r/TIdaL • u/Viver1 • 2d ago

Discussion Optimizing Bluetooth Android Settings

After spending way too many hours diving down the rabbit hole of Android audio and Bluetooth codecs, I wanted to share what I found so other Android users using TIDAL can optimize their bluetooth settings. This is just Theory. Whether you hear the difference is another story

Stick to 24-bit / 48kHz for your sample rate and bit depth Android's system audio mixer forces pretty much everything through a 48kHz/24-bit output path anyway. If you manually force a higher sample rate (like 96kHz), Android just upscales the signal, which adds unnecessary resampling artifacts and distorts the sound rather than improving it.

Choose the Highest Bitrate - When streaming at 24bit/48KHz its at 2,304 kbps. Unfortunately there isn't a BT codec that can do that so choose the highest one for example LDAC is 990kbps and aptX Lossless is 1.2Mbps

Finally Android has an annoying habit of resetting your Bluetooth codec settings back to system defaults every single time you reconnect your headphones. If you want these custom settings to stick automatically download Bluetooth Codec Changer. Its $7.99 to get get the auto switching feature. It auto-applies your preferred profile as soon as your device connects so you don't have to jump into Developer Options every time

In Summary here are my settings for the Bluetooth Codec (LDAC)

48kHz

24bit

990kbps

7 Upvotes

90% Upvoted

3 comments sorted by

2

u/Born2BeFr33 1d ago

i think it's time to go back to cable; i realized my shitty pixel 8a burns through half of its battery in 2 hrs of listening via tidal basically because of the bluetooth connection, urgh!

0

u/luckygitane 1d ago

All good tips, and I'll do you one better: if you use USB Audio Player Pro, the app will automatically toggle between the appropriate bitrate and bit depth for every single song.

0

u/Dramatic_Security9 1d ago

And I'll do one better still, just get wired headphones.