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Speed of tethering BT vs Hotspot iPhone 6

IPhone 6 connected to iPad mini

tethering via BT is much slower than WiFi hotspot.

is this normal? Can it be fixed?

According to to speed test wifi hotspot is 25.55 Megabits upload and 23 Megabits download

BT yields 0.37 download and 0.31 upload, same place, same time.

MacBook Pro, OS X Yosemite (10.10.2), iPhone6, iPad3

Posted on Feb 20, 2015 7:36 AM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Feb 20, 2015 7:47 AM

Bluetooth is slower than wifi.

8 replies

Jul 25, 2015 7:06 PM in response to Lawrence Finch

Mr. Finch is partly right, but WAY out of context as to the question at hand. For example, the 3mb at close distance (10-20 ft) has been gone for nearly 10 years. Yes, 10 years.


From BT 3.0 and up, the throughput is 25mbps (faster than 90% of wired connections) and range of 100 meters (or up to 350 ft). Be careful what you post, brother. 4.0 is "LE" (low energy) and mostly the same as 3.0 which has been around for about 7 years or so. My old iPhone 3G could hold a bluetooth connection and feed a laptop with data 100 yards away in 2008.


Long story short? ALWAYS tether with Bluetooth. The range is equal to WiFi. The power consumption is less than half. The throughput exceeds all but the best LTE connections we have at this moment.


Side note: Bluetooth is now (and has for a few years been classified under 802.11 (WiFi). USE IT.


Last note: Bluetooth REQUIRES pairing a PIN on two devices simultaneously (once and done). WiFi does not. Whomever says BT is not secure is purely out of their brain.

Jul 25, 2015 7:12 PM in response to mbaltozer

Sorry but Mr. Finch is correct and you are incorrect. BT 4.0 includes a profile called Low Energy but that does not = 4.0.


No form of BT has a range of 350 feet. At best, with a clear view, you can get 40 feet with full power and less with low power. It is also still much slower WiFi.


Can you show us any cite that shows BT to be that fast and have that kind of distance?

Jul 25, 2015 8:45 PM in response to mbaltozer

LOL, if you were a techie and a professional you would know that the IEEE abandoned the 801.15.1 standard (that was Bluetooth) and that only a Class 1 BT device, only used for industrial purposes, meet your 100 meter standard. You are connected to WiFi. Neither the iPhone nor the iPad are Class 1 devices, they are Class 2 devices with a range of 10 meters. Class 1 requires far more power than a battery powered device could ever provide.

Speed of tethering BT vs Hotspot iPhone 6

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