The Bluetooth Special Interest Group laid out details on Bluetooth 6.0 on Tuesday. The standout feature in the upcoming short-range wireless standard is dubbed “true distance awareness,” which should make tracker tags like Apple AirTag easier to find.
However, there’s no mention in the specifications of the change many are hoping for: faster connections.
Bluetooth 6.0 promises ‘true distance awareness’
Bluetooth is easy to overlook — it’s not as cool as Wi-Fi. But it’s how so many of us connect our iPhone and Mac to headphones, keyboards, mice and more. A growing use for it is tracker tags, and the Bluetooth SIG took notice.
It included Bluetooth Channel Sounding in version 6.0. This brings true distance awareness that will “enable one device to determine the presence, distance, and direction of another,” according to the SIG.
Coming to improve AirTags and its rivals
Apple’s own AirTag connects to iPhones and other devices with Bluetooth, but that provides only a limited ability to judge the distance between iPhone and tag. That’s why Apple also built in ultra-wideband technology: to improve tracking the tag.
However, most third-party tags that also support Apple’s Find My app have only Bluetooth, making them not as accurate as AirTag. But Bluetooth 6.0 could change that.
With the Bluetooth Special SIG just now releasing a new version of the Bluetooth Core Specification, it will almost certainly be many months before any devices that make use of Bluetooth Channel Sounding are available. It might be a feature of a future AirTag 2.0, for example.
It’s a slow process. The last major update, Bluetooth 5.0, launched way back in 2016.
Where are our faster connections?
In 2023, the Bluetooth SIG said it’s working on a method to “more than double the Bluetooth LE data rate,” according to Chuck Sabin, Senior Director, Market Development at the group. The goal: “Taking it up to four to six megabits — maybe up to eight megabits,” said Sabin.
Currently, Bluetooth LE can not handle sending lossless audio to headphones. Some of the audio must be stripped out to transfer. Doubling the data rate would fix this problem.
However, the SIG’s announcement this week about Bluetooth 6.0 made no mention of faster wireless connections or lossless audio.
