If you’re trying to listen to podcasts or music on your phone, it can be annoying when your AirPods keep switching between other devices, like your Mac or iPad.
Personally, I don’t mind this behavior. If I’m sitting at my Mac, I want to use the Music and Podcasts apps on the Mac. But a lot of people consider their phone to be their primary device and always want to play audio from their phone, no matter which other device they’re using.
If you want your iPhone to keep supreme control over your ears, here’s how to disable AirPods auto-switching.
Stop your AirPods from switching between devices
Prevent AirPods from connecting to a Mac
Screenshot: D. Griffin Jones/Cult of Mac
If you’re playing podcasts or music out of your iPhone and you sit down at your Mac, you might be annoyed that it suddenly stops and switches to the computer. It’s easy to turn this behavior off, although it’s a little counter-intuitive.
First, connect your AirPods to your Mac. If, in a cruel bit of irony, it doesn’t happen automatically, you can open Control Center in the top right of the menu bar, click the Bluetooth menu and select your AirPods.
Then, open System Settings and scroll down in the sidebar on the left. Towards the bottom, you should see an option appear for your AirPods, just above “Keyboard,” “Mouse,” “Trackpad,” etc. In this menu, set Connect to This Mac from “Automatically” to When Last Connected to This Mac.
Personally, I have a giant speaker hooked up to my Mac, sitting below my desk. While I don’t use AirPods, I would definitely be irritated if music switched to playing out of the earbuds instead.
Prevent AirPods from switching to your iPad or iPhone
Screenshot: D. Griffin Jones/Cult of Mac
If you’re jamming out to tunes while you’re cooking dinner and happen to pick up your iPad to bring up a recipe, you certainly don’t want your AirPods to switch to the iPad unnecessarily. Luckily, it can be disabled here, as well.
Make sure the AirPods are connected to the device, then open Settings. You should see your AirPods at the top of the list (no scrolling necessary, as is inexplicably required on the Mac). Tap on it to bring up AirPods settings, then tap Connect to This iPad, and set it to When Last Connected to This iPad.
More AirPods pro tips
To get the most out of your AirPods, you should check out our other articles:
