Majority Bowfell Halo Atmos wireless 5.1 surround-sound system review

Setting up surround sound can be a pain. Firstly, there’s the cost of buying a system, sub-woofer included, and on top of that you’ve got to find places for the wires to go. Do you leave them as a trip hazard, shove them awkwardly under the carpet or start stapling them to your walls?

The Majority Bowfell Halo Atmos wireless 5.1 surround-sound system does away with all that. Not only is it surprisingly affordable at £169.95, there are also no trailing wires. Instead, the rear surround speakers (wired to each other), soundbar and subwoofer all plug into a power supply and communicate wirelessly.

It was a piece of cake to perch the rear speakers on the corners of the sofa, and almost out of the box, the whole setup was communicating. Plug the soundbar into your TV’s HDMI ARC and you’re ready to go. It really is that easy and, between the whole setup, the Majority Bowfell Halo Atmos boasts 180W of audio power.

Despite being relatively compact at 16 inches across, the triple-driver sound bar, coupled with the subwoofer, puts out room-filling sound across a respectable frequency range. I found myself having to dial the bass back for some music tracks, however, so I wouldn’t recommend it purely for playing or streaming music.

But movies and games? That’s where the Majority Bowfell Halo Atmos comes into its own. At 3.5 inches across, the circular rear surround speakers are not going to fling you across the room. But perched on the sofa behind me, they beautifully complemented and enhanced the audio experience.

Granted, not every game and console supports surround sound, but if yours does, it’s worth the effort setting up, especially if horror is your genre of choice. Playing Resident Evil: Requiem on the PS5, the rear speakers delivered every creak and hiss to my ears and Kingdom Come 2: Deliverance’s medieval world was more alive than ever.

Was I able to pinpoint enemies’ locations due to the Halo Atmos’s audio position? Sometimes, yes, though not always. If you want position-perfect surround sound, you’re looking at a pricier and potentially more unwieldy setup, but the speakers add an extra level of immersion to games.

The same is true of movies. Take Jurassic Park’s famous T-Rex scene; as Lex and Tim’s jeep was getting mauled by the beast, I could hear the patter of rain behind me. It brought the jungles of Pandora to life in Avatar and handled the dialogue scenes I threw at it with virtually zero distortion at higher volumes. Not that I plan on maxing out the Halo Atmos’s volume; it’s quite capable of waking the neighbours if you push it all the way up.

Despite my reservations about using it just for music, the Halo Atmos fared well with Wicked: For Good’s repertoire. I got the best results by switching to one of the setup’s pre-set EQ modes. I couldn’t tell you exactly which mode however; the soundbar simply displays them numerically, as EQ1, EQ2, etc. You can match the mode to what it does in the manual, but it’s still an odd oversight. I’d expect that over time, though, you’ll probably figure out which mode works best for specific situations.

My other gripe with the Majority Bowfell Halo Atmos is that while you can also connect via aux, Bluetooth, and even plug in a USB stick filled with MP3s, there’s no headphone socket. I didn’t necessarily expect the Halo Atmos to apply its effects to a pair of headphones, as is the case with the Sound Blaster Katana V2X gaming soundbar. But given that fewer and fewer TVs come with headphone sockets, it would have been a useful convenience.

Majority Bowfell Halo Atmos is a great, budget-friendly way to explore surround sound, and an excellent audio upgrade in its own right. It’s stylish, easy to use and levels up your audio experience without the hassle often associated with more complex setups. If you’ve been itching to dip your toes into 3D audio, it’s hard to go wrong.

Thanks to Majority for providing a unit for the purposes of this review.