Great sound, ease of use, and a big list of features make it hard to beat.

An imperious single-box soundbar with a brilliant balance of power, finesse and tonal clarity. Expanding to the full package ain't cheap, however.

A terrific performance across a range of sources, the Sony HT-A7000 is a sonic delight with movie and music

The Sony HT-A7000 is a generally impressive soundbar that delivers an enjoyable sonic experience with Dolby Atmos and DTS:X object-based audio. The 11 built-in drivers, 500W of amplification, and advanced spatial processing all combine to produce an expansive front soundstage that has plenty of width, a decent amount of bass, and some nice overhead effects.

he level of future-proofing here is impressive. But since my LG CX has four HDMI 2.1 ports, I already had everything I needed with my Arc, Xbox Series X, and PS5. The passthrough aspect of the HT-A7000 isn’t a big selling point for me, though it does work as advertised — except for the VRR situation. If that asterisk weren’t present, I’d feel more comfortable labeling the HT-A7000 as worthy of the price for those who can swing it and want a simple path to sublime home theater audio. If you’re not an Xbox gamer, maybe it’s still worthy of that title. This is a soundbar that truly does everything. But it comes at such a premium that anything less than perfection is a reason for pause and closely examining other options.

Impressive overall performance from an elegant and full-featured soundbar, but the flagship price feels like a misstep compared to rivals.

Sony’s HT-A7000 is a ringer of a soundbar, offering some of the very best virtual surround performance I’ve heard, a truckload of connectivity options and features, and a sweet and well-balanced soundstage. For what it is—a black slab of sound—it’s also pretty attractive looking. But you’ll really have to be someone who doesn’t pay much attention to price tags to buy it. At $1,300 with no sub (and $400 to add one), the A7000 faces a throng of heartier competitors from a sheer value perspective.

On its own, the Sony HT-A7000 soundbar outputs a very spacious soundstage for immersive surround-sound formats and converted audio, with wide-reaching side speakers and effective top channels. It’s powerful enough to saturate most living rooms and media spaces with immersive audio and has a bass response from its built-in subwoofer that improves upon TV speakers and many other standalone soundbars. In comparison, the more expensive Sennheiser AMBEO has deeper bass, more powerful output, and a more expansive 3D soundstage.

The Sony HT-A7000 offers excellent sound and a broad feature set, but it's a little too temperamental for how expensive it is.

A powerful, musical and immersive single soundbar that succeeds where many multi-speaker systems fail

The Sony HT-A7000 may have a massive sticker price, but it promises a long shelf life thanks to its two HDMI 2.1 ports and support for all the major spatial audio formats. At this price we wish it came with the surround and subwoofer units, but those with incredibly deep pockets can tack those on for a few hundred more.

The Sony HT-7000 might be expensive, but it's serious impressive. The tall and impossibly wide Dolby Atmos audio with tight sound positioning is as good as we've heard from any system without rear speakers, and it even manages a good dose of bass. The HDMI 2.1 connections are very welcome, too.