blueutil

CLI for bluetooth on OSX: power, discoverable state, list, inquire devices, connect, info, …

Notes

Uses private API from IOBluetooth framework (i.e. IOBluetoothPreference*()).

Opening Bluetooth preference pane always turns on discoverability if bluetooth power is on or if it is switched on when preference pane is open, this change of state is not reported by the function used by blueutil.

Alternative Method

By default, blueutil uses IOBluetooth framework APIs to query paired devices. As an alternative, you can set the BLUEUTIL_USE_SYSTEM_PROFILER=1 environment variable to use the system_profiler command instead.

The system_profiler method resolves an issue where some multi-point Bluetooth devices (devices that can connect to multiple devices simultaneously) may not report their connection status correctly through the IOBluetooth APIs, but do show the correct status via system_profiler.

Note: The system_profiler method is experimental and may have compatibility issues with some blueutil commands.

Usage

Usage:
  blueutil [options]

Without options outputs current state

    -p, --power               output power state as 1 or 0
    -p, --power STATE         set power state
    -d, --discoverable        output discoverable state as 1 or 0
    -d, --discoverable STATE  set discoverable state

        --favourites, --favorites
                              list favourite devices; returns empty list starting with macOS 12/Monterey
        --inquiry [T]         inquiry devices in range, 10 seconds duration by default excluding time for name updates
        --paired              list paired devices
        --recent [N]          list recently used devices, 10 by default, 0 to list all; returns empty list starting with macOS 12/Monterey
        --connected           list connected devices

        --info ID             show information about device
        --is-connected ID     connected state of device as 1 or 0
        --connect ID          create a connection to device
        --disconnect ID       close the connection to device
        --pair ID [PIN]       pair with device, optional PIN of up to 16 characters will be used instead of interactive input if requested in specific pair mode
        --unpair ID           EXPERIMENTAL unpair the device
        --add-favourite ID, --add-favorite ID
                              add to favourites; does nothing starting with macOS 12/Monterey
        --remove-favourite ID, --remove-favorite ID
                              remove from favourites; does nothing starting with macOS 12/Monterey

        --format FORMAT       change output format of info and all listing commands

        --wait-connect ID [TIMEOUT]
                              EXPERIMENTAL wait for device to connect
        --wait-disconnect ID [TIMEOUT]
                              EXPERIMENTAL wait for device to disconnect
        --wait-rssi ID OP VALUE [PERIOD [TIMEOUT]]
                              EXPERIMENTAL wait for device RSSI value which is 0 for golden range, -129 if it cannot be read (e.g. device is disconnected)

    -h, --help                this help
    -v, --version             show version

STATE can be one of: 1, on, 0, off, toggle
ID can be either address in form xxxxxxxxxxxx, xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx or xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx, or name of device to search in paired or recent devices
OP can be one of: >, >=, <, <=, =, !=; or equivalents: gt, ge, lt, le, eq, ne
PERIOD is in seconds, defaults to 1
TIMEOUT is in seconds, default value 0 doesn't add timeout
FORMAT can be one of:
  default - human readable text output not intended for consumption by scripts
  new-default - human readable comma separated key-value pairs (EXPERIMENTAL, THE BEHAVIOUR MAY CHANGE)
  json - compact JSON
  json-pretty - pretty printed JSON

Favourite devices and recent access date are not stored starting with macOS 12/Monterey, current time is returned for recent access date by framework instead.

Due to possible problems, blueutil will refuse to run as root user (see https://github.com/toy/blueutil/issues/41).
Use environment variable BLUEUTIL_ALLOW_ROOT=1 to override (sudo BLUEUTIL_ALLOW_ROOT=1 blueutil …).

Environment variables:
  BLUEUTIL_USE_SYSTEM_PROFILER=1  EXPERIMENTAL: use system_profiler instead of IOBluetoothDevice API for paired device queries

Exit codes:
   0 Success
   1 General failure
  64 Wrong usage like missing or unexpected arguments, wrong parameters
  69 Bluetooth or interface not available
  70 Internal error
  71 System error like shortage of memory
  75 Timeout error
 134 Abort signal may indicate absence of access to Bluetooth API

Examples

List paired devices using IOBluetooth API (default):

blueutil --paired

Use system_profiler for a single command:

BLUEUTIL_USE_SYSTEM_PROFILER=1 blueutil --paired

Use system_profiler outside of shell (e.g., in scripts):

/usr/bin/env BLUEUTIL_USE_SYSTEM_PROFILER=1 blueutil --paired

Set environment variable to always use system_profiler:

export BLUEUTIL_USE_SYSTEM_PROFILER=1
blueutil --paired
blueutil --connected

Install/update/uninstall

Homebrew

Using package manager Homebrew:

# install
brew install blueutil

# update
brew update
brew upgrade blueutil

# uninstall
brew remove blueutil

MacPorts

Using package manager MacPorts:

# install
port install blueutil

# update
port selfupdate
port upgrade blueutil

# uninstall
port uninstall blueutil

You will probably need to prefix all commands with sudo.

From source

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

# build
make

# install/update
git pull
make install

# uninstall
make uninstall

You may need to prefix install/update and uninstall make commands with sudo.

Alternative Interface

For a TUI (text-based user interface) build on top of blueutil, you can take a look at blueutil-tui. It offers a simple interface for the following blueutil functionalities:

• displaying paired devices
• searching devices
• pairing and unpairing devices
• connecting and disconnecting devices

It's written in python using the textual framework.

Development

To build and update usage:

make build update_usage

To apply clang-format:

make format

To test:

make test

To release new version:

./release major|minor|patch

To create release on github:

./verify_release

If there are no validation errors, copy generated markdown to description of new release:

open "https://github.com/toy/blueutil/releases/new?tag=$(git describe --tags --abbrev=0)"

Copyright

Originally written by Frederik Seiffert [email protected] http://www.frederikseiffert.de/blueutil/

Copyright (c) 2011-2025 Ivan Kuchin. See LICENSE.txt for details.