ToothFairy is intended to facilitate switching between Bluetooth devices. Although it is specifically meant to work with AirPods, this utility actually supports other Bluetooth devices, such as headphones, speakers, keyboards and headsets.
If you have used USB devices on macOS, then you probably know that to connect your AirPods, for instance, you need to dig into a series of menus and submenus. What is worse, there is no visual indicator of a successful connection.
Luckily, the application is very unobtrusive and straightforward. In this respect, it solves the problem mentioned above. It is available from the Menu Bar. So, if you want to switch to a particular device, just click on its icon there. This can even be done more easily by assigning global hotkeys to connect or disconnect a device. When connected, there is a menu bar alert, which shows the name of the device as well as its current battery level.
Good news is that the tool can enhance the quality of the audio output by using the AAC codec. Moreover, you can use individual settings for each of the connected devices. This way, you can decide whether that particular device is automatically connected at login, assign the desired global hotkey and set it to show the battery status. Likewise, advanced users can automate some processes, for example, using a script to show a notification whenever the device is connected or disconnected.
All in all, ToothFairy can help you save a lot of time by allowing you to switch between USB devices without needing to go through multiple bothersome steps. It is shame, however, that there are some devices for which showing their battery level seems not to be supported. The product is available for purchase at the Mac App Store.
v2.8 [May 11, 2022]
- If a Bluetooth audio device is connected but is not selected as the sound output device—as can happen if you are using Automatic Device Switching—ToothFairy now shows its menu bar icon as solid but faded out.
- Telling ToothFairy to connect to a Bluetooth device that’s connected but not the current sound output device will now set it as the sound output device instead of disconnecting.
- ToothFairy is better at detecting when a Bluetooth device has connected or disconnected in cases where macOS did not notify it.
- ToothFairy now converts carriage returns to line breaks when saving a script, as improper line breaks can prevent scripts from running.
- Updated the “How can I turn off Automatic Device Switching?” section of the manual.
- Worked around a macOS issue where sometimes a Bluetooth audio device would connect without being set as the sound output target.
- Worked around a macOS issue where an incorrect Bluetooth device name could be shown after disconnecting and reconnecting.
- Worked around some macOS issues that could cause crashes when reading battery information or adding a new Bluetooth device.
- Fixed a bug where the spinning progress indicator would be drawn for Light Mode when the Mac was running in Light Mode but the transparent menu bar was showing a dark desktop picture underneath. ToothFairy now treats this as defacto Dark Mode to make the progress indicator easier to see and match the rest of the menu bar content.
- Fixed a bug where the progress indicator for a device icon could be drawn on top of it.
- Fixed a bug where a connection or disconnection script could be run multiple times for the same event.
- Fixed a bug where device names were prematurely truncated in the preferences table view.
If you enjoy using ToothFairy, please take a moment to rate it or leave a review. We’d really appreciate it.
