Bluetooth crashes in MacOS Sonoma (M1 MacBook Pro)

Adding my journey to the log here:

Short Story: Wipe the entire drive and reinstall/downgrade to Mac OS 13 Ventura.

Long Story: Like many others here, my Bluetooth has been cutting in and out since upgrading to Sonoma. For me, it was happening several times a day. My Mac is an M1 Macbook Pro, and the connected Bluetooth devices are a Magic Trackpad, AirPods (seldom connected), and Keychron Q1 Pro. Here's a list of things I tried that haven't worked:

• spoke with Apple support several times, including capturing and sending extensive logs to them - no dice
• tried the Onyx approach listed in this thread - no dice
• ran diagnostics - no issues detected
• reinstall Mac OS 14 Sonoma without wiping entire drive - no dice
• reinstall Mac OS 14 Sonoma with wiping entire drive - no dice
• reinstall/downgrade to Mac OS 13 Ventura with wiping entire drive - success!

Bluetooth has been stable now for several days. At first it wanted to detect my keyboard a few times (more than was needed), but that's since disappeared. I'll be waiting at least several months before testing out Sonoma again on a different drive. Rough stuff.

Note - after running diagnostics I tried downgrading to Mac OS 13 Ventura, but wasn't possible without wiping the drive, as the installer refused to do so. That's when I worked through each of the above 'reinstall' steps.

Edit - I have also tried upgrading to the latest 14.x.x versions - no dice

I spoke at length with Apple Support, and they said it’s a known issue with certain models (I’m on a 2021 MBP 16 M1 Max w/ 64 GB ram). When I asked about a fix or a repair under AppleCare, they told me:

1.) it’s not a hardware issue, so it’s not covered under AppleCare

2.) the devs are aware of the issue, and they are no longer needing logs from users

3.) there is no timeline for a fix

4.) I should be “on the lookout” for a future update that might include a fix.

This is nuts.

When I really pressed for options, I was basically told that I could buy an M2 or M3 at full price. 🤬

So it appeared that the problem only occurred when I used the Keychron K8 Pro keyboard. Once I switched to Magic Keyboard, everything went back to normal. Zero issues so far while the bluetooth would crash every hour or so with Keyrchon. Love the Keychon keyboard, not sure why it is causing issues with Mac, it works perfectly fine on Windows.

I resolved by unpairing the keyboard and mouse, running Onyx maintenance and rebooting and then repairing the keyboard and mouse. Of course, if you don’t have a laptop, you will have to find a wired keyboard and mouse to perform this.

Has anyone read my post? I solved it in 14.0. Here are the steps: ( you will need a wired keyboard or if you’re using a laptop, you can use the laptop keyboard)

1. unpair the Bluetooth keyboard and mouse. Make sure they’re gone from Bluetooth.
2. download and install Onyx
3. select Maintenance tab in Onyx and disable under Rebuild: Launch Services Database. Under Misc Options, disable Font Cache
4. click Run Tasks, this will run and ask you to reboot.
5. after reboot, re-pair your Bluetooth keyboard and mouse

this worked for me, MBP M1 14”

As explained several times in this thread, the solution is quite symple:

1. Install Onyx.
2. Remove ALL bluetooth devices in settings.
3. Execute maintenance in Onyx.
4. Let it reboot.
5. Pair all your devices again.

And done. All problems solved. It seems related to file permissions and caches, which Onyx solves completely.

Hope it helps.

Just want to update on what other people have been saying. Plugging my keychron keyboard in via USB fixed the problem for me.

I had the exact same issue after Sonoma upgrade. Waited until the latest 14.3 Sonoma even and still bluetoothd crashes repeatedly and airdrop is unresponsive.

From the logs it looked like a permission issue that I never managed to get resolved or find the root cause of.

After 3 months now of trying everything I now completely wiped the drive and went back to Ventura.

