Enhance your audio, upgrade your sound setup, and connect everything wirelessly. It’s all possible with Bluetooth speakers. Not sure where to get started? Let’s walk through the basics of great sound systems, without needing to plug in a thing (well, maybe a power cable or two).
How to connect a Bluetooth speaker
Let’s start from the very beginning – pairing your new Bluetooth speaker to your phone:
- Make sure your Bluetooth speaker is turned on (kind of crucial) and ‘discoverable’. Most speakers will be discoverable as soon as they’re on, but there might be a button to press. Often there will be a little blinking light, so you know your speaker is discoverable.
- Search for Bluetooth on your phone, TV or laptop. It will typically be under Settings.
- Make sure Bluetooth pairing is switched on – this should be obvious as a little on/off toggle.
- From there you can see all the Bluetooth devices around you – simply select your speaker and you should be good to go.
This is the same for all Bluetooth devices, whether you want to connect to your headphones, car audio, or multi-room speakers.
How to connect two speakers using Bluetooth
Okay perfect – you’re up and running. Now let’s connect multiple Bluetooth speakers to one device. After all, the joy of wireless speakers is the ability to have music in every room (or all around you if you want).
A load of speaker brands are fully aware that you’ll want to connect multiple devices for bigger sound, so there’s a load of apps to let you do just that. Here are some of our faves:
Bose
Using the Bose Connect app you can link two Bose speakers together in either party mode (both speakers doing the same thing) or stereo mode (one speaker working as ‘left’ and the other as ‘right’)
Ultimate Ears
Ultimate Ears also have party mode - you can pair as many Boom speakers as you like (no, really, up to 50!) and can sync them using the UE Boom app.
Sonos
Sonos is known for creating great wireless surround sound, so of course it’s easy to pair lots of these speakers together. All you need is the Sonos app.
Multiple speakers from different brands? Not a problem with a Samsung phone
- Go to Settings - Bluetooth and pair both your speakers (they don’t have to be the same kind)
- A pop up should appear that asks if you want to Listen together
- If you didn’t get the pop up, that’s fine, just scroll down from the top of your screen, and select Media or Media Output
- Scroll down to Audio Output, and select the speakers you want to play from
And Apple?
iPhones, iPads and Macs can only be connected to two HomePod or HomePod Mini speakers:
- In the Home app, double-click on your HomePod – Settings - Create Stereo Pair
- Select the second HomePod you want to add
How to connect Alexa to a Bluetooth speaker
Currently playing your playlists through your Smart assistant? You can connect your Bluetooth speaker to your Amazon Echo, Dot or Show for twice the sound.
- Make sure your speaker is discoverable for pairing
- Open the Alexa app and select Devices – Echo & Alexa
- Choose your speaker
- Select Bluetooth Devices, then Pair a new device
How to connect Google Nest to a Bluetooth speaker
So you have a Google Nest smart speaker? Let’s get you connected.
- Make sure your speaker’s discoverable
- Jump into the Google Home app and tap your Google Home
- Select Settings – Audio – Paired Bluetooth devices – Enable pairing mode
- Then, back in Audio, select Default music speaker – Pair Bluetooth speaker
- Select your speaker when it pops up, and you’re good to go.
What about connecting multiple Google Nest speakers?
You can create groups of Google speakers to spread music throughout your home. To do this, put them into one group in the app:
- On the top left of the Google Home app, tap + then Create speaker group
- Select each device that you want in the group
- Select Next – choose a name for your group – then Save.
We hope that helps. But if you have any other questions, our colleagues are in-store to help, or available online with ShopLive. Already know what Bluetooth speaker you want? Enjoy.
