Connect to a paired Bluetooth device from C#.

PolarGoose 11

It is a duplicate of my question on StackOverflow.
There is a "Connect" and "Disconnect" buttons in Windows Bluetooth settings.

I want to create a console application which would make Windows connect and disconnect from my Bluetooth Headphones or other Bluetooth devices. However, I can't find a proper API to do that.
I have done some investigation described here but none of the ways I have found worked.

Could you help me finding a proper API or a workaround?

Jack J Jun 24,491 Reputation points Microsoft Vendor

2022-02-02T09:12:10.133+00:00

@PolarGoose , you could try to use the following code to get a list of connected bluetooth devices.

The answer could tell you about it.
PolarGoose 11 Reputation points

2022-02-02T11:37:00.57+00:00

@Jack J Jun ,

Why do I need a list of connected Bluetooth devices?
Castorix31 82,751 Reputation points

2022-02-02T12:41:01.047+00:00

There are some sample codes on Google, but not sure if they are useful, like :
(in C++, but if they work, not too difficult to convert into C# with P/Invoke...)
BluetoothLowEnergy.cpp
Bluetooth connection sample
(I have no BT devices, so I cannot test...)
PolarGoose 11 Reputation points

2022-02-02T13:35:49.203+00:00

@Castorix31 ,

No, unfortunately it is not what I'm asking for. I don't need to connect to a Bluetooth device. I need to command Windows to connect or disconnect from a Bluetooth device.

Jack J Jun 24,491 Microsoft Vendor

@PolarGoose ,

Why do I need a list of connected Bluetooth devices?

Because you want to connect to a paired Bluetooth device.

DeviceInformationCollection PairedBluetoothDevices =await  DeviceInformation.FindAllAsync(BluetoothDevice.GetDeviceSelectorFromPairingState(true));

We could get the connection of paired Bluetooth Device, then we could filter it by name to connect which we want to connect

foreach (DeviceInformation item in PairedBluetoothDevices)  
            {  
                if(item.Name=="")  
                {  
                    //connect to device use DeviceID  
                }  
            }

PolarGoose 11 Reputation points

2022-02-03T09:47:03.96+00:00

@Jack J Jun ,

I don't need to connect to a Bluetooth device. What I want is the following quote from my question:

I want to create a console application which would make Windows connect and disconnect from my Bluetooth Headphones or other Bluetooth devices

I just want to automate the procedure of connecting to my headphones for instance, instead of always opening Windows settings and pressing the "Connect" button.
Jack J Jun 24,491 Reputation points Microsoft Vendor

2022-02-09T07:15:26.4+00:00

@PolarGoose , Sorry for the late repsponse, Based on my search, I sugegst that you could use powershell to enable it to make Windows connect and disconnect the Bluetooth Device.
Like the following link:
how-to-connect-and-disconnect-a-bluetooth-device-with-a-powershell-script-on-win
PolarGoose 11 Reputation points

2022-02-13T09:16:21.283+00:00
@Jack J Jun ,

Thank you for your proposal. Unfortunately, the script that you proposed doesn't work:

When my audio device is connected, calling Disable-PnpDevice -InstanceId $device.InstanceId -Confirm:$false does nothing. I would expect it to disconnect my headphones.

When my headphones are disconnected, calling the script Disable-PnpDevice, Wait, Enable-PnpDevice doesn't make Windows to connect to my audio device. This sequence of commands just does nothing (maybe it does something but I don't see any effect).
zpcc 11 Reputation points

2022-03-11T13:55:53.777+00:00

I've encountered the same problem and find your post here, and I noticed a strange device name ends with " Avrcp transport" using Get-PnpDevice -class Bluetooth. Maybe you'd change the friendlyname option.
PolarGoose 11 Reputation points

2022-03-19T15:45:56.147+00:00

@zpcc ,
Thank you for the hint. It indeed works.
I have posted the results of my testing to my original StackOverflow post, please check it out:
https://stackoverflow.com/a/71539568/7585517

However, it is still a workaround. And it seems it is not what "Bluetooth devices" dialog does when you click "Connect". I would really like to find a proper solution.
Eric 0 Reputation points

2024-05-04T17:17:06.5+00:00

idk if this is still needed, or not, as it has not been marked as having an answer, from as far as I can tell, but here is a YouTuber, who created a C# program, to communicate with a Bluetooth device.
https://github.com/michaelreeves08/car-bci-shit

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Connect to a paired Bluetooth device from C#.