Everything works perfectly now including bluetooth, all my bluetooth devices ( AirPods, keyboard and mouse ) as well as airdrop

_bhb wrote:

• I just upgraded to MacOS Sonoma. Now my bluetooth crashes every 15-45 minutes. Bluetooth turns off entirely (not just devices losing connection).

I already tried all the "bluetooth issues" troubleshooting I found online:

unpaired and repaired everything

• deleted `/Library/Preferences/com.apple.bluetooth.plist`

• reset bluetooth module with `sudo pkill bluetoothd`

• restart computer

• turn off wifi

Nothing has worked.

Now I notice a few Crash Reports in the Console app.

Note this does NOT represent all the times bluetooth has turned off (like I said, it probably every 15-45min), but I wonder if maybe it can provide some clues.

Any advice on how to proceed?

" I just upgraded to MacOS Sonoma"

I certainly would shut down and restart more than once after any major upgrade like new macOS...this seems to sort many a glitch that appear...

To trouble shoot further you can:

—A SafeBoot Use safe mode on your Mac - Apple Support will sort many anomalies

Does a quick disk repair before it fully boots up, and certain system caches get cleared and rebuilt, third party system modifications and system accelerations are disabled.

Login and test. Reboot as normal and test. Caches get rebuilt automatically.

This test will tell you if third party interference; most* extensions etc are not loaded in safe boot mode.

—Test issue in another user (or guest user) account Change Users & Groups settings on Mac - Apple Support

This will tell you if it a universal issue or isolated to your user/admin account. 

unplug all third party peripherals when testing

Uninstall all third party apps that are Cleaners/Optimizers/VPN/Anti-Virus

all known to cause issues on the macOS

you can file a bug report /submit your Apple Feedback here: Product Feedback - Apple

Call Customer Support (800) MY–APPLE (800–692–7753)

or on line https://getsupport.apple.com/

or call AppleCare Support at 1-800-APLCARE (800-275-2273)

Outside the USA—Contact Apple for support and service by phone

See a list of Apple phone numbers around the world.

Contact Apple for support and service - Apple Support

After upgrading to 14.1.2 the problem has gone away for me.

My issue was a gaming controller that kept disconnecting every 30 seconds or so. Tried everything I could. Finally turned off a wireless mouse I’d used one time that wasn’t even connected but was still in the Bluetooth devices list. By turning it off I mean physically flipping the switch on the mouse. That solved the issue. The signal from that wireless mouse was pinging the Bluetooth of the computer, which I guess was somehow throwing off everything else. Once that mouse was turned off, no connectivity issues. Really weird. Only sharing to say that you can try turning off any other Bluetooth devices on the devices list directly that might be nearby and powered on.

If it is a Bluetooth issue, it could always be a hardware issue. People complain, for it is easy to complain than look for a solution. Find another bluetooth device and try to connect with it. It could be the Bluetooth device that's malfunctioning and/or the Bluetooth module in the Mac. I'm running Sonoma 14.1.1 on a 4 1/2 year old MBP, even some Chinese, Korean Bluetooth devices connect and stay connected. The Apple devices connect absolutely well.

I noticed when I connected the Keychron bluetooth keyboard and Apple mouse also and it’s occurred the bluetooth is disconnect every 30-60 minutes. but once I connect the Keychron with USB. there is no any issue about the bluetooth connection never more.

If your bluetooth stops working completely, you can just run these commands (paste them if you prefer):

sudo launchctl kill 9 gui/501/com.apple.bluetoothuserd
sudo launchctl kill 9 gui/501/com.apple.bluetoothd
bluetoothd

I'm not sure if the first one's necessary, but it's there because the "user" part indicates it's probably a DriverKit daemon. I don't think you'd need to stop it, but I haven't looked at the code (or whatever code is available). I don't think the second one's necessary because the bug looks like a bluetoothd crash (not hang), but Apple hasn't shared information about the bug. The last on just starts the daemon.