An Android Open Source Project developer may have just stopped airplane mode disconnecting your Bluetooth headphones once you’ve updated to Android 11.

A commit posted to the project titled ‘Context-aware Bluetooth airplane mode’ is intended to leave Bluetooth active if airplane mode is turned on while certain Bluetooth profiles are connected. These are the hearing aid profile and the AD2P profile, the latter used for streaming music and device audio (not calls) to Bluetooth headphones and speakers. All Bluetooth audio codecs, such as SBC, AptX and LDAC, will be supported, as the connection uses the A2DP profile regardless of the codec used.

In addition to use on flights and other areas where mobile phone use is restricted, airplane mode is also commonly used to reset a misbehaving data connection or to shut the outside world out for a few minutes. This small change could finally allow users to do so without manually reactivating their Bluetooth and reconnecting, interrupting playback.

Featured image credit: Suhyeon Choi