“It feels and looks like a like a toy made for a grown woman, not a porn star.”
Revel Sonic Vibrator product page >
Update, February 2016
We’re sad to read today that Revel Body appears to be discontinuing their products. A Note on their website says they’re switching over to focusing to licensing their core technology. Best of luck to them. We’re still loving our Revel.
They do appear to still be available on Amazon though:
I’ve had quite a few vibrators. My first toy was the basic hard plastic beige stick dick vibe. It got the job done and I was happy to have something to play with. But as I got older, got more money in my pocket and got the guts to go shopping, I began to choose toys with more colors, more features and more vibe options. While there are some great options and designs out there, the technology has been the same basic formula—a vibrating motor inside a plastic phallic shape. Having a quiet and discreet vibe has meant settling for a less powerful vibe, while enjoying more powerful sensations has usually meant putting up with a louder and larger vibrator.
My Rabbit vibrator is exactly that—big, loud, and pink. It is definitely powerful and it feels great, but it’s definitely not discreet. In fact, when my partner and I use it, we laugh because of the noise and the movement. It can also be hard to use since there are so many options and each option seems to get noisier. But, it has always seemed like noise and an awkwardly large form factor were just things you had to put up with if you wanted to experience a really powerful vibrator. So, when I saw the Revel, it was hard to believe that a tennis ball-sized vibe that looks like a cross between a gadget made by Apple and a tiny lamp from Ikea, could compete with the Rabbit. At the same time, I also had to wonder if the Revel Body could live up to its own price. At $129* (price updates noted above), it cost over twice what I paid for the Rabbit.
Ordering and Shipping
It made a good impression befitting a $129* gadget purchase. (Note price updates above.)
Packed with a little feminine flair—it’s a small detail that made a big impression.
Note: If ordered direct from Revel, the Revel Body Sonic Vibrator comes with a 2-year warranty and a 30-day money back guarantee, which is somewhat rare for a sex toy.
With a little skepticism over the size and high expectations based on the price, we ordered the Revel Body directly from the company site (here). (Thanks to the return policy, we weren’t too worried though.) There are a number of accessories and a variety of differently designed interchangeable tips (the part of the Revel that delivers the sensations) available. We only ordered the Revel Body alone though, but we regret overlooking the “Three Tip and Travel Bag Bundle” which cost only $20 more. Considering that each tip costs $19 each on its own, the bundle is a good deal. And once you try the Revel Body’s standard tip, you’re going to be curious about the potential of the additional tips. (Look for an In Bed review of the additional tips soon.)
Discrete shipping—as promised on the site, the Revel Body arrived in a generic brown shipping box with a discrete shipping label—nothing that says “woo-hoo, vibrator inside!!!”
The Revel Body arrived in a discreet, generic looking shipping box with no branding on the outside and no mention of Revel Body, which is a good thing. The inside, however, was packed with a bit of flair—the bright pink tissue paper and a card promising a “new kind of wow” was a nice touch and gave an impression of sensuality from the moment the box was opened. Likewise, the product packaging reflected the same attention to design as the product itself. It made a good impression befitting a $129 gadget purchase.
Nice package! They make design a top priority, down to the details. (Reminds me of Apple.)
Design and Materials
Though it doesn’t scream, “hey look, I’m a sex toy”, it is a curious looking item so you’ll still need to be careful about leaving it around where a kid might find it.
Okay, this is different…who would ever guess this is a vibrator?
The Revel is a nice size—about the size of a tennis ball, and weighs just over 6 oz., which feels like just the right amount of weight. The rounded shape feels comfortable in your hand, and the smooth, soft, silicon material feels luxurious against your skin—almost velvety. It definitely feels premium and high quality. It’s almost a shame to call it a “toy”. It’s more like a pleasure technology device. The color is nice too, not overly girly, sparkly or glittery. It feels and looks like a like a toy made for a grown woman, not a porn star.
Keeping it simple—just three little buttons: On/Off, + (faster), and – (slower).
The design also helps make this vibrator a little more discreet than many on the market. If the pink tip isn’t visible, it’s easy to overlook it sitting a nightstand, though it could also be mistaken for an old webcam. Though it doesn’t scream, “hey look, I’m a sex toy”, it is a curious looking item so you’ll still need to be careful about leaving it around where a kid might find it. At $129, you don’t want little Jimmy to try bouncing it on a tile floor.
Ahh…the pink nub. We’re betting that’s where the magic happens.
Features and Accessories
The charger stand is pretty cool, but it takes some concentration to get it to click when you’re in a state of afterglow. And a longer charger cord, please.
Clicks into place…almost easily. Cool charger, but it doesn’t click into place as effortlessly as we imagined.
Vibrator? What vibrator? There’s no vibrator on this nightstand. Oh…wait, you mean this little ball?
