You are currently browsing comments. If you would like to return to the full story, you can read the full entry here: “How to Reset an Apple Wireless Bluetooth Keyboard, Mouse or Trackpad (Troubleshooting Pairing and Other Common Problems)”.
Travelling Through Life
You are currently browsing comments. If you would like to return to the full story, you can read the full entry here: “How to Reset an Apple Wireless Bluetooth Keyboard, Mouse or Trackpad (Troubleshooting Pairing and Other Common Problems)”.
it does not work
I found it does work to hold the power button down as directed.
I tried every possible recommended fix and nothing worked UNTIL I performed the ‘hold the power button’ fix Dave suggested. THIS WORKS!!
Bottom line – one fix does not fit all! Keep trying and get the right fix for your problem. After a week of trying everything, my trackpad is back up and running! Yeah!!!
Greg
Thanks so much Dave. You have saved my sanity. The keyboard is once more connected to the iMac after having been used with my iPad. I haven’t had this problem before when using the wireless keyboard with either device.Time for aspirin and a lie down in a darkened room to recover!!! Many, many thanks again.
What button on a wireless apple keyboard is the power button. All I did was change the bat tiers out on my keyboard and it won’t connect to my apple keyboard?
The power button is on the opposite end of the keyboard from the battery compartment.
Hi when I am typing the somehow the cursor or place i am typing jumps to mid sentence or other random place and therefore sentences dont make sense. what could be the remedy for this?
Is this on a Bluetooth keyboard? On a Macbook its not uncommon to touch the trackpad whilst typing, which can cause the cursor position to move on screen. But for a Bluetooth keyboard where you aren’t likely to touch the trackpad if its nearby, it shouldn’t be related to the keyboard.
aha! I will try to move trackpad away…that indeed might be the problem
Woohoo. Thank you both very much!
Bless you! After diddling away several hours, trying and failing at every other published solution, yours worked in an instant. Many thanks.
Thanks Dave! Fixed my problem with Apple bluetooth keyboard not pairing after updating to El Capitan. I’d tried PRAM reset, SMC reset, turning everything on and off etc. This tip did the trick.
Agree — thanks for the tip. Worked exactly as described.
Dave, THANK YOU!!
Random keys on my apple wireless keyboard stopped working all of a sudden, a couple of months back. Tried everything, searched every nook and corner of the interwebs and couldn’t find a solution. Ruled it out as hardware issue/fried chipset and gave up.
Came across this post and thought I would just give it a whirl. Held the power button for a while and that did the trick ! Works flawlessly.
Thank you very much !
THANK YOU!!!! I was going crazy trying to fix my keyboard and thought I’d have to buy a new one. Thank you for helping me!!
Me too! Tried for 2 days and finally found this blog… You rock!
This worked, but only after I uninstalled USB Overdrive. I found another support forum where someone suggested that USB Overdrive could interfere with the pairing of a magic trackpad. I uninstalled USB Overdrive and then followed the instructions here…finally, a successful pairing! Thank you for pointing me in the right direction. I would have returned the trackpad out of sheer frustration!
Thank you so much….It works as directed. You saved me a few hours of frustration.
Wonderful! It would not pair. Your tips worked; thanks!
I have a macbook pro and a mac mini. I have two bluetooth keyboards, one for each. The macbook had problems with it’s keyboard(1), which (the keyboard) is a little older, so I decided to swap them. Since my mac mini is also a little older. I deleted the keyboard(1) from the device list of the macbook pro. (also did this with the mac mini and it’s keyboard(2)). I connected the older keyboard(1) to the mac mini and the newer keyboard(2) to the mac book pro. worked fine for 2 months. Today was a glitch. Keyboard(1) is supposed to be connected to the mac mini, but keeps connecting back to the macbook pro. This keyboard isn’t even listed in the devices under the preferences, but is listed as connected in the bluetooth menu bar. I want to delete the Keyboard(1) from the macbook pro, but how can I when It’s not listed as a device in the BT preferences. Help!
My problem is how to put in your password when the keyboard is not connecting
If the keyboard is not connecting after rebooting you may need to borrow a wired USB keyboard.
I overcame this by borrowing my next door neighbour’s wired mouse and keyboard to turn bluetooth on again and pair my mouse and keyboard. Bit of a fag though and I bet my neighbour is getting fed up with me. I still have the problem that bluetooth turns off every time I shut down the computer and so no mouse or keyboard until I go next door and grovel……………
I tried every combination of these tips and tricks….but nothin’ worked for me.
I followed the notes here perfectly…not fixed at all.
I’ve almost busted a finger holding in the power button….so frustrating!!!!
Keyboard just will not pair or be discoverable!!!
It may be an issue inside the iMac??!!
Same for me. Do not have access to the original paired machine. Have followed the directions diligently, religiously, carelessly and without any regards to any religious faith. Holding down the power bottom does at least make my Apple keyboard discoverable but no matter how long I hold down the power button it simply will not pair. It just eventually gives me the dreaded warning exclamation mark inside a triangle telling me that it could not pair. Have tried new batteries, no batteries, steam powered batteries, solar batteries and assault and batteries. Nope! Would love to know if there is another way. Thanks to all who have given their advice in an effort to help. Much appreciated.
