I'm building an app that relies on waking up and notifying the user when an iBeacon is detected and have discovered some really strange behaviour.

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On iOS15, when a user has AirPods paired to their device and the AirPods are set to connect Automatically the device will not reliably receive notifications that the iBeacon is in range.

The reliability is very sporadic when set to Automatically. The user will have good days with reliable events or go ~10-120 minutes where their phone doesn't detect the beacon at all.

The setting is located under Settings -> Bluetooth -> Airpods -> Connect to this Phone

If set to When last connected to this phone the beacon events are received consistently.

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For context:

• I've implemented the workaround to the prewarming bug described on this post
• I've only managed to reproduce on iOS15 so far
• I only use beacon region monitoring
• Range is not the issue. This occurs anywhere between standing next to the beacon and at the edge of signal limits.

Has anybody else experience this issue and/or have a programmatic workaround?

I'd rather not have to instruct users to change their AirPod settings!