[Reason077]

The issue isn't really bandwidth - it's about the host and device agreeing on a suitable codec.

On a Mac, my Sony headphones will fall back to the SBC codec if the mic is active. Fine for voice, but music/video/gaming sounds terrible. On Android, however, they will negotiate bi-directional AptX or some similar modern codec, so the quality is much better.

[sudosysgen]

Fun fact though, on Linux you can force high-bitrate SBC on almost any headphone to get almost the same result as AptX.

[srrr]

SBC and aptX have the same quality (at the same bit rate). You are most likely talking about SBC XQ and aptX HD: http://soundexpert.org/articles/-/blogs/audio-quality-of-sbc... & https://habr.com/en/post/456182/

[sudosysgen]

Indeed, however the AptX family has other codecs that support even better quality (AptX Lossless) and lower latency as well as adaptive bitrates, so modern AptX support is still better (hence almost as good)