Sorry to hear thats not working for you. If the machine you thought it used to be paired to is really no longer there, then it can’t be interfering. Are you sure there are no other Apple devices (or non-Apple for that matter) in the vicinity that it might ever have been paired with? It might be reconnecting to those and denying the new pairing. Frustrating I know, but that tends to be what it turns out to be.
Any ideas on how to make a mouse or keyboard forget other devices? I had my mouse paired with an android tablet, and have since forgotten it on the tablet, and I keep getting notifications about it wanting to pair with the tablet again when I reboot my mini into Windows.
Holding power button just worked for me!!! I installed the “Mobee” charging bar and was prepared to return it after reading here about recharging batteries issues but seems to work fine now. Thank you
it worked for me after struggling all afternoon with other methods – thank you Mr Meehan
Thanks for the helpful tip. I had paired my Apple keyboard with Apple TV, and this process released it and allowed me to pair with other devices. Very helpful.
Dave in Canada
My apple keyboard wasn’t working and because of your suggestions it is now working. Thank you si much Dave, you’re a genius!!!
Hi I have a magic keyboard for my Mac and I’m now on my second one. For some reason the 789U I OJKLM. keys will not work, the rest of the keyboard works fine. Same problem with both keyboards. Mac is one year old
Gone into system preferences and keyboard shows as being connected and fully charged. Have also checked input sources and text tabs and all seems fine
Dave, that totally worked. Cheers.
This works! At last a solution! Thank you
Thank you so much, Dave. The first and only guide that works for me. Easy to understand. Why is it not printed in Apple’s Bluetooth manuals. Would make life much easier for a lot of people.
Awesome! Thank you!!
Thanks so much! I thought my keyboard was toast, but it just needed a reset. Nice that Apple left this tip off their troubleshooting page 😛
Thank you! This helped a lot.
To reset the wireless b;luetooth apple mouse. I held it upside down and held the click down. then power it one. And it works – so yes it works for mice too.. Thanks for the tip
Thanks! worked for me too!
hurrah! thank you 🙂
This solution does not represent the title. This is not resetting the keyboard, or mouse, or trackpad. Does anyone actually know how to reset these devices? My keyboard consistently connects to a different computer than the one I would like to use it on. The solution provided here does not resolve this.
Brett, thanks for the feedback but the title is accurate. These instructions reset the device. In your instance, you need to tell OS X to forget the Bluetooth device so it won’t auto connect to it. Once paired, the device should reconnect to the last machine, but due to signal issues it can connect to any paired device in range.
Go to Bluetooth preferences on the machine you don’t want it to connect to and remove the device from the list. If you do in future want to connect to that machine, you’ll need to re-pair.
Thank you for your response, but I respectfully disagree. These instructions do not reset the bluetooth device, but seem to allow a device to pair when having some kind of difficulty. My situation is different. I work in an environment where there are dozens of Mac computers and I have no idea which this device is actually paired to. It would be very difficult, at best, to allow it to connect and then go to each computer to see if it is the offending one. Using your instructions, my keyboard continued to connect to the wrong computer. I need a way to totally and completely reset the keyboard so that it does not maintain any of its previous pairing information.
Thanks again for your considerate reply and extra detail. I think this comes down to whether you think its the keyboard or the Mac that is remembering the pairing. I think you will find that its the Mac that remembers – the device just presents itself.
When pairing a keyboard, the Mac proposes a passcode that is entered on the keyboard, but the keyboard just uses that to provide verification that it is the same physical keyboard that requested the pairing (not another within the vicinity). The Mac then records the fact that a device with a particular hardware ID is paired so that it doesn’t need to ask again.
If you look at the Apple Support article on Bluetooth pairing (http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1809) and look in the section ‘Pairing you Apple Wireless Keyboard with another Mac’, you’ll see that it notes that you must unpair with the original machine if it is within 10 metres before pairing with the new machine. If you do not do this, it will be arbitrary which Mac makes a connection at the next attempt (although the support doc actually say that it is my experience).
The instructions in my article do correctly represent how to reset the bluetooth device, although in reality there is little that this seems to achieve but it does seem to be necessary to overcome certain issues when connection cannot be established. The keyboards do seem to remember something about the last paired machine, which only may be to allow it to make a quicker connection when that machine starts announces its presence. But whatever it remembers it can cause it to have problems connecting later.
Your problem seems to be that you either have a keyboard that is not connecting to the desired machine (and should therefore be reset), or that there is another Mac nearby that it is connecting to out of chance or by choice. By identifying which machine has the erroneous pairing and removing it from the Bluetooth settings, you should be able to keep your keyboard connecting to the desired system.
I hope this info help you, I know that Bluetooth issues can be extremely frustrating because most Bluetooth devices have no ‘user interface’ other than a status LED which is usually less than helpful when you have problems (particularly with Apple devices!)
