- Auracast is a feature of the Bluetooth LE Audio standard that enables broadcasting audio to nearby devices.
- Android added basic support for Bluetooth LE Audio in Android 13, including support for starting and connecting to audio streams.
- Android 15 could get a dedicated page for audio sharing, signaling that Auracast could be a key feature of the new OS.
Imagine you’re traveling with a group of friends, and you want to listen to some music together. Unless the app you’re using has a built-in social listening feature like Spotify, there’s no easy way to share the audio you’re listening to with everyone else in your group. That’s a problem that Auracast, a feature of the Bluetooth LE Audio standard, tries to solve. Auracast enables broadcasting audio to nearby devices using Bluetooth Low Energy without the hassle of pairing. However, the broadcaster and receiver devices must support Auracast for this feature to work.
Although Auracast was announced over a year and a half ago, there still aren’t many headsets on the market that support it. That could change in 2024, though, as many accessory makers are going to release new products that support Auracast now that most smartphones that are being released also support it. To prepare for these new devices, Google is preparing to add a dedicated “audio sharing” page in Android 15 that lets users share or connect to nearby LE Audio streams.