Bluetooth 6.0 could revolutionize one of my favorite iPhone features (original) (raw)

As IFA 2024 is about to start, the Bluetooth Special Interest Group announced the new core specification for Bluetooth 6.0. With this new technology, Bluetooth is bringing Channel Sounding, which could “greatly improve” Find My solutions.

According to Bluetooth SIG, this innovation brings “true distance awareness, introducing transformative benefits across various applications,” making it easier and faster to locate lost items. Currently, Apple, Samsung, and many other accessory makers use Bluetooth to locate items.

Apple, for example, relies on two different technologies. One of them is ultrawide-band chips, which can offer precise location of items, and with the second generation of this technology, it’s even possible to find friends in a crowd. BGR tested Find My with two iPhone 15 models at Taylor Swift’s concert, and it was great.

The other option is Bluetooth connectivity. To find Apple TV’s Siri Remote, your iPhone can show whether you’re getting near to it or farther away. Although it won’t give you the precise location, it works fine. Bluetooth 6.0 could greatly improve item trackers, home devices, and other accessories.

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Although it’s unclear when companies will start adopting the new Bluetooth 6.0 standard, it’s already being announced, so we could see these improvements in the next few years. Still, the company informs that even if a device supports this new standard, it does not necessarily mean they’ll add support for this feature.

That being said, Bluetooth SIG reveals that the Channel Sounding feature could also “add a robust layer of security” for digital key solutions, “ensuring that only authorized users within a specified range can unlock doors or access secure areas.”

Besides these changes, the group is also adding the following features to the new standard:

Decision-Based Advertising Filtering: The Bluetooth Low Energy (LE) Extended Advertising feature supports a series of related packets being transmitted on both primary and secondary radio channels
Monitoring Advertisers: The host component of an observer device may instruct the Bluetooth LE controller to filter duplicate advertising packets. When filtering of this type is active, the host will only receive a single advertising packet from each unique device
ISOAL Enhancement: The Isochronous Adaptation Layer (ISOAL) makes it possible for larger data frames to be transmitted in smaller link-layer packets and ensures the associated timing information that is needed for the correct processing of the data by receivers can be reconstituted.
LL Extended Feature Set: With this advancement, devices can exchange information about the link-layer features that they each support.

BGR will let you know once companies start shipping devices with this new standard.