Microsoft is improving wireless call quality on Windows 11 with a new Bluetooth LE Audio profile. You’ll no longer experience a drop in audio quality when entering a Discord or Teams call with a Bluetooth headset, and more importantly, you’ll hear everything in stereo.
By default, Bluetooth LE Audio utilizes the “Hands-Free Profile” for two-way calls. As soon as you turn on your microphone, the sound quality of your speakers is summed to mono and kicked down to a 16kHz “wideband” sample rate (or worse, in some cases). This is fine when taking calls while driving, but it’s less ideal during video calls, and it can be a major nuisance for online gamers who just want to make the most of their expensive wireless headsets.
Windows 11’s new “super wideband stereo” profile utilizes an improved audio compression algorithm to deliver 32kHz “super wideband” stereo audio during calls. It’s a massive upgrade from the standard Hands-Free Profile, particularly for gamers, though it also serves as the basis for new Bluetooth Spatial Audio support in Microsoft Teams (which I’m sure you were begging for).
You may still notice a drop in quality when taking calls with “super wideband stereo.” Microsoft hasn’t really laid out all the specifics, but LE Audio doesn’t have a ton of bandwidth, so two-channel audio with microphone functionality naturally requires heavy-handed compression. Plus, this profile uses the LC3 compression algorithm, which can be very inconsistent due to its variable bitrate. It may work poorly with cheap hardware, and it may be prone to interference. Still, if you insist on using a Bluetooth headset while gaming or taking calls, this is something to be excited about.
Microsoft acknowledges that there’s still progress to be made on this front. The company says that it’s working to bring CD-quality sound to LE Audio game chat and voice calls, which would be a boon for Bluetooth-obsessed gamers.
Bluetooth LE Audio with “super wideband stereo” is featured in the latest versions of Windows 11 24H2. It requires an LE Audio-compatible headset and PC. Unfortunately, hardware manufacturers still need to distribute driver updates for enhanced LE Audio functionality—the rollout will probably take a few months, per Microsoft.
Source: Microsoft