The Revel Body has a cool charger stand that keeps it from rolling around. When you click it into a place, the Revel Body itself lights up for a few seconds to let you know the charger has made contact—another nice touch. However, actually getting it to make contact without turning on lights and looking closely can be a little challenging. It would be nice if getting it spot-on was more effortless, especially in a state of afterglow.
One more very small critique related to the charger—the power cord could stand to be about six inches longer in order to accommodate different heights of nightstands and various hiding places. As it is, ours had to stay precariously perched at the very edge of the nightstand in order to keep it plugged in.
Additional piston tips (more on how it works below) featuring different shapes and textures are also available through the website. We didn’t get a chance to test these but look for a full review soon.
Use
A quiet vibrator is a vibrator you get to use more often. And that’s good, because with this kind of power, you’re going to want to—more often.
1…2…3…working the buttons is actually pretty easy during use, once you get familiar with them.
It takes a little of bit of practice to learn the settings. There are only three buttons—on/off, speed up, and speed down. There are no vibration patterns like there are on a lot of high-end vibes, but the vibrations change dynamics substantially from the lowest setting to the highest setting.
You have to experiment with the grip and the angle to find what works right for you, but the globe shape makes positioning it very easy.
The Revel is described on the website as being “90% less noise”, which is a very appealing feature. The first time I tried it though, it still seemed a bit noisy. After reading the manual and making an adjustment by adding a little bit of water to the piston, however, it was very, very quiet. Revel also recommends a light touch to your body, this is all that is needed because of the power, and the range of speed settings, and a lighter touch results in less noise. The Revel is also waterproof, so underwater in the tub it’s practically silent.
The loudest part of the Revel is probably the tiny click you hear from the buttons. You can click through each speed setting or you can hold down the button and it will escalate or deescalate speed without as much of a click noise. However, the click noise is not much louder that the key on a laptop.
For use in the water, the manual suggests that you use the side with the glow as opposed to the throbbing piston side. It makes for a nice flutter and suction feeling on the lowest setting, but I get off on more of a throbbing sensation so I switched to the piston side. But, if you like a light, fluttery sensation, you may really enjoy the other side in the water.
Also thanks to it being waterproof, it’s quick and easy to clean, dry off, and put away.
Sensations
…as soon as I felt the relentless waves of pleasure coming from the middle settings, the orgasm came on fast and strong. What was most amazing was getting this kind of feeling from something so small and so quiet.
Oh…wow…just, wow. That’s a LOT of power from something so small and quiet.
The Revel Body is marketed as a “sonic vibrator” and takes an entirely different approach to generating sensations. Instead of a vibrating motor, it uses magnetic pulses to move a small piston back and forth. The company claims this results in much more powerful and concentrated vibrations from a relatively compact design. Unlike a traditional vibrator, which causes vibrations to transmit through the entire structure, vibrations on the Revel Body focus and emanate directly from the piston tip alone. You don’t actually feel as much vibration transmitting to your hand, which is interesting.
The sensations produced by the Revel Body are a little different than what you feel with a traditional vibrator. More specifically, the way that it feels at different speeds is quite different than a regular vibrator. Rather than vibrate, the piston actually moves back and forth to cause the sensations. Some sensations at the middle speeds do feel like vibrations, but others don’t. The sensations are actually more powerful on the slower settings, and more subtle at the higher settings. At the lowest settings, the sensation is a rumble and you perceive a lot of movement from the piston. At the highest settings, the piston moves extremely fast but the movement is also equally shallow, which is a much more gentle sensation—more like a strong humming sensation. The sweet spot for me was the middle settings, which provided deep, powerful, and very pleasurable throbbing sensations. It took some experimenting to find the right speed—neither the low rumbles nor the high-speed hums did much for me, but as soon as I felt the relentless waves of pleasure coming from the middle settings, the orgasm came on fast and strong.
What was most amazing was getting this kind of feeling from something so small and so quiet. Normally, this is the kind of experience I could only have when there was absolutely nobody else home who might hear the Rabbit powering up. If a sex toy can provide this kind of sensation, and make it possible for you to enjoy that kind of sensation more often, that’s a winning combination.
We checked out some other reviews of the Revel before ordering it, and some women didn’t have quite the same experience. We’re all different and not all of us respond the same to certain sensations. The Revel Body is working wonders for me, but if you need both high speed vibrations and high intensity vibrations—the type of sensation you can only get from a big powerful vibrator cranked to the max in order to get off, you may need to stick to exactly that—a big, traditional vibrator. But if your sweet spot ranges from deep throbs and rumbles, to light fluttering, and having something that does the job efficiently and quietly will make it possible for you to actually use it more often, the Revel Body is well worth the price.
Overall, I really like this toy. It feels like it is a well-designed toy for healthy play with or without your partner. The warranty, if bought direct from Revel (here), provides piece of mind despite the price, and as for that 30-day money back guarantee—that’s great, but the Revel is my new favorite. It’s a keeper.
