Enhance Bluetooth audio on your Mac, forcing the aptX or AAC codec

Javier Porcar

2 minutes

The quality of Bluetooth audio streaming has improved a lot in recent years. To this day, no loss may be noticed as long as we have good headphones and the use of a codec with sufficient quality.

Through the Mac, we can force our team to use Quality codec preferentially, such as aptX or AAC Codecs. The latter is the native Apple Codec, and it has a good quality, but some users prefer to use the aptX Codec, as it is found on more computers. Let's see how to check the codec used and how to change it. 

How to know the codec that our headphones / speakers use:

  1. Must connect Bluetooth speakers to our Mac and we start to play any audio. 
  2. When we see the Bluetooth icon in the menu bar, press the Option key and without releasing it, click on the Bluetooth icon. If you cannot make it appear, go to system preferences - Bluetooth and check the option that you will find at the bottom, which indicates: Show Bluetooth in the menu bar. 
  3. Now go to the chosen Bluetooth device and A menu will open indicating the codec you are using. 

In the example that we give you, this device it does not use any of the above-described codecs of better quality. It is a codec that compresses the signal too much and therefore, you have quality losses. If you want more quality, we will show you how to do it.

Force aptX / AAC on compatible Bluetooth headsets:

  1. You must have installed the Xcode developer app and a developer account, even if it's free. Also, you need the tool what can you download here.
  2. After clicking on the previous link, if you don't have a developer account, you can do it for free. If you are a developer, a file in dmg format.
  3. Mount this file Discharged.
  4. Opens Additional tools and go to the Hardware folder.
  5. Drag the Bluetooth Explorer app to the applications folder.
  6. Launch the app and go to Tools - Audio Options, located in the menu bar.
  7. On this new screen, check Force use of aptX and Enable AAC. Check that: Disable AAC and Disable aptX are disabled.
  8. Now it's time to close the application, restart the Mac or disconnect and connect the headphones.
  9. Check now, as we described at the beginning, that we reproduce in aptX / AAC.

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked with *

*

*

  1. Responsible for the data: Miguel Ángel Gatón
  2. Purpose of the data: Control SPAM, comment management.
  3. Legitimation: Your consent
  4. Communication of the data: The data will not be communicated to third parties except by legal obligation.
  5. Data storage: Database hosted by Occentus Networks (EU)
  6. Rights: At any time you can limit, recover and delete your information.

  1.   Eduardo J. Paredes said
    ago 5 years

    Hello,
    I am very interested in the issue of being able to use the aptX codec on my mac.
    I have a developer account, but when I click on the link to download the dmg it tells me that I don't have permission on my account.
    Can you help me?
    Thank you.

    Reply to Eduardo J. Paredes
  2.   Fran said
    ago 5 years

    It works perfectly. Thanks for the recommendation.

    Reply to Fran