My Bongos
In my humble opinion, the best bongos for under $50 are Remo PTS bongos. I’ve written about them elsewhere, but at the risk of repeating myself, I think these are by far the best bongos for the beginners for the following reasons - they’re inexpensive, easy on the legs, and don’t require tuning/detuning. They are quieter than most tunable bongos and are lower pitched as well. That said, I get more use out of my Remos than my tunable bongos. The only major drawback that I see is that you can’t do the moose call with the Remos because the skin is too smooth. Other than that, they are a great value and a lot of fun. One last note - because they come in white, you can easily customize them with stickers or even paint them!