If you do find that this info is not helpful, please feel free to post your comments with some explanation or alternative solutions so as to help others. This post gets over 2,000 hits per month so this is no doubt a common cause for concern.
Brett,
Why don’t you take the keyboard and the computer you want to pair it with 100 yards away from all the other computers – then you can be sure the keyboard cannot communicate with any of those other computers.
Dave,
Thank you for your painstaking efforts to explain this topic to us all.
Brett, one solution is to put all the Macs asleep and then press a key on the keyboard. That will wake up the offending Mac. Another option:
Press Command+Shift+A and that will open Applications on the offending Mac.
Just in case someone comes across this and are wondering the same thing seven months later – actually my problem was having to reset the keyboard. Thanks to this web page, I knew to uninstall the keyboard on BOTH my computers, install new batteries, and then do as Dave suggested. It worked all because I had to reset the keyboard. Thank you!
I’m not sure this author knows the difference between a reset of the keyboard and a repairing of bluetooth…a reset is what you do when you set it back to factory specs, say after you changed the default language.
Shawn, thanks for the reply. It’s not possible to change the language of the keyboard – you can change the input source which correlates with the physical keyboard layout (i.e. position of certain letters and symbols, which varies from country to country). That isn’t a function of the keyboard though, its a function of OS X. The keyboard isn’t aware, or care, about how the OS interpret the keypresses. So these instructions are accurate for resetting a keyboard, and do not cover changing input sources in OS X.
I was having the same problem of not being able to pair my iPad with my Apple wireless keayboard too that I had already paired with it. I couldn’t firgure out for the longest time why my iPad couldn’t see the keyboard anylonger. Then it hit me, I had paired it with my Apple TV and that had canceled out the iPad. As soon as I “Forget” the device it worked on the iPad again. I hope this helps.
Okay. We must need the blog titled “how to Hard reset apple keyboard to factory defaults”. Dave, maybe you have a link? This blog wouldn’t get 2000 hits per month if the title read ‘How to pair a apple device with a mac’, as it should be. I don’t have a mac, any help for PC/Android users? Perhaps leaving the batteries out for 5 mins will HARD reset the keyboard. Maybe if we type the word ‘reset’ 3 times and turn it upside down. Oh. I’m so silly. I’m sure if I take it to the Apple store they’ll give me a fresh one.
Sorry that you and a few others don’t seem to get the solution you want from this article. Perhaps if you try Googling for that article title suggestion you’ll have better luck, as this page doesn’t appear in the search results.
Dave, your article is very helpful and appreciated. And I only found it because I added “reset” to my search query. However, if there exists a true way to factory reset an Apple Keyboard or Mouse it’d be much appreciated. In my case, I’ve got a used mouse (from Goodwill) and a hand-me-down keyboard, both Apple Wireless variety. They work great with GNU/Linux, but there’s one little problem. Somehow, Apple has embedded into the devices the names of the previous owners. I’ve left the batteries out for days, and they still remember, so it’s some sort of flash memory. I know how to make a bluetooth alias so that it looks like the device has a different name on my computer, but no magic I’ve found actually clears the names from the hardware’s memory. I know, not a big deal, but it’s an annoyance that would be fixed if we could do a genuine factory reset.
Thank you so much!!!!
Thanks to you I’m typing this message from my wireless keyboard after hours of trying to reconnect it to my computer. You rock! Thanks!!
Thank you, you saved me!
Thanks for this. Also worked to fix connection issue with a 1st gen iPad. Had been connected fine in the past, but along the way the Bluetooth connections seem to get corrupted. For the iPad, the only difference in instructions is to click on the iPad’s Settings icon (the grey ‘gear’ symbol), then click on ‘Bluetooth,’ (make sure bluetooth is on, btw). There is no “set up bluetooth device” selection, just a list of currently or previously connected devices. Likely your Apple Keyboard may not be evident here. If it is, you may want to click on arrow to the right and select “Forget this Device” in the menu that opens if you’ve been unable to connect. Then, do as instructed here, hold down power button continuously on keyboard that has been shut off. The keyboard should now appear on list, (on mine it shows in black type whereas other devices appear in blue type.) After you select it, there will not be a “Continue” command, but pairing window should just appear. OK now to let go of button, enter the pairing code, and it shoud show “Connected” to the right of the Apple Keyboard device on list. It may say, “So-&-so’s Keyboard” with your name unless it’s a brand new keyboard. Thanks.
tks SO MUCH for this! was going nuts trying to figure this out & then my husband came across your article and fixed it on the spot… thank you!!
Nice. Work 🙂 Thanks!
Thank You! The instruction worked perfectly with my wireless keyboard.
My husband and I tried everything we could think of, even things I read in the “iMac for Dummies” (I’m not very computer-savy)! Nothing was working, tried new batteries, found the power button on the keyboard, etc. For 2 weeks, I couldn’t really use my computer, just my phone. In desperation, I kept trying ideas from websites–and finally found yours on my phone. I tried it 4 or 5 times trying to type in the code, as my keyboard finally was recognized. Then the computer said it didn’t connect– until my husband restarted the computer. Wow! It worked, and I am using it now. Thank you!