How to Connect Beats to Mac

Apple doesn’t typically give its Beats headphones as much attention as it gives to AirPods, but that doesn’t mean they’re not as capable. In fact, the latest Beats share many of the same specifications as AirPods internally, which means they’re just as versatile—and just as compatible with your Mac.

In this guide, I’ll show you how to connect Beats to Mac, as well as how to fix common disconnection issues that you may encounter. Stay with us if you’re eager to get these clues from our team.

Before we start:

If you need to make room for more music, or you’re suffering poor performance on your Mac, try cleaning old and unnecessary junk from your computer’s internal storage drive with MacKeeper’s Safe Cleanup. Our tool not only gives you more space to work with, but it’ll also help your Mac run a lot smoother.

Here’s how to use it:

1. Download and install MacKeeper.
2. Select the Safe Cleanup tool, then click Start Scan.
3. Choose all the junk you want to remove, then select Clean Junk Files.

Can you connect Beats to Mac?

Wireless Beats earbuds and headphones use Bluetooth for connectivity, which means you can pair them with almost any Apple computer in the same way you would connect AirPods to a MacBook. If you have a recent pair of Beats, you’ll even get seamless switching between all your Apple devices.

Other features that work on Mac, assuming your Beats support them, include active noise cancellation, Transparency mode, Spatial Audio with dynamic head tracking, and Audio Sharing among other Beats and AirPods users. I’ve used Audio Sharing between AirPods and Beats many times, and it works great.

How to pair Beats to your MacBook

To connect Bluetooth headphones to Mac, including Beats, you first need to put the headphones into pairing mode. You can then go to the Bluetooth menu within System Settings on your MacBook Air and select your Beats in the Nearby Devices list to connect them.

A pro hint from me: Beats headphones equipped with the H1 chip will automatically connect to your Mac and work across all your Apple devices if they’re already been paired with your iPhone or iPad. This is because the connection is synced to your iCloud account and then shared, so you don’t have to pair every device individually.

How to connect two Beats to Mac

Our Mac experts have discovered that it’s possible to connect two pairs of Beats to your laptop and enjoy playback on both of them simultaneously using the Audio MIDI Setup app built into macOS. First, pair the Beats to MacBook (both sets) in System Settings, as outlined above, then follow these steps:

1. In Finder, launch the Audio MIDI Setup app from Applications > Utilities.
2. Click the + button in the bottom-left corner, then choose Create Multi-Output Device.
3. You’ll see a list of all audio devices connected to your Mac. Check the boxes next to both pairs of Beats headphones to activate them.
4. Right-click Multi-Output Device in the sidebar, then select Use This Device For Sound Output.

An extra note from our team:

Any audio you play on your Mac should now be sent to both sets of Beats buds that you have connected. Now that a multi-output setup has been created, when you want to use it in the future, you can simply select Multi-Output Device within System Settings > Sound. There’s no need to use Audio MIDI Setup again.

How to fix disconnected Beats on Mac

When I find my Beats Studio Pro headphones disconnected from Mac, I fix it like so:

1. Check if Beats headphones are turned on.
2. Click the Control Center icon and press Bluetooth.
3. Select Beats headphones to reconnect them.

From my observation, this issue usually happens due to a random drop in the connection, which isn’t uncommon with Bluetooth devices. And I know one more way to fix it. You can go to System Settings > Bluetooth and select your Beats headphones there. If they still won’t connect, it could be because your Mac Bluetooth isn’t working, in which case, other wireless devices like mice will disconnect, too. We recommend a system restart when this happens.

Important: 

Also, I’ve noticed that Bluetooth issues can frequently occur when your Mac is low on storage space, which causes the system to become slow and unstable. I’ve found that a quick and easy way to free up space and remove potentially problematic files is with MacKeeper’s Safe Cleanup. Try this:

1. Open MacKeeper and select Safe Cleanup.
2. Press Start Scan.
3. Select all the junk you want to remove from your Mac, then click Clean Junk Files.

Once you’ve freed up some storage, you should find that your Mac is snappier and less prone to freezing.

Conclusion

Beats headphones work brilliantly with Mac, just like AirPods Pro, and they connect just as seamlessly over Bluetooth. To pair yours or to use two sets of Beats buds or headphones with your Mac simultaneously, follow the steps above.

If you experience Bluetooth issues like frequent disconnecting or general system instabilities on Mac, make sure you’re not low on storage space. You can safely free up more by removing old system junk with MacKeeper’s Safe Cleanup. Try this out today.