel art and game capabilities, sure to add to the aesthetic of your gaming setup. As a speaker, it’s alright, but it makes a better knickknack than a speaker.

Pros

• Cute design
• Pixel art is fun and easy to make
• Has an alarm clock, a timer, and simple arcade games
• Nice mechanical key switches

Cons

• Speaker is middling at best
• No water or dust resistance
• Divoom app isn’t very well designed or intuitive

Price, specs, and availability

What’s up with this tiny retro computer-shaped speaker?

The Divoom Ditoo is a portable Bluetooth speaker shaped like a retro computer with a CRT monitor, complete with six mechanical keys as control buttons. The speaker has a bit of heft to it by virtue of its design, weighing 533 grams. It comes in five colors: pink, black, blue, green, and white. It isn’t waterproof, so don’t take it outside or spill any water on it.

The speaker connects using Bluetooth 5.0, and it can also connect to devices using USB-C. It has a 5000mAh lithium polymer battery, with a battery life of around eight hours, and it charges using USB-C.

To use the custom pixel art features on the Ditoo, you need to download the Divoom app, which is available on Android and iOS.

The Divoom Ditoo is available on Divoom’s website, as well as Amazon, for $130, though it is often on sale for $100.

What I liked about the Divoom Ditoo

It’s certainly an adorable speaker, there’s no denying that

One of the main appeals of the Divoom Ditoo is that it’s adorable. It looks like a tiny CRT monitor with a mechanical keyboard, what’s not to adore about it? I had it sitting on my desk while I used it, and it was like having a cute knickknack on my desk that also has a function. Everyone who came into my apartment while I reviewed it picked it up and marveled at it. But it’s certainly an eye-catching little speaker.

The pixel art aspect was fascinating. To customize the art on the speaker, I had to download the Divoom app, which has a variety of sections to look through. The landing page for the app is the gallery, where you can browse through other peoples’ pixel art creations that you’re free to use on your Divoom Ditoo. There’s also a tab called “expert” full of very elaborate pixel art made by people who have tens of thousands of followers and have various levels. Next is the album tab, which has art categorized by tags.

Creating my own pixel art was very easy, which I appreciated. The last thing I’d want is for the speaker to have a learning curve. I made a few designs with various frames, so I was basically making pixelated animations to display on the speaker while I listened to music or podcasts. The default pixel art options that react to the sound input were also really fun.

I really enjoyed the mechanical keys, as a mechanical keyboard enthusiast. After doing a bit of digging, I found out that the switches on the keys are Outemu Blue switches, which are very similar to Cherry MX Blue switches, a very popular mechanical key switch among keyboard nerds. The switches on the Divoom Ditoo feel extremely satisfying to press down, and I found myself fidgeting with the speaker a lot when it was turned off because the keys were so fun to press.

Lastly, I appreciate that I can play games on it. They’re simple arcade games based on games like Snake and Flappy Bird, but they’re entertaining nonetheless.

What I didn’t like about the Divoom Ditoo

As a speaker, it’s middling at best

Beyond the pixel art aspect and the fact that the speaker looks like a cute knickknack to have on your desk, there’s, arguably, the key feature of the speaker: the speaker itself. I’m not particularly impressed with the sound quality from the speaker. It does get quite loud, but I found that the bass starts to sound a bit distorted. I also occasionally heard crackles or pops when listening to music that I know doesn’t have any added in the production, which while not a huge deal, isn’t ideal for a speaker. The higher treble frequencies, like snares and cymbals, could be quite tinny at times, too.

I think that at this price, the speaker should at least sound a bit better. This sounds like a sub-$50 Bluetooth speaker, and I know that the main selling point of the speaker is the aesthetic appeal of it, but I think if you’re buying a speaker, it should sound good, proportional to how much it costs at least. This is not a speaker for audiophiles, and while a lot of the marketing is toward gamers as well, Bluetooth audio is not good for gaming because of latency. This speaker is for casual listening, not anything that would suffer from a bit of lag.

I also was not a huge fan of the accompanying Divoom app. The user interface is a bit clunky and slow, and I found myself a bit confused by various aspects of it. What makes someone an “expert” according to the app? What are these levels associated with various accounts? Why would I want to talk to someone over an app I had to download to use a speaker? It also asked for a lot of permissions, including my location, which I declined. I don’t appreciate when an app asks for more personal information than is absolutely necessary, and I would say that an app for a speaker doesn’t need my location under any circumstances.

Should you buy the Divoom Ditoo?

The Divoom Ditoo speaker is for people who want something cute that sits on their desk that displays fun customizable pixel art, with the added benefit of being a Bluetooth speaker. It is a very adorable speaker that will probably fit in with the desk setup of a cozy gamer with a lot of other knickknacks around their setup, complete with RGB lights.

This speaker is not really for anyone that falls outside of that category. As a speaker, it’s middling at best, and the pixel art feature can get old pretty quickly. If you’re not super committed to it, it’s probably not going to be worth your money. TikToks claiming that this speaker is an “essential” are really overblowing it — it’s just a speaker with a fun display and an app. This is the kind of product that would likely be an impulse purchase more than anything, and will be a reminder of your over-consumption problems a few months down the road.

Divoom Ditoo Pixel Art Bluetooth Speaker