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Hand Off and Continuity Setup

Armen

Armen

macrumors 604
Original poster
Apr 30, 2013
7,405
2,274
Los Angeles
I searched the Internet for hours trying to figure out how to get Hand off and Continuity and phone calls to work. I thought I'd put all that stuff in one place and hopefully save someone the trouble of trying to collect this information themselves.

Initial Steps:

-On your Mac go to About this Mac > System Report. Under the Bluetooth Category your LMP version needs to be 0x6.. Anything lower And the hand off feature will not work. I have heard phone call do however.

-On Your Mac: Go to system preferences > General > and click the "allow handoff" box at the bottom.

-On your iDevice Go to settings > general > and enable hand off.

-On your Mac open FaceTime and go to preferences. Check the "allow iPhone calls" box.

Next few steps:

- Make sure Bluetooth and Wifi are turned on for both devices.
- Make sure you are logged in to the same iCloud account on both devices.
- Make sure that your FaceTime is also logged in to the same account (this is needed for the phone calls feature to work).
- Make sure you are on the same Wifi network. Especially if you have a dual band Router. Both devices need to be on the same band to work. Don't connect to 2.4ghz on on device and 5ghz on the other.

How to verify Hand off actually works or not:

- If you open a web page in Safari on your iDevice you should get a bouncing icon on your Mac computer dock that shows up on the left end of the dock (it will kind of look out of place).

- If you open a web page on your Mac with Safari the lock screen of your iDevice should show an icon opposite the camera icon. Swipe up to open it.

Making phone calls

Open the contacts app on your Mac IF you click the phone icon it should say calling using iPhone.

Hope this helps.

P.S. you do NOT need to pair your devices.

Forgot to add if Safari is in private mode it doesn't hand off.
 
Last edited:
Apple_Robert

Apple_Robert

Contributor
Sep 21, 2012
34,306
49,597
In the middle of several books.
I was going to install iOS8 on my iPhone 5 in hopes of pairing with my MBP late 2011. After reading your informative post, I see that that would have been a waste of time. My MBP doesn't have the right LMP. Thank you for the post.
 
0

0970373

Suspended
Mar 15, 2008
2,727
1,412
Very helpful! I could not figure out how to get the phone calls to work now I'm all set so thanks!
 
L

lehman310

macrumors member
Mar 10, 2009
49
0
I can get phone calls to work but I cannot get safari, messages and other handoff features to work. Any ideas on how to fix this?
 
Patriot24

Patriot24

macrumors 68030
Dec 29, 2010
2,813
805
California
It appears that Handoff has been hidden/disabled in DP4.

Edit: I saw the toggle in previous builds, but do not see it in Settings > General now. I'm on a mid-2011 MBA with the requisite LMP. Not sure why it isn't showing the option?
 
Last edited:
mikecwest

mikecwest

macrumors 65816
Jul 7, 2013
1,188
493
Thanks for the tips.....You have me one step closer... I checked the box in FaceTime, and I try to make a call, it will say "using iPhone", however it never actually does it. The iPhone does not seem to even try.

The iPhone is not actually activated right now, (cracked screen, wife's old phone, I use it as a camera only) I would think that it would at least show the iPhone trying to dial.

I also do not hear anything out of the mac speakers....
 
jameslmoser

jameslmoser

macrumors 6502a
Sep 18, 2011
696
669
Las Vegas, NV
I haven't looked at any of this as I haven't installed either the Yosemite DP or iOS 8 DPs, but I can't believe the number of posts on people trying to get this to work. Its pretty obvious that apple needs to make it clear what devices support what and how you use them if your device supports them.
 
L

lehman310

macrumors member
Mar 10, 2009
49
0
jameslmoser said:
I haven't looked at any of this as I haven't installed either the Yosemite DP or iOS 8 DPs, but I can't believe the number of posts on people trying to get this to work. Its pretty obvious that apple needs to make it clear what devices support what and how you use them if your device supports them.
Click to expand...


Yeah, there is no real help for setup besides a simple check box on both iOS and OS X. They need to implement some sort of setup process.
 
Armen

Armen

macrumors 604
Original poster
Apr 30, 2013
7,405
2,274
Los Angeles
Patriot24 said:
It appears that Handoff has been hidden/disabled in DP4.

Edit: I saw the toggle in previous builds, but do not see it in Settings > General now. I'm on a mid-2011 MBA with the requisite LMP. Not sure why it isn't showing the option?
Click to expand...

That's strange because the toggle is there for me on DP4 with a Mid 2013 MBP. Have you tried restarting your Mac?
 
DarkCole

DarkCole

macrumors 6502a
Jul 21, 2013
506
925
I thought I read somewhere that SMS wasn't suppose to work with iMessage yet? Well in the public build a text message that was sent to my phone shot to my iMessage on my Mac. I was unable to to reply though.

MBPr and 4S
 
tooshaggy

tooshaggy

macrumors regular
Jul 3, 2007
227
3
SoCal
In the seed notes for DP4 the SMS messaging is disabled. It worked for the previous builds but is broken for this build.
The handoff toggle is still in System Prefs> General, near the bottom.
 
0

0970373

Suspended
Mar 15, 2008
2,727
1,412
Patriot24 said:
It appears that Handoff has been hidden/disabled in DP4.

Edit: I saw the toggle in previous builds, but do not see it in Settings > General now. I'm on a mid-2011 MBA with the requisite LMP. Not sure why it isn't showing the option?
Click to expand...

They removed it in DP3 for the mid-2011 MBA, which I also have.
 
S

Serban

Suspended
Jan 8, 2013
5,159
928
I have both iphone and ipad connected to 2.4 ghz and the macs because they have wifi ac i have them connected to 5ghz to my time capsule and hand off works phone calls sms etc
 
Donfor39

Donfor39

macrumors 68000
Jul 26, 2012
1,896
371
Lanarkshire Scotland
Ive never been able to get bluetooth working via iPhone os7 +mcbpro -mavericks/now Yosemite beta

Why doesn't my phone pair with macbook when the pairing code is confirmed it says connected for 2-3 secs then disconnected:mad:
 
DarkCole

DarkCole

macrumors 6502a
Jul 21, 2013
506
925
I can somewhat get the calling to work on my mac. I can hear the other person but they can't hear me.

Edit: I'm stupid thought I had bluetooth on but I didn't

Thanks to the OP for this guide :)
 
Last edited:
L

langscinema

macrumors member
Jun 5, 2014
50
0
Serban said:
I have both iphone and ipad connected to 2.4 ghz and the macs because they have wifi ac i have them connected to 5ghz to my time capsule and hand off works phone calls sms etc
Click to expand...

when you say handoff, sms, etc work........do you mean on every one of your devices or just certain devices
 
0

0970373

Suspended
Mar 15, 2008
2,727
1,412
tooshaggy said:
In the seed notes for DP4 the SMS messaging is disabled. It worked for the previous builds but is broken for this build.
The handoff toggle is still in System Prefs> General, near the bottom.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I lost SMS when I upgraded to DP4. Calls still work though.
 
menano

menano

macrumors regular
Jun 7, 2011
127
37
Neverland
Is there any feature of this at all that somehow doesn't require iOS8? Because I got the public os x beta and don't have access to iOS8 as a non-dev
 
menano

menano

macrumors regular
Jun 7, 2011
127
37
Neverland
proshots4you said:
There may be some features that work but continuity and handoff defintely will not
Click to expand...

Yeah thanks, I meant features within continuity, like calls or sms. It would be possible to make it available since the account is already connected to the phone but apparently not. Thanks gain!
 
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