Many electronic devices emit radiation. In addition to WLAN and mobile phone radiation, Bluetooth is also said to be harmful. We tell you how dangerous this technology really is for your body.
Bluetooth: Harmfulness in gradation
Bluetooth is high-frequency radiation that officially poses no direct threat to health. The Bluetooth standard is approved worldwide and the radiation levels are within the accepted range.
- Bluetooth is mainly used to transmit data and voices. Among other things, the technology is used in computer mice, headsets or music systems and replaces annoying cables.
- Bluetooth is divided into three performance classes. Class 3 and 2 achieve a range of between 5 to 30 metres. These two are the most widely used and are considered harmless.
- Class 1 can achieve a range of up to 100 metres in an open field and can be compared to mobile phone radiation. Such devices are of greater concern, but are not usually used in private homes.
How harmful is Bluetooth really?
Because Bluetooth usually only appears as class 2 and 3, the radiation is anything but harmful in many situations. If you make a phone call with a headset or a hands-free device, the radiation exposure is much lower than when you use the mobile phone directly on your ear.
- An example: The radiation exposure of electronic devices is measured in the unit SAR. An iPhone 11 has a SAR value of 0.95 and is thus in the middle range for current smartphones. A hands-free device only has a SAR value of 0.003.
- Bluetooth is therefore much more harmless than mobile phone radiation and can therefore be neglected as a health risk. Only class 1 devices should be regarded with similar caution as mobile phones.
- International research on mobile phone radiation is ongoing. Even though the SAR values here are much higher than for Bluetooth, no long-term effects have yet been clearly proven.
Protection from Bluetooth radiation: Is it possible?
Because Bluetooth radiation is usually much weaker than radiation from mobile phones and the WLAN router, protection is generally not necessary. However, to minimise Bluetooth radiation, you can simply deactivate the function on most devices, for example on your smartphone.
- Online you can find a variety of devices and aids that are supposed to reduce radiation. However, the effect of such aids is highly controversial. For example, you can paint house and interior walls with so-called “shielding paint” to shield radiation from the outside.
- Also popular are so-called radiation detectors. With these, you can measure the current radiation exposure at any time in any place. This also tells you how strong the radiation of your Bluetooth devices actually is.
