up vote 69 down vote favorite
25

I just can't figure a way to change my Bluetooth device name.

Is there any command?

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Defect: Cannot change bluetooth name – AlikElzin-kilaka Mar 5 '17 at 11:45
up vote 62 down vote accepted

You can't change bluetooth device name from control panel in ubuntu yet. Here is the bug report, which provides this workaround:

If you want to change the bluetooth device name permanently, you have to create a file called /etc/machine-info which should have the following content:

PRETTY_HOSTNAME=device-name

After this, restart the Bluetooth service:

sudo service bluetooth restart

Or reboot.

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No need to restart. service bluetooth restart does the trick. – arunasr Oct 21 '14 at 15:23
    
Still working on 15.04, thanks! – phaberest Aug 17 '15 at 10:34
up vote 0 down vote 
sudo apt-get update; sudo apt-get install -y nano
sudo nano /var/lib/bluetooth/*/config
sudo service bluetooth restart

Update the value for “name”. In my case, it was: Ubuntu-0

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This answer provides the same solution as many others, but with much less detail. – TheWanderer Mar 17 '16 at 18:12
up vote 3 down vote

You can change the Bluetooth of your PC just by:

  1. opening the Terminal an type:

    sudo gedit /var/lib/bluetooth/XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX/config

  2. if it asks for the password, type it (you won't see it)

  3. the gedit will open up with that file.

  4. on the line that begins with "name" replace the name itself. It will not be instantaneous! You'll have to restart the service (or the PC). Do it by typing:

    sudo service bluetooth restart

It worked for me.

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1  
If your adapter has an alias, also edit /var/lib/bluetooth/XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX/settings, and change that. – Mr. B Jun 20 '16 at 22:30
up vote 4 down vote

To change the bluetooth host name permanently, on Ubuntu 14.04 or later:

Open a terminal with CTRL-ALT-T

  1. Edit /etc/bluetooth/main.conf replacing "%h" with the computer name you want. "%h" always seems to represent "ubuntu" on my systems for some reason.

    gksudo gedit /etc/bluetooth/main.conf

    For example change Name = %h-%d to Name = gruber-%d `

  2. Remove /var/lib/bluetooth/xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx/config to make your system forget the old name. The xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx has a hexadecimal value unique to your bluetooth hardware.

    sudo rm /var/lib/bluetooth/xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx/config

  3. Restart the bluetooth service

    sudo service bluetooth restart

    (Under 15.04 or later:)

    sudo systemctl restart bluetooth.service

You can check the new name by opening the Bluetooth settings. The last two steps are from Marx's answer.

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This is my preferred answer, but rather than delete the config file I would rather edit it, as in dreis nineoneone's answer. Incidentally, the service command still works in 15.04. – AFH Dec 6 '15 at 16:01
up vote 4 down vote

I am using Blueman Bluetooth Manager. There is an option to change a computer's BT name in:

Adapter → Parameters

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Thank you very much! This is more like the Ubuntu-way ( more user-friendly ;-) than other answers, and the latest version 1.23 has this feature via menu Adapter → Preferences → Friendly Name. Further info: github.com/blueman-project/blueman – Sadi Sep 21 '14 at 8:02
up vote 19 down vote

What I did (on 12.04):

  1. device name is stored in /var/lib/bluetooth/XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX/config
  2. delete it
  3. restart (~# service bluetooth restart)
  4. device name is rewritten in config (according to /etc/bluetooth/main.conf ?)
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If you don't like the bluetooth version of the device name, i.e. hostname-0, you can replace the line "Name = %h – %d" to simply "Name = %h" in step 4 above, which will get rid of the numbering suffix, as I just did in 13.04. – Sadi Jul 10 '13 at 17:31
    
this works on 15.04 – Mark Jun 17 '15 at 14:27
up vote 75 down vote

It seems the option was removed from the Bluetooth control panel, but you should still be able to change the name via the command line:

sudo hciconfig hci0 name 'Device Name'

Once you run the command, you should be able to verify the change by bringing up the Bluetooth control panel again and checking the device name.

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Useful Answer! Helped Me Thank You Very Much! :) – Gaurav Nov 19 '12 at 15:24
    
this is the safest and right way to do it, thx! – Aquarius Power Oct 1 '13 at 16:40
6  
This should be the accepted answer. – Naftuli Kay Mar 27 '14 at 18:07
3  
It works, but the name is reset after reboot. I use Ubuntu 14.04. Can it be set permanently? – BornToCode Sep 4 '14 at 2:49
4  
As @BornToCode points out, the change doesn't persist. Restarting the service with service bluetooth restart will show that the name change is reverted. – Paul Lammertsma Jan 22 '15 at 0:40

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