Trying the Solace by Lovense

Is the Solace good, though?

Short answer: 

The Solace is ambitious, creating a toy in an underserved niche and miniaturizing a fucking machine to a bit bigger than a chunky loaf of bread.  Unfortunately, the tech is not there yet, but it’s a good try and incredibly impressive for what it is. If you are an early adopter, or get off on the aesthetics of machines themselves this could be a great fit. However, there’s a few design flaws here that make it not quite the winner of their other products.

The toy might be priced at $369, but never in my history of buying from them have they not had pretty steep discounts running at all times, including of all things a %60 off for students. In reality it will probably set you back something in the range of $184.

Long Answer:

Lovense is one of those popular brands that has a pretty established presence as the defining version of a niche category: remote controlled sex toys. I have a long history of ending up in LDRs where anything horny is happening at a distance. Silver and I filled that gap by buying various and sundry Lovense products, and he was a fan even predating our relationship. I am usually the worst reviewer in the world for stuff (I don’t like most things and I can’t do the reviewer vague positive that would ever make it a reliable business model for me), but I have had enough success with Lovense in the past to take a gamble here. When Lovense reached out to maybe, possibly consider an affiliate code sign up, I decided why the heck not. They were even willing to send me a toy to review, and me, being shameless, asked for one of their fancier options, the Solace.

That being said… the Hush is their old reliable that I would recommend to anyone with a butthole, but Silver, on his own, tried their prostate version, and I got him the Max one year (the OG edition). Neither of those worked out quite as well. They make good anniversary/birthday/christmas gifts, and I have remarked before that I was pleasantly surprised by the Gravity (my review here). Alas, lightning didn’t strike twice.

I really wanted the toy, a penis engulfing, handheld milker, to work for us. It’s a concept that fits really well into my fantasies, a relentless, hands free apparatus you strap someone into and they are mercilessly teased and drained. If it had worked as well as I imagined, this would probably be a Lovense stan account now and Silver would be lying comically shrivelled in a puddle of lube and semen.

But, in the history of sex toys, onnaholes simply have never gotten the love of dildos, plugs and vibes. When it comes to things you stick your dick into, their relative lack of penetration (snrk) to the western market belays a bunch of psycho-social biases that give the technical side of the problem less of a foundation. A buttplug is a solved problem Lovense is simply improving by adding their app, a powered masturbation sleeve is an experimental satellite launched to sample Mars for evidence of life. 

So, I certainly applaud the company’s ambition here. Lovense takes some pretty big swings, trying to adapt their system to everything from a vagina operated control stick for their other toys to nipple clamps, and that’s generally a thing I care about. Teledildonics is a tech that I will never say no to innovation in.  However, the problem with the Solace is threefold:

There’s not enough sensation, it’s hard to operate and it’s loud.

Loud is forgivable. It’s the Mach I of a motor driven toy. When we tested it, the noise part was dealt with by putting a hood on Silver so that it sounded a bit less like you were getting a panicked hand job from Beaker. Loud might even be a value add if you are one of the many folks turned on by knowing this is a machine, so if that was the only issue I would have been able to ignore it. If we are being fair, the Gravity is loud too.

The operation challenge, unfortunately, is the make or break part. Some things were seamless. It connects and controls with the app beautifully, and has buttons on the unit so you can do manual if you really want to. Points there for making a toy that doesn’t brick if they stop supporting it. For the person controlling it from a distance it’s easy as pie to figure out. One slider controls depth of thrust, the other speed. As well as full control, you can create a loop or leave it on one setting while you do other things to the victim. All very good.

The problem comes from the deployment part. It’s hard to keep your dick in it, and it doesn’t offer enough stimulation to get you anywhere on its own. Worse, if you wiggle too much the safety feature to prevent the motor from burning itself out doesn’t let you hilt. It will immediately stop moving with a worried whine. At no point on Silver was it going to the base of his cock. If he wiggled at all, which most aroused people will do, his cock easily popped out and sort of wobbled uselessly next to the unit while it still shrieked away, hell for leather.

The manual suggests two options, attaching it with the included brackets to the front of a desk, pointing down (as if you were doing a cam2cam session with someone else) or simply holding the whole unit in place on yourself, on all fours. I don’t know how Lovense thinks this is going to work, but the external housing is rounded hard plastic. Not only is it bigger than the average person’s hand span (and awkwardly heavy), but there is no texture on the exterior. Add some lube and you are immediately going to drop this puppy. If this ever gets a Mach II this needs a handle and some external grippy silicone. I can’t stress how much the base to brace off is essential in a thrusting toy, and if you want to hold it on yourself you will need both hands. 

Furthermore the dependence on the desk bracket is doing a lot of work in assuming the height of your desk and the clearance between your lap and chair. We were lucky, as I own a sit stand desk that can be adjusted exactly so. But if you don’t, you may struggle even more than we did. You will not be using this, despite the advertisement, “slumped on the sofa” or “lying in bed” without some extra work and I don’t know if this unit would handle being stuffed between mattress and box spring the way you can a Fleshlight.

The sensation problem is perhaps the last point of concern. I get that Lovense’s safety feature on the motor would be at odds with the toy having any availability to grip, but they are offering what is in effect a stroking toy, but one size fits most and without suction, that will be largely stroking the middle third of a penis. If it can’t suck, it needs to vibe or it needs a heck of a lot more texture. Otherwise on most people it’s a whole lot of effort for nothing in particular as far as outcome. And that, given what the toy is trying to do is a unfortunate. They do offer a tighter “vagina sleeve” as an aftermarket add on, but unless the depth issue also is fixed I worry that isn’t enough and the innards of that sleeve might still not bridge the gap. It’s also pretty baffling that if you hop up in price point to the Solace Pro their default sleeve has a lot more texture. Was there really that much to be saved when they both have a base price of $369 USD?

At this point you are probably wondering why you would even bother with this and I am probably going on some reviewer blacklist somewhere, but I will reiterate the positives…

The good stuff about the Solace (and the brand)

At least based on porn and fantasy, people really, really want this toy to be a thing and bless them, Lovense is taking the problem seriously. Particularly in the niche of femdom, stuff that flips the gaze to focus on the bottom is a breath of fresh air. This toy is clearly designed with the vagnina based control stick I mentioned as the intended pairing (the Mission 2) and that’s spaceage level miracles.

And if you do want a hands free remote control option that you won’t struggle to hold, there’s always the Max 2, which is outside grip texture all the way, or the Calor, which leaves the squeeze in the hand of the one operating it. The tech here still has a lot of room to grow, but it’s clear that Lovense considers it a priority when they offer both their regular and pro edition.

I’m also happy to note you can get replacement sleeves for incredibly cheap ($15 USD if there’s no sales), and since this part will be the bit that needs changing most often (soft materials mean porous) this significantly increases the possible life of the toy. Furthermore, I haven’t experimented with cramming other maker’s sleeves into the channel, but the design is so simple it does suggest some aftermarket modding is possible. If you are into cutting edge sex tech, wanting to mod your stuff is probably your default state.

Lovense, as a company, is also surprisingly affordable for what you get. I already mentioned they are always running sales, but for bang for your buck, you will generally get what you paid for. And, while this one might have undershot the target a bit, but given a year or two I suspect their 2 version will have made up considerable distance.