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Comment by ValentineC | Hacker News Reader

It doesn't look like the HomePod Mini would support Bluetooth devices as an audio source [1] (the older HomePod has the same issue), even though it lists Bluetooth 5.0 as a connectivity option.

[1] https://www.apple.com/homepod-mini/specs/#specs:~:text=Audio...

[2] https://www.apple.com/homepod-mini/specs/#specs:~:text=Wirel...

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Am I the only one that finds this astounding? Not to mention the inability to take an aux cord.

It's one thing for phones to have these lock-in properties, but not being able to aux in audio into a speaker feels wild to me.

Welcome to the future

Sonos has not supported this for over 10 years, and seem to be doing quite well.

It is a “smart speaker”, not a speaker, so expectations are different.

Are you talking about aux? Because Sonos Move supports plain bluetooth audio connections; I use it all the time.

Bluetooth wasn't an option for Sonos before the Move. All my Sonos devices support WLAN only, no other way to connect.

Bluetooth used for Homekit stuff IMO.

Does that mean it only works with Apple devices?

It uses Bluetooth LE for proximity sensing so that you can pass audio from your phone to the HomePod just by waving them near one another.

Alas, it's actually using the U1 ultra-wideband chip for position finding. That means this only works on the iPhone 11 and above. My guess is that bluetooth signal strength just isn't accurate enough.

You can see that this documented [1] in a footnote [2].

[1] https://www.apple.com/homepod-mini/#overview-sound-handoff-1...

[2] https://www.apple.com/homepod-mini/#footnote-2:~:text=speake...

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