iBeacon

Detect nearby Bluetooth beacons and react when people are close to a place or object.

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Introduced

2013

iOS 7

Kind

Platform feature

Runs on

Get it from

iOS

13.0+

iPadOS

13.0+

Mac Catalyst

13.1+

macOS

10.15+

tvOS

visionOS

watchOS

Overview

iBeacon is a Bluetooth Low Energy technology that lets an app know when a device is near a beacon. Each beacon advertises a UUID plus major and minor values, which an app uses to identify a store section, a museum exhibit or a café. Apple describes it as room-level proximity, not precise positioning.

Apps use Core Location in two stages: region monitoring to notice when a matching beacon is in range, which can relaunch the app, and ranging to estimate whether it is immediate, near or far. An iOS device in the foreground can also act as a beacon using Core Bluetooth.

Beacon identity

A 128-bit UUID plus 16-bit major and minor values identify each beacon.

Region monitoring

The system can launch your app when a matching beacon comes into range.

Proximity ranging

Ranging reports immediate, near or far rather than an exact distance.

Device as beacon

A foreground iOS app can advertise as a beacon using Core Bluetooth.

BeaconRanger.swift

import CoreLocation

final class BeaconRanger: NSObject, CLLocationManagerDelegate {
    let manager = CLLocationManager()

    func start(uuid: UUID) {
        manager.delegate = self
        manager.requestWhenInUseAuthorization()
        manager.startRangingBeacons(satisfying: CLBeaconIdentityConstraint(uuid: uuid))
    }

    func locationManager(_ manager: CLLocationManager, didRange beacons: [CLBeacon],
                         satisfying constraint: CLBeaconIdentityConstraint) {
        guard let nearest = beacons.first, nearest.proximity == .immediate else { return }
        print("At beacon \(nearest.major).\(nearest.minor)")
    }
}

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