How to Manage Mobile Devices and Phone Link in Windows 11 Bluetooth Settings

Bluetooth Pairing vs. Phone Link: What’s the Difference

Windows 11 uses two separate systems for phones, and mixing them up is the most common source of confusion:

• Bluetooth 🔷 pairing connects your phone to your PC for audio, file transfer, and notification mirroring over a short-range radio link. This is the same pairing process you’d use for headphones or a mouse.
• Phone Link (formerly called Your Phone) is a Microsoft app that mirrors your phone’s screen, texts, calls, and notifications over Wi-Fi 📶, using your Microsoft account to link the two devices. It doesn’t require Bluetooth 🔷 to function. Windows surfaces its setup inside the Bluetooth & devices page because most people set both up around the same time.

You can have one without the other. A phone can be Bluetooth 🔷-paired for audio only, or linked through Phone Link with no Bluetooth pairing at all. The steps below handle both.

Where to Find Mobile Devices Settings in 🪟 Windows 11

1. Open Settings by pressing Win+I.

   

2. Select Bluetooth 🔷 & devices in the left-hand navigation pane. You’ll see your Bluetooth 🔷 toggle at the top, a list of paired devices below it, and a Mobile devices entry further down the page.

   

3. Select Mobile devices to open that page. This is where the Allow this PC to access your mobile devices toggle lives, along with a dropdown to pick which phone Windows treats as your “linked” device and a Manage devices link that opens Phone Link.

If you don’t see a Mobile devices section at all, your version of Windows 11 may not have it enabled, or Phone Link has been uninstalled. Check Settings > Apps > Installed apps and search for Phone Link. If it’s missing, reinstall it from the Microsoft Store before continuing.

How to Pair a New Phone Over Bluetooth

Do this if you want audio streaming, file sharing, or notification mirroring over Bluetooth specifically — not the full Phone Link screen-mirroring experience.

1. On your phone, turn on Bluetooth and make it discoverable. The exact menu depends on your phone's operating system, but it's usually under Settings › Connections or Settings › Bluetooth
2. On your PC, go to Settings > Bluetooth & devices and confirm the Bluetooth toggle at the top is turned on.

   

3. Select Add device. A window titled Add a device opens with four options: Bluetooth, Wireless display or dock, Everything else, and NFC.

   

4. Select Bluetooth. Windows scans for nearby discoverable devices and lists them by name.
5. Select your phone's name from the list. Windows shows a pairing code on both the PC and the phone screen.
6. Confirm the codes match on both devices, then select Connect on the PC and accept the pairing request on the phone. Your phone now appears in the device list on the Bluetooth & devices page with a status of Connected.

If your phone doesn't show up, move it closer to the PC — Bluetooth range drops quickly through walls and furniture. Also make sure another computer nearby hasn't already paired with it, since some phones only advertise themselves to one device at a time.

How to Set Up Phone Link from the Bluetooth & Devices Page

This links your phone for screen mirroring, texts, calls, and notification access, using your Microsoft account rather than Bluetooth pairing.

1. Go to Settings > Bluetooth & devices > Mobile devices.

   

2. Turn on Allow this PC to access your mobile devices if it isn't already on. This toggle has to be enabled before Phone Link can mirror anything from your phone.
3. Select Manage devices. This opens the Phone Link app, or a Microsoft Store prompt to install it if it isn't on your PC yet.

   

4. Follow the on-screen setup in Phone Link: sign in with the same Microsoft account on your PC and phone, scan the QR code with your phone's camera, and grant the notification, contacts, and phone permissions it asks for on Android. iPhone users get a reduced feature set — calls and messages work, but full screen mirroring is Android-only.
5. Return to Bluetooth & devices > Mobile devices. Your phone now appears in the device dropdown as your linked device.

If setup hangs on the QR scan step, switch both devices to the same home network and try again.

Managing an Already-Connected Mobile Device

1. Open Settings > Bluetooth & devices.

   

2. Find your phone in the device list and select it, or select the three-dot menu next to its name.
3. Choose what you need from the options shown: Disconnect to break the Bluetooth link without removing the pairing, or select the device to see toggles for which services it's allowed to use — things like audio, contact sharing, or notification mirroring, depending on what your phone supports.

