System Turn On or Off Nearby Sharing in Windows 11

This tutorial will show you how to turn on or off nearby sharing for your account in Windows 11.

Nearby sharing in Windows lets you share documents, photos, links to websites, and more with nearby devices by using Bluetooth or Wi-Fi.

You can choose to turn on nearby sharing for My devices only or Everyone nearby.

If you choose Everyone nearby, the Bluetooth MAC address and name of your PC are made available to other devices around you so you can share with other PCs nearby. This info could be used to link your PC to you.

To use nearby sharing, both PCs—the one you’re sharing from and the one you're sharing to—must have:

• Nearby sharing turned on.
• Bluetooth 4.0 (or later) and must be running Windows 11 or Windows 10 (version 1803 or later).

References:

Starting with Windows 11 build 22622.436 and build 25163, the discovery of devices under nearby share when sharing a local file from the desktop, File Explorer, Photos, Snipping Tool, Xbox, and other apps that use the built-in Windows share window has been enhanced by using UDP (Network needs to be set to private) along with Bluetooth to discover nearby devices. You will now be able to discover and share to more devices including desktop PCs. When sharing a local file from the desktop, File Explorer, Photos, Snipping Tool, Xbox, and other apps that use the built-in Windows share window, you can choose OneDrive as a target to directly upload the file to OneDrive and share it further along with access control options. All this can be done right from sharing local files in File Explorer without any context switches or opening the OneDrive app.

Starting with Windows 11 build 22631.3374, affects how Nearby Share turns on and off. You can use quick settings or the Settings app to turn on Nearby Share. If you do and Wi-Fi and Bluetooth are off, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth will turn on to make Nearby Share work as you expect. If you turn off Wi-Fi or Bluetooth, Nearby Share turns off as well.

Starting with Windows 11 build 22635.3720 (Beta), if you are in China and turn on nearby sharing, you will receive a notification asking to allow turning on Wi-Fi and or Bluetooth should these settings be off as Wi-Fi and Bluetooth are required to be enabled for nearby sharing to work.




EXAMPLE: Nearby Sharing

This will turn on nearby sharing for Everyone nearby.

Starting with Windows 11 version 22H2 KB5030310 Build 22621.2361, instead of a dropdown menu in the Windows share window, there is a button to turn on nearby sharing.

1 Right click on the file(s) you want to share, and click/tap on Share. (see screenshot below)


2 Click/tap on the Turn on button under Nearby Share. (see screenshot below)






1 Open Quick Settings (Win+A).

2 Click/tap on the Nearby sharing quick setting button to toggle On or Off (default) for what you want. (see screenshots below)

On will be for My devices only or Everyone nearby depending on what you have set in nearby sharing settings.

1 Open Settings (Win+I).

2 Click/tap on System on the left side, and click/tap on Nearby sharing on the right side. (see screenshot below)



3 Under Nearby sharing, select Off (default), My devices only, My Family, or Everyone nearby for what you want. (see screenshot below)


4 You can now close Settings if you like.





1 Do step 2 (on - Everyone nearby), step 3 (on - My devices only), step 4 (on - My Family), or step 5 (off) below for what you want.





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This is the default setting.

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6 Save the REG file to your desktop.

7 Double click/tap on the downloaded REG file to merge it.

8 When prompted, click/tap on Run, Yes (UAC), Yes, and OK to approve the merge.

9 Either restart explorer process, sign out and sign in, or restart the computer to apply.

10 You can now delete the downloaded REG file if you like.


That's it,
Shawn Brink