Smartphones Bluetooth profiles

We recently tested eight smartphones that all feature wireless connectivity via Bluetooth, which can be used to connect your phone to a variety of other devices. Not only can you connect to your PC for syncing your data and contacts, but you can also connect to wireless headsets, in-car systems or even directly to other phones.

However, not all implementations of Bluetooth are equal. It would be easy to assume all Bluetooth-enabled phones would be capable of the same functionality, but this is sadly not the case. What a phone can do is determined by a set of capabilities known as ‘profiles’.

For each Bluetooth feature you want to use, you’ll need to ensure that your phone supports the relevant profile.

For example, if you want to use a Bluetooth headset to make hands-free calls, your phone will need to support the Headset Profile (HSP) for the two devices to work together. As one of the most often used Bluetooth features, all the phones in this test support this profile.

However, if you have a set of high-quality stereo Bluetooth earphones you’d like to use with your phone then it will need to support the Advanced Audio Distribution Profile (A2DP). While most of the phones we tested do support it, the Palm Centro and iPhone 3G do not – so those two phones won’t work with your earphones.
The Dial-up Networking Profile (DUN) allows you to connect a laptop to the internet using your phone as a wireless modem; it’s a widely supported feature that is notably missing from the iPhone 3G.

Many in-car phone systems can also use Bluetooth to access the SIM in your mobile phone, to make calls. For this, a phone must support the SIM Access Profile (SAP). Although a very widely supported profile, once again it’s absent from the iPhone 3G as well as the Palm Centro and Moto Z10.

The pdf attached to this feature shows a list of Bluetooth profiles currently supported by the phones in our group test, although these are subject to change with vendor software updates.

For more information head to www.bluetooth.com, where you can find detailed descriptions of all available profiles.