For Phone Link specifically, notification and messaging permissions are managed inside the Phone Link app itself, not the Bluetooth & devices page — go to Phone Link's own Settings if you want to turn off, say, text message mirroring while keeping calls active.

How to Remove or Forget a Mobile Device

You'll need to pair it again from scratch if you want to reconnect it later, so do this only if the device is genuinely no longer needed or is causing connection problems.

1. Go to Settings > Bluetooth & devices.
2. Find the phone in the list under your paired devices.
3. Select the three-dot menu next to it and choose Remove device.
4. Confirm the removal when Windows asks. The device disappears from the list immediately.

To remove a phone from Phone Link without touching its Bluetooth pairing, open the Phone Link app, go to its settings, and look for an option to unlink or sign out of the device — this is separate from the Bluetooth removal above and won't affect audio or file-sharing pairing.

Fixing a Device That Shows "Connected" But Isn't Actually Working

A common problem: the Bluetooth icon in your taskbar shows a device as connected, but opening it shows "Not connected," or Phone Link says the phone is offline even though Bluetooth looks fine. This usually means the pairing itself is still active, but something higher up the chain — audio streaming, Phone Link's connection, or Windows' Bluetooth support — has stalled.

1. Toggle Bluetooth off and back on from Settings > Bluetooth & devices, or from the quick settings flyout by clicking the network/sound icons in the taskbar. Wait about 10 seconds between turning it off and back on.
2. If that doesn't fix it, run the built-in troubleshooter: go to Settings > System > Troubleshoot > Other troubleshooters, then select Run next to Bluetooth. It checks for driver issues and stalled services automatically and reports what it fixed.
3. If the troubleshooter finds nothing, remove the device using the steps above and pair it again from scratch. A stale pairing that's out of sync between the phone and PC is a frequent cause of this exact symptom, and re-pairing resolves it more often than restarting.
4. If it still misbehaves, restart the PC. Bluetooth stack issues in Windows sometimes only clear with a full reboot, not just a service restart — this is a case where a restart genuinely fixes something a toggle won't.

Why Mobile Device Options Might Be Greyed Out

A few conditions block access to these settings entirely, and it's worth checking these before assuming something is broken:

• Airplane mode is on. Check quick settings in the taskbar — airplane mode disables Bluetooth along with Wi-Fi and greys out the toggle in Bluetooth & devices.
• No Bluetooth hardware or driver. If your PC has no Bluetooth adapter, or the driver failed to load, the entire Bluetooth toggle is missing or stuck off. Check Device Manager under Bluetooth for a yellow warning icon, which points to a driver problem rather than a settings problem.
• Managed device restrictions. On a work or school PC managed by an organization, an administrator can block Bluetooth or Phone Link through policy. If the toggles are greyed out and you're on a managed device, this is almost certainly the cause — contact your IT department rather than trying to work around it.
• Phone Link isn't signed in. The Mobile devices toggle can be on, but if you haven't signed into Phone Link with a Microsoft account, the Manage devices button just relaunches the sign-in flow instead of showing device options.

Turning Off Mobile Device Access Without Removing Pairings

If you want to stop Phone Link from accessing your phone temporarily — say, before lending the PC to someone else — you don't need to remove anything.

1. Go to Settings > Bluetooth & devices > Mobile devices.
2. Turn off Allow this PC to access your mobile devices. Phone Link stops syncing immediately, but your Bluetooth pairing and Phone Link account link both stay intact.
3. Turn the toggle back on later to resume exactly where you left off, with no need to re-pair or re-link anything.

What to Do Next

If your phone still won't stay connected after re-pairing and a restart, check for a Bluetooth driver update through Windows Update or your PC manufacturer's support site — outdated Bluetooth drivers are behind a lot of intermittent disconnects that settings changes alone won't fix. From here, it's also worth reviewing your notification and privacy permissions inside Phone Link itself, since screen mirroring and message access are controlled there rather than in Bluetooth & devices. If you manage a work PC and these options are locked down by policy, your next step is a conversation with IT rather than more troubleshooting on your end.