Booming explosions. Immersive space battles. Clear, crisp dialogue
With a high-quality soundbar, you can experience your favorite movies, shows, and games with cinematic audio right from your living room.
Setting up an LG soundbar with your TV is easier than you may think. With just a few key connections and settings adjustments, you can be enjoying a premium home theater experience.
In this guide, we’ll walk through the full process of unboxing, positioning, connecting, pairing, and configuring your new LG soundbar.
Follow these simple steps to seamlessly integrate room-filling surround sound into your entertainment setup.
Soon you’ll be able to enjoy the full dynamic range of sound effects and music scores just as the director intended.
Let’s dive in and get that LG soundbar pumping.
1. Unboxing and Connecting the Soundbar to the LG TV
When you first unbox your LG soundbar, you’ll find the main soundbar unit, a wireless subwoofer, power cords for both, an HDMI cable, and an optical audio cable.
After unpacking everything, we’ll start by connecting the soundbar to your LG TV. This will allow you to hear audio from your TV shows, movies, and more through the high-quality speakers of the soundbar.
The first step is deciding where to place the soundbar. Most people position it directly below their wall-mounted TV or place it on a TV console below the TV.
You’ll want to place the LG soundbar centered below your TV so the audio seems like it’s coming directly from the screen. With the soundbar positioned, plug both the soundbar and wireless subwoofer into power outlets using their included power cords. This will allow them to turn on and connect wirelessly.
For the best audio quality, use the included HDMI cable to connect the soundbar to your TV. This creates an HDMI ARC connection which we’ll discuss more later.
On the back of your TV, locate the HDMI ARC port. It’s often labeled ARC, eARC, or Audio Return Channel.
Connect one end of the HDMI cable to this HDMI ARC port on your TV. Then connect the other end to the HDMI ARC port on the back of the LG soundbar.
2. Connect Your LG Soundbar To TV
Connecting your new LG soundbar to your TV is the crucial first step to upgrading your home entertainment experience.
While modern LG TVs offer great visuals, their built-in speakers often leave much to be desired. Hooking up a premium LG soundbar fills your room with immersive, cinematic audio to match the stunning 4K picture.
In just a few quick steps, you can have your soundbar paired and connected to transform weak TV speakers into a thunderous surround sound system.
Pairing LG Soundbar to TV via Bluetooth
Now that you’ve physically connected your LG soundbar to your TV, you need to pair them so the TV recognizes the soundbar over the connection. The quickest way to pair is using Bluetooth.
From your TV’s settings menu, ensure Bluetooth is enabled. You may need to actively turn on Bluetooth before the TV can find the soundbar.
Then from the soundbar, press the Bluetooth button. This puts the soundbar into pairing mode. Next, go into your LG TV’s settings until you see an option like “Bluetooth Devices” or “Bluetooth Audio.”
Here you should see the LG soundbar show up as an available device. Select the soundbar to pair it which will allow you to hear the TV’s audio through the soundbar speakers wirelessly via Bluetooth.
Connecting with HDMI ARC vs Optical Cable
We connected the LG soundbar using an HDMI cable earlier which utilizes HDMI ARC technology. But you can also connect using the included optical audio cable.
HDMI ARC allows uncompressed multi-channel audio to transmit between the TV and soundbar. This allows for higher quality sound than optical can provide.
ARC also allows TV remote control signals to travel both ways. This lets you control the soundbar volume and settings through your TV remote.
If your TV lacks an ARC HDMI port, you’ll need to use the optical audio cable instead. This can still transmit high quality sound, just without the ARC benefits.
To connect optically, plug one end of the cable into the Optical port on the soundbar. Then plug the other end into the Optical Out port on the TV.
3. Sync LG TV Remote to Control Soundbar
Once connected via HDMI ARC, you can use your LG TV remote to control the volume and settings on the soundbar. This saves you from needing multiple remotes.
From your TV’s settings, navigate to the Sound Out/Output menu. Here you should see options to adjust the connected soundbar’s volume, treble, bass, subwoofer, and more.
Make any audio adjustments you desire through the TV menu as you tweak the TV’s speakers.
Your LG TV remote also likely has volume buttons that can directly control the soundbar’s volume. Press the volume up/down to adjust the soundbar volume instead of the TV speakers for easy control without menus.
4. Connect External Devices like Blu-ray Player To Your Soundbar
To play audio from devices like a cable box, Blu-ray player, or gaming console through your soundbar, you need to connect them.
You can use HDMI ARC by plugging the device into the TV, and then using the soundbar’s HDMI connection to the TV to transmit the audio. Or, directly connect the device to the soundbar via optical cable or HDMI IN port, then route that same HDMI to your TV.
Once connected, set the device’s audio output to PCM or bitstream/pass-through. Ensure surround sound or S/PDIF output is enabled if available. This allows proper multi-channel audio transmission to the soundbar for surround sound.
5. Adjust Audio Settings like Volume, Bass etc
Your LG soundbar offers audio settings to tweak for the perfect listening experience. We covered adjusting settings through the TV remote, but you can also tweak them on the soundbar.
The LG soundbar remote allows you to control volume, mute, input source, power, and access sound settings. Use it to easily control the soundbar without the TV remote.
Play content through the soundbar and press the audio settings button on the remote. Here you can adjust bass, treble, subwoofer volume, sound modes, and more. Make small incremental adjustments while testing with different content until you arrive at the perfect settings.
With your LG soundbar fully connected, you can now enjoy immersive cinema-quality sound. Tweak the settings as needed to balance the bass, treble, and surround sound.
Conclusion
With all the key connections made between your LG TV, soundbar, and other entertainment devices, you now have an immersive home theater audio system.
Follow the tips above to pair over Bluetooth, make HDMI ARC and optical connections, sync controls, and adjust audio settings.
Soon you’ll be enjoying booming bass, clear dialogue, and surround sound special effects as you stream movies or play video games.
The LG soundbar seamlessly fits into your existing setup while transforming your entertainment experience with theater-quality audio.
All that’s left is deciding which movie to watch first to break in your new sound system.
