Enable High Quality mode on your headphones (Updated for macOS Catalina)

change-codec.md

If you're using a high-end bluetooth headset on your Macbook Pro it's likely your mac is using an audio codec which favors battery efficiency over high quality. This results in a drastic degradation of sound, the SBC codec is the likely culprit, read more about it here.

Find out what codec you're using

1. Play a song on your headphones
2. Option (⌥) click the Bluetooth button at the top of your screen
3. If you're using AAC or aptX, you can stop here—those are the highest quality codecs.

Change your codec to AAC or aptX

UPDATE: It looks like Apple has silently dropped support for aptX, leaving only AAC

You'll need to download Apple's Bluetooth Explorer in order to change codecs.

1. Head over to Apple's Developer Downloads

2. Search for additional tools and download Additional Tools for XCode 11.dmg

3. Open the dmg, and open Bluetooth Explorer

4. Click on Tools > Audio Options and change your audio codec to the following settings:

   • Enable AAC
   • Force use of aptX
   

5. Disconnect your Bluetooth headset, reconnect it, and while some music is playing, inspect your codec. It should now show either AAC or aptX.

   

Squeezing the most out of AAC

You can increase the AAC bitrate in Audio Options but be sure to keep an eye on the graphs. The retransmission percentage is roughly equivalent to packet loss, and if you increase the bitrate too high your audio will start cutting out:

The retransmission rate is a function of distance and interference, and you'll need to disconnect/reconnect on each attempt before you find the sweet spot.

On 11.2.2 also works from tools 11.4. It just doesn't show anything on startup, but required functionality can be opened from the upper menu.

mac-1:~ $ sudo defaults read bluetoothaudiod
2021-06-12 15:26:11.798 defaults[6281:131593]
Domain bluetoothaudiod does not exist

Getting above errors on MacOS 11.3.1, any solution ?

Seems Bluetooth Explorer and the Bluetooth menu display of the active codec do not work anymore on macOS Monterey, although sudo defaults read bluetoothaudiod still shows things enabled. Any ideas?

AptX is working on Catalina - I'm on Catalina 10.15.4 and using a Sony WH-1000XM3.

Steps I followed:

1. Run the following commands (Bluetooth Explorer is no longer needed)

  sudo defaults write bluetoothaudiod "Enable AptX codec" -bool true
  sudo defaults write bluetoothaudiod "Enable AAC codec" -bool true

1. Reboot both your system and headphones.
2. Connect and use an output-only application (i.e. do not use the mic) to check if the AptX codec is being used.
3. For Sony WH-1000XM3 specifically - Connect your headphones to a mobile device with the "Sony | Headphones Control" App, and configure your headphones to "Priority on sound quality" instead of "Priority on stable connection". This is crucial - my headphones refused to stop using the SBC codec until I did this.

Hope this helps someone! :)

Hi! Do you know any way to connect the 1000xm4 and use both the mic and the headphones without loosing quality? When I check the 2 options the codec changes from AAC to SCO, which makes the audio and mic quality awful. If there's no way to do it, do you know how to prevent the macbook from selecting the BT input as default. Is very annoying to change the settings every time I reconnect the headphones to the macbook. Thanks for the help!!

Indeed this has stopped working for Monterey. Does anyone have a solution?

I also found that my voice becomes clear and without "old phone" effect by disabling Hands Free Profile. Than they behave only as Headset and don't change codec to some low quality one. I'm not an expert , but it seems i'm right :)
sudo defaults write bluetoothaudiod "Disable HFP" -bool true

Additional_Tools_for_Xcode_10.4.dmg worked for me on Big Sur 11.6

Indeed this has stopped working for Monterey. Does anyone have a solution?

Unfortunately no. I used the Additional Tools for XCode 11.4 but aptX/AAC do not work in Monterey.
I also had another problem. After the upgrade, my bluetooth device (Creative SoundBlaster Roar) had the VERY low volume compared to Big Sur. I had to fix the volume by slightly moving the Output level in "Audio MIDI Setup" app.
I'll wait for a new minor release and then make a fresh installation of the OS.

Would like updates to making aptX work in Monterey too.

sub'ed

need update for Monterey please

same

do you guys can find Sony WH-1000XM3? I can' find my device after upgrading to v12.0.1 macOS Monterey (m1 chip)

Still not sure if it possible to enable aptX in Monterey? Audio without aptX lagging behind
And apple decisions not clear to me, I bought headphones with the aptX support because it's high quality, but apple force me to buy airpods 👎

Additonal tools for xcode 10.2 dmg worked for me with airpods pro

Additonal tools for xcode 10.2 dmg worked for me with airpods pro

Are you sure? Didn't work for me. It literally doesn't even work on a system level (terminal command not working either)
Make sure you're on the latest Monterey.

Additonal tools for xcode 10.2 dmg worked for me with airpods pro

Are you sure? Didn't work for me. It literally doesn't even work on a system level (terminal command not working either) Make sure you're on the latest Monterey.

it worked for me and i’m using catalina 10.15.7

Looks till MacOS 11.6.1 AptX is working but not beyond that. obviously newer "Tools" Package utility never worked. As always with Apple we are mercy of them that they will bring back support.

Another thing that's broken in Monterey are the tools within the "Bluetooth Explorer" application, in particular "Audio Graphs" (the graphs are just empty no matter if you're listening to music or not).

Apple, what happened? You guys are supposed to be the "do it right" for the audio world! Needless to say I eagerly await a fix / workaround for this issue.

Cries in Monterey

A solution I used was to just get a USB BT transmitter like this one I had laying around:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00ZYYPFHU/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Please Apple, do the right thing... Bring back the bluetooth explorer tools. 😢

@brendandebeasi I've seen your solution mentioned and confirmed as working on another site as well (can't remember where but I can say it's not one of the mainstream commercial sites that describe how to enable aptx since all of those are just spewing out outdated techniques without realizing they don't even work anymore 🙄)

PS, SCREW APPLE for fisher-pricing out OS X (sorry... MacOS 😒) and removing aptx support!

I can confirm this solution is working on Monterey for AAC. See attached screenshot of my -fantastic- hiby R3Pro. It was showing SBC until I enabled AAC using : sudo defaults write bluetoothaudiod "Enable AAC codec" -bool true
I can't get AptX working though :-(

Subbing!

Looks like it's totally impossible to know what codec is being used in Monterey?

It doesn't work with Monterey MacOS 12. Seems Apple promotes their expensive headphones by banning aptx and aac on none apple's device. Yuk.

It doesn't work with Monterey MacOS 12. Seems Apple promotes their expensive headphones by banning aptx and aac on none apple's device. Yuk.

AAC is still used per default when the receiving device supports it. Which is as it should be because AAC is better than APT-X.

sudo defaults write bluetoothaudiod "Enable AAC codec" -bool true

but how do you know?

And apple decisions not clear to me, I bought headphones with the aptX support because it's high quality, but apple force me to buy airpods

Sounds like their decisions are clear enough then

@Eugene-Y

sudo defaults write bluetoothaudiod "Enable AAC codec" -bool true

but how do you know?

That's the setting that the Bluetooth Explorer util sets. Not sure about Monterey, but for everything else just setting those values enables AAC without the need for Bluetooth Explorer.

---

AAC is working fine for me on Monterey and my Sony WH-1000XM3 with all the default settings. (nothing in bluetoothaudiod). Haven't tried aptX.

Too bad about aptX going away, but it seems like it has. Though it was probably only ever used by a tiny number of people in the first place. Maybe it's extra tricky because aptX is proprietary and patented? Apple might be unable/unwilling to support it and have to hand over money to the patent holders.