Windows 11 | No Hands free mode for bluetooth earphones

This is NOT an issue to be resolved by the manufacturer of the bluetooth headphones. I have 3 different models of bluetooth headphones from 3 different manufacturers. ALL of them have this issue where there is NO hands free option and in Teams if you don't select the same bluetooth device for Speaker and Microphone you get NO sound and you can't hear the person on the other end. Kinda sucks to have an expensive Yeti microphone and I can't use it.

I am a sysadmin that is trying to resolve this issue for more than just myself. I have 2 identical Lenovo P15 laptops, one running Windows 10 21H1 and one running Windows 11 21H2. All my bluetooth headphones work perfectly with Windows 10 but NOT with Windows 11. I have fought bluetooth issues with Windows 11 since the beginning of testing the very earliest beta version. Updating and rolling back bluetooth drivers does not work. Uninstalling and letting the driver get reinstalled does not work. This is a Windows 11 problem between bluetooth and sound and Teams.

Hi,

Got some interesting information when I listed down all the PnP devices using Powershell.

It seems my Hands-Free mode is detected but is in Unknown state.

Thanks,

Kartikey

Hi RottweilerX,

I agree with you that bluetooth is a completely different technology than Windows.

The reason I posted this here is that the bluetooth modes were working fine on Windows 10.

As soon as I upgraded to Windows 11 on the same laptop the Headset (for video-conferencing) mode is no longer visible.

I'm using the same earphones and the same laptop, the only thing that changed was upgrading to Windows 11.

This makes me believe that the issue is due to Windows 11 OR I need to do something else to get this working in Windows 11 which apparently I cannot find anywhere online.

Thanks,

Kartikey

Following up to my earlier post. This is an issue that Microsoft MUST address. This only happens with bluetooth headphones or earbuds when trying to use an alternate microphone. You CANNOT choose an external microphone such as a Blue Yeti or a microphone on a webcam when using bluetooth headphones or earbuds. You will not be able to hear the parties you are talking to in Teams. It worked perfectly in Windows 10 mixing and matching microphones and speakers/headphones. Unfortunately I can't go back to Windows 10 as a CIO of the company I work for. I have to continue testing Windows 11 and so far I am not allowing any of my users to upgrade. This is NOT a small issue Microsoft. Get off your duffs and fix it.

Long Post.
TL;DR at the bottom.

I don't need or want Hands-Free mode.
I use Discord which works great without it.
Also, my friends and I are always watching screen-shared videos, so the quality drop of Hands-Free mode is just unusable.
In Windows 10, I just disabled the Hands-Free device right after pairing any new BT device.

Based on this thread, I can see some people want or even need Hands-Free mode for some applications.
So I can see it's important for users have access to both.

As Windows 11 has proven, it NEEDS to be an option people have access to.
And as @logularjason's post shows, this option kind of exists.

I have to be honest and say that while this did help me get further in solving the issue, things did not go as expected.
I'm going to be as thorough and transparent as possible in case this helps someone else out.

So if you're having this issue, you're on Windows 11, so follow @logularjason's directions:
Settings -> Bluetooth & Devices -> Devices -> More devices and settings -> WH-1000XM4 -> Services

If you can't find it, try this:
Settings -> Bluetooth & Devices -> Devices -> More devices and printer settings -> Right-Click your bluetooth device -> Properties -> Services

I unchecked Hands-free telephony
I also unchecked Remote Control and Remotely Controlled Device, but that was personal preference and may or may not affect your results.

I was (probably stupidly) in a Discord call while testing this, so after making this change, my BT earbuds just stopped working.
I restarted my PC, hopped back into my Discord call, and it worked.
I pulled up a YT video to see if it was still giving me the terrible sounding Hands-Free (call) audio, and there was NO audio!
So I clicked on the audio symbol on the taskbar to look at my audio devices and BEHOLD, two devices:

• Headphones
• Headphones (Hands-free)

I changed my PC's device to the non-hands-free device.
I went into Discord settings and changed my output device to the non-hands-free device.
Everything was great... except for a small problem and a BIG problem.

Small problem:
I went back into the settings, and Handsfree Telephony is checked again...
Also, so were the "Remote Control and Remotely Controlled Device" options.
I was scared to mess with the Handsfree Telephony setting again, in case it broke things again.
But I did disable the other two again.

Big problem:
While I initially thought this solved my problem, I realized that while it did split the Audio (output) devices back to two devices (HF and non-HF), it DID NOT do that for the mic (input) devices.
The only Mic option is "Headset (hands-free)".
And the moment I switched my mic (input) device from the terrible laptop built-in mic back to the Headset (hands-free), my audio went back to garbage quality.
If I remember correctly, the same thing happened in Win10 if I tried to use the non-hands-free output device and the hands-free mic at the same time.
It basically seems like the device can either be used in one mode or the other.
So to fully fix this, it seems I'm going to need to find a way to split the mic into two devices as well.

Before anyone says it's just the device (there were a lot off those earlier in the thread), this was ENTIRELY possible in Windows 10.
I had these earbuds, a USB Headset that used a 2.4Ghz connection (instead of BT), and a Wired Mic.
I had the HF versions of these BT earbuds disabled and swapped between each of the input and outputs on my devices at-will.
I had zero problems in Windows 10.

Microsoft NEEDS to give us these settings again, and if like @logularjason posted, this option is hidden away for splitting the output part of BT devices, then hopefully there's a way to do so for the mic as well.

And if anyone is thinking "just try @logularjason's fix but choose the input rather than the output device" feel free to try whatever you want, but the problem I ran into was that the screen where you select your device only shows the device as a whole, not separate mic and headphones devices.

Sorry for the long post.
TL;DR - Following @logularjason's post should allow you to actually see the separate device and Hands-Free device options, but unless someone has better luck than me, it will only do it for the output and not the input, which *might* solve the issue for people who only want to manually choose Hands-Free mode, but not for people who don't want Hands-Free mode.