What do you do when you have Bluetooth problems on your iPhone or iPad? What troubleshooting can you do in situations like these?

What is Bluetooth?

Bluetooth is a technology that helps connect different devices wirelessly within the limitations of a short distance. Devices like iPhone can connect to wireless headphones, for example, and share data and communicate with each other. Effective distances over which Bluetooth works is a maximum of 10 meters or around 33 feet.

Bluetooth Devices

As with all technologies, you would expect that sometimes the connections may not work. How would you go about troubleshooting Bluetooth problems on your iPhone when the music on your iPhone is not playing on your external Bluetooth capable speaker system?

Apart from the devices mentioned earlier, we also have Androids, tablets, home theater systems, play stations, wireless headphones, PC output speakers and other devices that have flooded our gadget markets. The farther your paired devices are placed within the distance limitations of the technology, the more the drain on your iPhone battery, if you are connecting from this device to your Bluetooth capable speaker, for example.

Troubleshoot Bluetooth Problems on Your iPhone

Simple Checks

Troubleshooting Bluetooth problems on your iPhone could be as simple as rechecking the Bluetooth status on your iPhone.

• Slide your finger upwards from the control center at the bottom edge of your screen and then confirm that the Airplane mode is turned Off and that Bluetooth is turned On. This is the easiest check to sort out Bluetooth problems on your iPhone.
• Ensure your Bluetooth devices are within the distance limitation of the technology. For the best connection, place your devices as close to each other as is possible. You can then establish how far apart from each other you can move or place them through a process of trial and error.
• Check if your other device for example, a Bluetooth speaker, is switched On and charged enough, or even better still, fully charged.

Try Some Force

• If your iPhone refuses to connect with your other device, your external speaker in our example, then let’s try some force to sort out the Bluetooth problems on your iPhone to make them connect to each other.
  • Switch Off the power on your external speaker.
  • Turn Bluetooth Off on your iPhone by opening Settings, then Bluetooth and turning the slider to the Off position.
  • Simultaneously hold both Home and Power buttons on your iPhone to force a restart on your device. Press down the Power and Volume buttons if you are using an iPhone 7 series device.
  • When the device restarts, turn Bluetooth back to On.
  • Now turn on your other device, the external speaker in our example and try to connect both devices.
• Both your devices should now connect, in most cases.

Other Measures

You can also employ other measures to troubleshoot Bluetooth problems on your iPhones and iPads.

You could force your iPhone device to forget the other Bluetooth device like the external speaker in our example, then try connecting both devices afresh or you can try resetting your iPhone’s network settings to help with the issue.

Conclusion

While the checks are relatively easy to confirm and troubleshoot, the last measure mentioned should be undertaken with caution, as resetting the network settings in your iPhone will wipe out all Wi-Fi networks on your phone, as well as all the Bluetooth pairings that have worked in the past.

In this article, we have briefly outlined measures you can take to troubleshoot Bluetooth problems on your iPhones and iPads when they do not connect to other Bluetooth capable devices.