Over the past many years, the Bluetooth technology has evolved through several versions. With each new minor or major version, it has brought forth many improvements in terms of speed, range, power efficiency, and features.
Bluetooth devices were available in the market as early as 1999 but not many people used them back then. As time passed, wireless communications over Bluetooth became more popular.
Because of this slow evolution of Bluetooth technology, our computers might have different versions of Bluetooth hardware installed in them. It is essential to match the versions of two Bluetooth versions so that they can use the features provided by the Bluetooth.
For example, if you want to connect your smartwatch to your PC over Bluetooth, then your PC must have at least version 4.0 of Bluetooth hardware available.
Here is how we can find the Bluetooth version available on a Windows PC:
- Press Win+R hotkey and enter devmgmt.msc in the Run dialog when it shows up. This will launch Device Manager.
- In the device manager, expand the Bluetooth category and double-click on the Bluetooth adapter device. You can also right-click on it and choose Properties.
- In the Properties window, switch to the Advanced tab. Next to the Firmware version, check the LMP version. For example, in the following screenshot the LMP is 8.
- Find out which version of Bluetooth is available on your Windows PC for corresponding LMP version using the following table:
- Now you can close all the windows opened during this process.
If you PC does not have the Bluetooth version required for communicating with a device, then you can easily buy a Bluetooth USB dongle or Bluetooth PCIe adapter. Some of these devices come with both WiFi and Bluetooth capabilities. Laptops can also be upgraded because they also have a WiFi+Bluetooth adapter. This is also a great way to upgrade your system’s WiFi and Bluetooth capabilities.
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