Is Bluetooth 4.0+ BLE?

Question

I am trying to identify which android phones support Bluetooth Low Energy and I am a bit confused on whether or not a device with BTv4.0+ is BLE compatible.

To be more precise, I am looking at the device Samsung Galaxy J5. According to http://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_galaxy_j5-7184.php, the bluetooth version is 4.1 but it doesn't mention anything about BLE.

According to the bluetooth specification: "Bluetooth Low Energy (LE) (also called Bluetooth Smart or Version 4.0+ of the Bluetooth specification) is the power- and application-friendly version of Bluetooth that was built for the Internet of Things (IoT).". According to this I would presume that 4.0+ is BLE.

However if you see the specs of Samsung Galaxy S6 (http://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_galaxy_s6-6849.php) it mentions that it supports both BTv4.1 and BLE. It therefore distinguishes the two BT specifications.

Any information would be very helpful

Edit

Additional reference information for interested parties:

from bluetooth.org: Two flavors of Bluetooth The two most prevalent implementations of the specification are Bluetooth Basic Rate/Enhanced Data Rate (BR/EDR), which was adopted as version 2.0/2.1, and Bluetooth with low energy (LE), which was adopted as version 4.0/4.1/4.2. Each implementation has different use cases and each implementation uses a different chipset to meet essential hardware requirements. Dual-mode chipsets are also available for applications that include both use cases. - See more at: https://www.bluetooth.com/specifications/bluetooth-core-specification#sthash.7X7IrtWy.dpuf

Answer 1

Instead of relying on gsmarena with unreliable information, you can refer to Bluetooth SIG's official information.

Based on this Bluetooth SIG's announcement and this one, BLE is a core specification of Bluetooth 4.0. Bluetooth 4.1 and 4.2 also adopt this core specification.

However, all this still depends on whether the manufacturers implement the firmware. To keep track of all this, Bluetooth SIG maintains a list of devices currently supporting any profile (for example GATT).

Answer 2

This crossed my mind myself as I saw it as a pointless advancement until I saw the low energy bLE (bluetooth low energy) side of it. In my pastime I tinker with various electronics and with various BLE 4.x modules and their pro's and cons are HUGE.

All in all, BLE is better as Bluetooth pretty much is battery drain on the most robust of phones.

I found a nice little writeup (pretty simple yet comprehensive) here: http://www.argenox.com/bluetooth-low-energy-ble-v4-0-development/library/a-guide-to-selecting-a-bluetooth-chipset/

Do cut my answer short, as the bag you linked shows it as being "NFC" compatible, then yet, it's BLE 4.x. (That's Near Field Communication i.e. similar to your your contactless bank card). The v4.1, A2DP which you mention is how one "audio device talks to another" via bluetooth. (dvanced Audio Distribution Profile).

If you're really bored, there's a long list of other profiles (other than A2D):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Bluetooth_profiles

Hope this helps!

Happy bluetoothing!