What is the quality of the audio signal transmitted via Bluetooth?

Bluetooth or Lightning, it doesn’t matter: the transition to digital transmission has allowed to improve the quality of the transmitted audio signal.

This is reported by representatives of the group that includes JBL, AKG, and Harman Kardon, who now prefer to follow Apple’s strategy and focus on wireless signal transmission. The future of music listening is without the jack not only according to Apple’s researchers, but also the staff of other smartphone manufacturing companies like Intel.

Already today there is an effort to make the old 3.5-millimeter interface obsolete to produce higher quality USB gadgets, in order to enhance Bluetooth’s capabilities. More and more people prefer to switch to Bluetooth to listen to quality audio, all without spending too much and without losing audio quality through Bluetooth transmission.

It is no coincidence, after all, that the range of Bluetooth products has grown tremendously recently. Replacing the jack with a Bluetooth connector is also a very simple investment for companies that could gain quite a lot from it. The return on investment is guaranteed also due to the great popularity that such devices enjoy.
According to Armin Prommersberger, Vice President of Technology at Harman, digital transmission further allows improvement of the quality of the audio signal transmitted via Bluetooth. Already many devices are capable of carrying a 24-bit signal, but it is estimated that within a few years smartphones will be able to transmit a 32-bit audio signal. The signal is taken from the digital device, which in turn allows creating better sound in headphones.

Thanks to sophisticated industry technologies, the listening experience can become even better. Just think of noise cancellation technology like NXTGen Active Noise Cancellation. The latter allows people to set which external sounds they want to eliminate to enjoy a listening experience without interference. Digital audio technologies such as TruNote allow calibrating the sound based on how the headphones are worn. Not to mention ShareMe, a technology that offers the possibility to listen to digital audio on another pair of headphones.

Certainly, even today, the problem of low battery life of wireless headphones exists, a factor that could limit the choice of such a model. According to Mr. Prommersberger, however, this obstacle will be overcome in the years to come, also thanks to the development of new gadgets, as well as the customers’ habit of frequently charging their headphones.

Yet already today Bluetooth headphones capable of transmitting music for up to 8 hours straight are on sale. Consider the JNL Reflect BT Mini model. In the future, it is thought that headphones will be created that can operate continuously for almost 20 hours.

What is certain is that wired audio transmission is increasingly fading into oblivion, also because it can no longer compete with digital audio.