Introduction to Bluetooth Direction Finding

Locating items or navigating indoors are functionalities with huge potential. Both have been possible with Bluetooth Low Energy for a long time using Bluetooth Beacons, but with limited accuracy. To improve accuracy and interoperability, the Bluetooth SIG introduced new features to the Bluetooth Core Specification.

Support for Direction Finding was introduced in the Bluetooth 5.1 specification. There are two major flavors, Angle of Arrival (AoA) and Angle of Departure (AoD). Both flavors provide angle information between a usually static and larger multi-antenna antenna array and a moveable single antenna unit.

Nordic added full production support for both AoA and AoD with both transmitter and receiver options in nRF Connect SDK version 2.1.1. This support can be extended to build a full Bluetooth Direction Finding solution.

0:00 Practicalities and agenda
2:05 Introduction
6:50 AoA vs AoD
11:53 The physics involved in direction finding
26:00 IQ samples and how to use them
30:00 Scope of Bluetooth specification
36:18 nRF Connect SDK samples
40:00 Supported hardware tools
41:18 Partner support
43:45 Q&A 1
1:07:29 Q&A 2

This is a recording of a webinar held on December 7, 2022.
The presentation can be downloaded here (direct download): https://devzone.nordicsemi.com/cfs-fi...