Windows – Bluetooth audio from an iPhone to windows 10 PC (A2DP sink)

a2dpaudiobluetoothiphonewindows 10

I was able to do this in Windows 7, but now I have a Windows 10 PC and I can't get it to work. The iPhone is running iOS 11.4 and the PC has Windows 10 with latest updates (version 1709, OS Build 16299.431)

What I want to do is to be able to make music/podcasts on my iPhone play through the speakers on my PC using a bluetooth connection between them.

I have been able to pair my phone to the PC using the "Bluetooth & other devices" dialog as shown in the first screenshot. It appears in the control panel as a bluetooth device second screenshot and I can connect to the PC from the phone using Settings/Bluetooth. The problem is that I can't play audio from the iphone using the PC speakers. When I try, the iPhone just plays through its internal speakers.

Can anyone walk me through how to do this? Am I describing this functionality correctly?

  1. Screen showing the iPhone is connected.

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  2. Screen showing device details.

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  3. Screenshot showing Bluetooth details on the iPhone.

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  4. But the iPhone does not appear as an input device in sound settings:

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  5. The Bluetooth adaptor is from Intel, latest firmware:
    enter image description here

This question is distinct from the other that was cited because it describes the specific feature I am interested in the title, playing audio from iPhone to PC over bluetooth. The other question only refers to this as A2DP sink– that's not a name that people can be expected to understand without familiarity with the complex bluetooth standards. The other question does go on to state that this is the audio streaming feature, but it wasn't findable when I started this question (didn't know what A2DP sink was until recently).

Best Answer

I was able to find the answer on microsoft forums here

I have included the quote, as the answer is a ways down. The user Celestrion stated:

Microsoft's Bluetooth stack presently supports only the "source" role of the A2DP profile, which lets it send audio. It does not support the "sink" role of the A2DP profile, which would let it receive audio.

There is a Toshiba driver that installs this service on their laptops to make up for this regression (the Bluetooth stack Toshiba shipped with Windows 7 had this feature), but its INF file is set up to only install on Toshiba computers.

The rest of us are stuck until Microsoft learns that some of us plug our computers into nice speaker systems and might want to stream audio digitally instead of dealing with cables and the associated logistical hassle. Or, we might want to use the same headset for Skype and telephone calls.

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