Bluetooth 5.2, LE Audio, LC3, What The Hell Does That All Mean?

Written by Geoff Cooling

Updated February 9, 2022
Published February 9, 2022

I had a query from a lovely gentleman from Iowa recently about the new Bluetooth standard. He had been doing some research into it and the terminology surrounding it was confusing at best. He asked if Bluetooth 5.2, LE Audio and LC3 were different or all the same thing? I was just going to send a reply when I thought maybe it was worth a quick blog post because maybe others had the same confusion, so here goes.

More rechargeable

To answer the question, they are all related, Bluetooth 5.2 is the new protocol. It enables LE (low energy because it doesn't drain batteries as much as Bluetooth classic) audio and finally, LC3 is a new audio codec that delivers superior sound with LE audio. A Codec is a rather clever way of compressing audio to a much smaller file size. LC3 is supposed to deliver full, warm audio with high fidelity.

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Posted by Geoff

Geoffrey Cooling

Geoffrey (Geoff, anything else makes him nervous) Cooling is an Irish hearing aid blogger and has been involved with the hearing aid industry since 2007. He has worked in private practice dispensing hearing aids and as a manufacturer's rep. He has written two books and they are both available on Amazon. He loves technology, passing on knowledge and is legendary for many other things, primarily the amount he curses, his dry and mischievous sense of humour and his complete intolerance of people who are full of themselves. Please feel free to connect with him.

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