The Bluetooth Special Interest Group (BSIG) is an international corporation that develops and propagates the world’s most famous near-field, short-range networking standard; better known to us as Bluetooth! Recently, the BSIG announced the latest version of their technology — Bluetooth 5.
What’s new with Bluetooth 5?
The latest advancement is a leap forward from the previous iterations. While it doesn’t provide any new features per say, it does offer significant improvements over the existing features. Let’s go over them one by one:
Range
The range in new Bluetooth is quadrupled over that of its previous version. The BSIG hasn’t given any specific figures, but we’re guessing anywhere between 40-50 meters.
Speed
Bluetooth 5 will more than double the data transfer speeds. That’s a relief because Bluetooth transfers are usually quite slow.
Number of Connections
The capacity of a Bluetooth 5 enabled gadget will be almost eight times more than that of Bluetooth 4.2. That mean the new tech should be able to handle 30+ devices without breaking a sweat.
Type of Connection
The most significant improvement for Bluetooth 5 can be seen here. With advanced technologies working behind the scene, Bluetooth has become incredibly intelligent. So much so that you’ll no longer need to pair the devices to transfer data.
Power Consumption
What’s incredible is that all this increase in functionality doesn’t increase power consumption. In fact, the new technology is more power efficient than its predecessor.
So, a lot of good news from the event hosted by BSIG at London where it announced Bluetooth 5. Interestingly, Apple not only has a stake in BSIG, it’s also a promoting member with voting rights! So we can be sure that Apple will be one of the first companies to enjoy a seamless transition into this new technology.
This latest advancement in Bluetooth technology is also good news for the Internet of Things (IoT) industry. With more and more devices becoming “smart”, their network communication also needed to be “smart”. And by that we mean fast and capable of transferring more data. And that’s exactly what Bluetooth 5 is all about.
