- I'm Andru Edwards and you're watching Gear Live.
(upbeat music)
Sharing audio from a device between multiple people
has always been kind of a mess.
But with iOS 13, Apple has the perfect solution
if you use AirPods or Powerbeats Pro
with a feature called Audio Sharing.
Audio sharing lets you pair two sets
of headphones to one iPhone or iPad,
allowing two people to enjoy the same song or video.
I show you how it works in this episode.
What's going on tech squad, Andru Edwards here,
editor in chief of gearlive.com.
As I mentioned, today we are talking about
the new Audio Sharing feature in iOS 13
which allows you to connect two pairs
of wireless headphones to one device
without the need for any messy adapters.
In the past, I've been all about
sharing my audio, especially if I'm on a plane
or a bus, hanging out with a friend,
but the old ways just weren't that elegant
and you even need to carry around a hardware splitter
which would plug into your headphone jack
and then have little Y shape at the other end
that you can physically plug two headphones into.
Instead of the Y shape, there were other splitters
that have multiple, up to five or six
different ones so you can share the audio
from one device with six other people.
Everybody wired in.
And then there's the ghetto way which I have to admit
is probably the one I use the most
because basically you're sitting next to somebody
and you have your earbuds in
and you take one out and you hand it
to the person next to you.
So you have one wired headphone going
into your device and the other side
is actually in the other person's ear
because that was the only way.
If you didn't have a splitter on you,
that was the only way to share the audio
from one device.
Well now Apple has fixed that problem
with the Audio Sharing feature.
In iOS, Apple has the perfect solution
if you use AirPods or Powerbeats Pro
and by the way if you're thinking of picking
up a pair of AirPods or Powerbeats Pro,
I'll have links down in the description below.
If you want to know how to use the feature,
here's how it works.
First the prerequisites.
Aside from the supported headphones
that I just mentioned, you need to have
an iOS device that supports Bluetooth 5.0 or later.
So those are gonna be the iPhone 11, 11R
and 11 Max, obviously when those come out.
The Apple XS, XS Max, XR, 10, 8 and 8 Plus.
Those are the iPhones that will support Bluetooth 5.0.
If you are using an iPad, you're gonna wanna
have an iPad Pro 2018 model or the latest iPad Air
or iPad Mini fifth generation.
Okay, now that you have the proper equipment
and you have the headphones that are supported
and you have your iOS 13 device with Bluetooth 5.0,
here's how you use Audio Sharing.
And there are actually a couple of ways to do this.
There are two specific ways
that you can use Audio Sharing.
First way involves two iOS devices.
As you're listening to content or watching your video
that you want to share with someone else,
take your device and then you take their device
and you touch the devices together.
You will then get a prompt on the screen
asking if you want to share your audio
with the other user.
Tap yes, then you are done and you're good to go.
Your audio will then be shared with the other person
through their smartphone.
They can then use their own smartphone
to control the volume coming through
on their pair of AirPods or Powerbeats Pro.
It's a very simple and easy process.
Apple probably couldn't have made it any simpler
than what it is.
Just tap the two phones together,
confirm and you're good.
However, what if you're in an instance
where the other person who you want to share with
doesn't have their phone with them
or their phone has died or their phone
is in their locker somewhere but they do have
their AirPods in their pocket.
You can still use the Audio Sharing feature
in that instance as well.
What you're gonna wanna do is take their AirPods case
and open it near your phone while holding down
the pairing button on the back of the AirPods case.
When the pairing dialog comes up on your phone,
tap on Connect and you are good.
Now go into the Air Play menu and you'll be able
to select two different pairs of headphones,
the two that are connected to your phone,
both your pair and the pair that is connected.
You can connect them both as the audio source
that you wanna stream your content to.
So again, the first way is to take two supported devices,
tap them together and then confirm that you want
to do Audio Sharing on your primary device
and the second way is to pair their pair of headphones
to your device and then select both pairs
in your settings as the headphones that you want
to stream audio to.
And that's it.
You're now able to share audio from one device
running iOS 13 to two pairs of AirPods
or Powerbeats Pro.
If you have any questions, drop them down
in the comments below.
I'll be happy to help you out
and I'll meet you there for further discussion.
Audio sharing is just one of many great features
coming to iOS 13 this September.
If you're curious about what else is coming
in iOS 13, I do have a couple of other videos
you might want to check out.
On of them looking at the brand new dark mode
and the other showing how you can connect
and pair Xbox One and PlayStation DualShock 4 controller
to your iPhone and iPad to play games.
I will leave links down below in the description
in case you want to check those out.
Until next time, thank you so much for watching
as always guys.
I appreciate your support, hit that subscribe button
to stay on top of all the latest videos.
I'm Andru Edwards and I will catch you
in the next video.