FCC Filing Indicates HTC Could Enable Bluetooth 5.0 on the U11 Via a Software Update

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A new FCC filing from HTC shows that the company is planning to roll out a firmware update that will enable support for Bluetooth 5.0 on the HTC U11.

The U11, which was launched back in May this year, comes with Bluetooth 4.2. However, if this new FCC filing is anything to go by, owners of the HTC U11 can look forward to seeing the latest Bluetooth standard trickling down to their devices.

The FCC filing states that the new update will “enable Bluetooth 5.0 by software without any hardware change.” This shouldn’t come as a surprise at all given the chipset powering the HTC U11, Snapdragon 835, already has hardware level support for the Bluetooth 5.0 standard, so it was all but expected that the device would probably receive this feature at some point.

The recently launched Moto Z2 Force also ships with Bluetooth 4.2 out of the box, though Motorola has promised to roll-out Bluetooth 5.0 in a future update.

In case you’re wondering, the Samsung Galaxy S8 was the first device to ship with the Bluetooth 5.0 standard. Apart from the Galaxy S8/S8+, the Xiaomi Mi 6 and OnePlus 5 are also on the list of the devices to ship with Bluetooth 5.0 out of the box.

Officially announced last year, Bluetooth 5.0 is in many ways a major upgrade over Bluetooth 4.0. The new standard offers up to two times the data throughput, up to four times the range, and up to eight times the broadcast message capacity compared to the Bluetooth 4.0 standard. Of course, all of those metrics won’t fully manifest themselves in your real-world usage, but it’s a thorough upgraded nonetheless.

Unfortunately, the FCC filing doesn’t state exactly when this new update will make its way to the U11.

Source: FCC Via: Ausdroid