Beautiful speakers they're very bright sound quality is very detailed and open they feel your room very nicely I love those speakers

Excellent floorstanding loudspeakers.
My combination with the Musical Fidelity M5si works very well
The MF is a straight forward and clean amp without bass/treble adjustment so the match must be right.
The Chora 816 sound outstanding to me.
Exiting and entertaining,never dull or boring.
They can be a bit bright in the high frequencies sometimes(harsch)
The midrange is very good(vocals)
Enough bass and it’s tight.
Great design,,I like the tilted stands for better time alignment.
No bi-wiring posts at the back(useless option Imo)
The cabinets are braced internally at 2 places.
The side-walls stay “dead” even at very high volumes.
Front ported and a 2.5 way system,excellent.
The amp can push these loudspeakers to a crazy level,they are rated at 200 Watts.
It blew me away at 50%,any higher would give me hearing-damage

We were very fortunate in deciding to replace/upgrade some of our hi-fi just as Focal had discontinued and replaced most of the Chora range. This meant that the 816 speakers, which might otherwise have fallen outside our budget, actually fell well within it due to discounts.

I have waited to run them in for a week or so before writing this review, but in truth they sounded great within a few hours.

We auditioned a lot of speakers ranging from Focal’s own Aria 906’s (which were superb), to KEF LS50 Meta (good, but I think slightly over rated in reviews), Triangle Genese Trio (probably our second choice), Dali Oberon 5, some Q Acoustics, Wharfedale Evos and several more. It was a challenging choice, but we both loved the Chora 816’s from the minute that they started playing.

To our ears there is a lot of detail, a truly massive sound stage and great musicality. We both have eclectic tastes ranging from 1970/80’s rock and pop to progressive jazz, and all sounded truly amazing. I had read that Focal speakers can be a bit bright, but I felt that the Chora and Aria speakers were warm and not at all fatiguing to listen to. It really is a case of re-discovering our respective music collections with a fuller sound and so much more detail and nuances noticeable in the music. I am really blown away by how good these speakers are and how big the sound is, even at low volumes.

The 816’s also look fantastic and little details like the construction of the magnetic covers shout out quality. Having features like the tilted plinths for time delay correction (I forget the technical name for it) is a nice touch at this level. All told, we are really pleased with these speakers. It is also great to have a product that is not made in China and has MADE IN FRANCE on the boxes.

Great sweet sounding speakers with a lot of detail, Rich mids and tight base.
Coming from B&W speakers and these show them their place.

SUPER

Amazing set of towers, speechless.

Prompt friendly service from Marek
These speakers although the smallest floor standing speaker in the Focal range filled our 30sq mtr room Fantastic sound stage Clear in muddies sound considering the understated frequency response +-3db
Retired Television Operations career so exposed to extensive sound and video equipment
These 816’s suit our budget and the light wood finish with the cream front baffle with grey grills give the speakers their unique style
The slanted posture with the supplied speaker bases added to their appearance and sound
focused on the listeners

Exquisite

Purchased a pair of these in the dark wood, visually they are well built and very attractive, from a sound perspective they do not disappoint bought my first JMLab speakers 20 years ago and have been a fan ever since so I was confident buying these without actually hearing them. Using them for TV/movies and music, they provide rich full sound with crisp high end.

These floorstanders are elegant and modern, sound exciting at all volumes; not just when cranked up, and make all music fun to listen too. Even lower res streaming sounds good, but high res recordings sound amazing; like the singer is in the room. Classical music comes alive and leaps out at you, metal blasts with authority, but quiet songs are subtle and all music is emotionally involving. Old recordings simply take you back in time. My unit is a naim uniti star and it pairs very well with these Focal speakers, even in the relatively small living room I have. I recommend! Music is fun again.

Absolutely fantastic speakers, sound, finish, build, how do they do they it for the money!! These are my second set of Focals, brilliant.

It’s fantastic.