Bluetooth not available on Mac

Bluetooth unavailable. Bluetooth no longer shows up in the preferences pane. This is after taking all advice resetting nvram/pram, resetting smc, deleting the plist file. Even reinstalled the OS. Nothing works. Pretty frustrating. Just wanted to add my complaints to the growing pile that apple needs to address.

You may disregard my comment above. After waking the machine from sleep, I again get the message "Bluetooth: Not Available."

I have now tried every one of the recommended fixes and the problem comes back after sleep and, when I go to System Preferences: Bluetooth and click "Turn Bluetooth On" nothing happens.

Restart reboots Bluetooth, but that's not a good solution.

The only way that worked for me was to install http://http://www.frederikseiffert.de/blueutil/ and then run

blueutil off

blueutil on

blueutil on

It only worked at the second "blueutil on" but at least, no restart was needed

There may be something to this. One thing I noticed is that, when I plugged something into my USB hub (attached to the iMac panel), my Bluetooth mouse and keyboard would just freeze. All of the other suggestions here didn't work. But I simply removed my USB hub completely...no longer using one at all...and my Bluetooth behavior seems fine now (so far).

Unfortunately, I continue to have this problem, even after updating to 10.13.3.

After my computer goes to sleep, Bluetooth is not available. Becomes available again after restart. The terminal: restart Bluetooth instructions also work, but sleep removes the service.

I have no USB peripherals.

Thanks Barry.

This solved the issue for me. I tried deleting the .plist file and rebooting. But it only resolved after resetting the SMC. I didn't have to reset the NVRAM, but that would have been my next step.

Just adding my voice to frustration over this issue. I drove a 2-hr round trip to my nearest Apple Store at Apple Support's suggestion. The Genius Bar people didn't seem to be aware of any issues, and suggested replacing my keyboard. That meant repeating the 2-hour drive a week later because they had no keyboard stock! I will try the suggestions here and report back if anything works.

Equipment: iMac 2017 (4 months old). Problem started after High Sierra update. Symptom: Bluetooth keyboard unresponsive. Sometimes I can re-connect the keyboard from Bluetooth symbol in menu bar; sometimes Bluetooth is 'not available' and only solution is a re-start.

This is the exact same problem I'm having. It started when I upgraded to 10.13.1, and it's still happening now (I've since upgraded to 10.13.3). The constant reboots whenever I swap into my Henge Dock (external monitor, usb hub, etc.) is really disruptive. I disabled Handoff when it first started happening - that appeared to fix the problem, but it's started happening again after the 10.13.3 upgrade. 😟

There is a command line solution, works fine my OS X HIgh Sierra 10.13.3 found here

Here's a Terminal recipe to make blueutil work for you:

cd ~/tmp/

git clone https://github.com/toy/blueutil.git

cd blueutil

make

make test

cp blueutil ~/bin/

Now run:

blueutil off && sleep 1 && blueutil on

I am glad that terminal series worked for you.

However, for anyone else reading this thread, I STRONGLY suggest that you NOT use terminal commands unless your are a very experienced user. Those commands can (and do) cause serious system problems if you make a typing error.

Barry

I have a late 2011 27" iMac. As soon as I upgraded to High Sierra I have no bluetooth. It doesn't even appear in the system report. I hired a tech to replace the bluetooth module, he did and checked all the wiring and connections but Mac still would not recognize the bluetooth. I am having to rely on a dongle which reduces the number of available USB ports. Apple, you apparently have an issue with bluetooth and High Sierra on some machines. Your fixes don't resolve the issue. Look deeper and give us a reasonable solution. We pay good money for these products and expect them to work as well as expect you to acknowledge and remedy issues. Please get on this. It's aggravating.

Are you using VMWare per chance? I traced this down to when I brought up one of my VM's this would cause the Mac host to lost bluetooth. In general settings, uncheck the share bluetooth with host. That fixed it for me. Thus far anyway.

Tried SMC and PRAM reset. No good. Unplugged USB 3 external hard drive. No change. Unplugged Apple Cinema Display Thunderbolt. Worked. Bluetooth returned. Rebooted with display connected. No Bluetooth. Rebooted with display disconnected. Bluetooth returned. Plugged display in while booted. Bluetooth remains. I'm sure this will be temporary, but I will let you know.

James

For anyone else experiencing this problem as of this posting-try the following-it worked for me.

http://osxdaily.com/2010/03/24/when-and-how-to-reset-your-mac-system-management- controller-smc/

SMC Reset (Systems Management Controller)

http://osxdaily.com/2010/03/24/when-and-how-to-reset-your-mac-system-management- controller-smc/

On the MacBook / Pro's keyboard, hold down the Shift+Control+Option keys and the Power button at the same time. Release all keys and the power button at the same time – the little light on the MagSafe adapter may change colors briefly to indicate the SMChas reset. Boot your Mac as usual.

its always something my bluetooth says not available all of a sudden i did a SMC reset, did a diagnostic nothing shows wrong hardware wise. so i think it is software related anyone have any other suggestions how to fix this i been on this for 2 hours now and just noticed it out of the blue when trying to copy and paste it did not even show the files that was mentioned in this reply in the library/preference for the bluetooth profiles to delete. the bluetooth options are totally gone i can't even see them in my system preference as if the computer is not bluetooth capable for me to use. it just shows a zig zag line like its not even recognizing the hardware.