
It’s in practically every device nowadays. It sends music to your speakers, lets you talk to your mom while you’re driving to work, and makes it easy to switch a show from your phone to your TV. Bluetooth makes the world go round, but how does it do it?

1. Devices need to speak the same language.
When you want your phone to talk to a speaker, or your keyboard to talk to your computer, you have to make sure they can speak the same language. Devices that are Bluetooth enabled contain the right software and hardware to be able to send out, receive, and interpret the signals to and from other Bluetooth devices.
2. A personal area network is created.
A trick to communication is to ensure signals don’t get crossed. If you’re trying to play music on your speaker, it won’t do any good for your phone to be sending information to your neighbor’s speaker. That’s why, when you connect two Bluetooth devices, they form what is called a piconet (personal area network). This way, no other devices can connect due to the unique address the piconet uses.

3. It all comes down to radio waves.
Bluetooth signals transmit via radio waves in about the 2.45 gigahertz range. These signals are designed to be quite weak so as to limit their range. This reduces the chance of interference with other devices.