AirTags
The idea is quite straightforward. An AirTag is a small round tracking device, slightly larger than a peppermint. You can pair an AirTag with your iPhone (which is extremely easy and can be done in just a few seconds) and then attach the it to something you don’t want to misplace. If you do lose that item, your iPhone will be able to lead you back to it.
A Word on Tile
AirTags have been a long time coming (since 2019, actually, according to Apple’s own packaging), and there were several Apple events prior to now where I really thought they were coming, but now they’re finally here. And the Tile company must be feeling a mix of things, validation (for their endless bitching to Congress about Apple “stealing” their (very obvious and destined to be sherlocked) idea), embarrassment (that their product is so much worse), fear (that their business is going to tank).
I was a fan of Tile back around 2015. I had a bad habit of misplacing my keys and wallet, and Tile was (seemingly) the perfect solution. In practice, though, they didn’t work well at all. They didn't connect half the time, the bluetooth range was very limited, and the network of other devices that had the tile app and could find your lost Tile was practically nonexistent. I never once found an item I’d lost because another Tile user had gotten close enough to it to alert me to its location. Their close-proximity finding tool was also extremely weak and inaccurate. The only real way Tiles would help you find your stuff was by beeping (which isn’t nothing, but Tiles on the whole certainly weren't nearly as useful as they had promised to be).
AirTags Versus Tiles
I didn't want to spend too much space in this review talking about Tile, but since this is a new type of accessory for Apple, and Tile happens to be AirTag’s biggest competitor and the only bluetooth tracker people may already be familiar with, it’s actually very useful and illustrative to contrast the two. And there is a lot of contrast, because AirTags have drastically improved everything about Tile’s experience.
When it comes to finding an AirTag that isn’t in close proximity, Apple’s Find My network whoops Tile’s network's ass. I’ve never left an AirTag anywhere that its location wasn’t updated within ten minutes by someone else with an iPhone getting near it. I lost Tiles for days at a time in public places and never saw them updated.
When it comes to finding an AirTag that is in close proximity to you, AirTags are, again, vastly superior to Tiles. Apple’s Precision Finding mode works pretty well. It isn’t perfect, but it gets close, giving you guided directions to your AirTag that are accurate to within about six inches in most instances. Tile’s interface (the last time I used it) gave a three step indicator to show your approximate distance from the lost Tile (and they weren't labeled with distances, they were just abstract circles that basically indicated “you’re cold,” “you’re lukewarm,” and “you’re warm,” but they were never accurate enough to actually get you to “you’re hot”). At best, the Tile would get you within about 8 feet.
One point that can go to Tile is the volume of the speaker used to make the trackers play a sound. Tile’s is technically a little louder if you just look at decibels. That said, I’m convinced Apple does some sort of voodoo with their speaker, like they’re intentionally playing frequencies that travel very well. It’s more difficult for an AirTag’s sound to be muffled than a Tile’s, so in practice, I’ve found the AirTag’s “play a sound” option to be more useful than Tile’s, despite it technically being (very) slightly quieter.
It’s also quite nice that AirTags have replaceable batteries, this was a(n extremely wasteful) mistake Tile made early on. The' batteries are supposed to last for a year, and the specific coin-shaped batteries they use are a pretty common type that will only cost you about $3 or $4 to replace.
The Pets/Kids Issue
A lot of people have been wondering if these can be used to track pets or children.
I don’t have a child, but I do have a dog, and while I haven’t lost him since putting an AirTag on his collar, I can tell you that it seems to work just fine and any time I leave him at home by himself, it only ever takes about 10 minutes at any given point for someone to get close enough for their iPhone to recognize his AirTag and let me know he’s still where I left him. If he ever did escape or get lost, then the AirTag would serve multiple functions. Since I live downtown and there are always a lot of people around, the odds of my dog running somewhere were no iPhones would be in close enough proximity to him to keep me appraised of his location is rather low. Additionally, if someone were to find him, they could use the AirTag to find out how to get in touch with me since you can put a custom message on the screen displayed to anyone to finds your missing AirTag (of course, you can also put your phone number on a normal name tag, but the AirTag allows for a lot more information to be passed on to whoever finds him than just a phone number).
Now, if you are wanting to use an AirTag to track for your kids, I would say you probably don’t need to waste your money. Again, I’m not a parent, but I’d imagine children don’t usually get lost in the same way pets do. I think children are less likely to just dart off by themselves, so I would imagine that if your child goes missing, they’re probably being accompanied by someone with less than pure intentions, and such an individual would probably have them empty their pockets/discard their backpack/etc. And then you’d be down one child and one AirTag, and that’d really suck! If you’re worried about your child going missing to the degree that you feel like you need to put a tracker on them, I’d probably just suggest saving your money and putting it towards some courses on how to be a more responsible parent.
The Stalking Issue
I think this is mostly a nonissue, and that a small kernel of genuine concern has been transformed by bored, Apple-critical tech journalists using clickbait headlines into a debate about human trafficking and stalking that are blown way out of proportion. The basic concern was that bad actors could slip AirTags into the purses (or otherwise) of individuals they wanted to stalk, and then track them around town. Obviously this would be possible, because it’s exactly what AirTags are built to do, but I seriously doubt that many people would do it. After all, it’s a pretty expensive trick, to treat AirTags as thirty bucks-a-pop disposable trackers that would be useless as soon as the victim found it in their bag, anyway. In any case, bluetooth trackers have been around for about a decade and I’m not aware of this ever happening before, this is just the Apple hate machine finding some new (Qanon-ish) bullshit to spout for a while.
Nonetheless, Apple did actually take several measures to prevent unwanted tracking. If an AirTag is separated from its owner and stays around the same person for a while, it will alert that individual that it’s there. It will also play a sound whenever it moves after being disconnected from its owner’s iPhone for a while. You might think “great, now it won’t be a problem at all,” but you’d be wrong. The sound doesn’t start until three days later, and alerts only work for people with iPhones, not Android devices. On top of that, it actually makes the AirTag itself less valuable, because it makes it far less useful to track stolen items. If a thief is going to be warned that whatever they stole could be tracked by you, they’re just going to toss out the AirTag, and with it goes any hope of getting your stuff back.
I wish Apple had just ignored this problem altogether and let a nonissue continue to be a nonissue. The “problem” they’re “solving” was far less likely than the problem their solution creates.
Price & Accessories
AirTags are one of Apple’s most reasonably priced accessories. I wouldn’t have put it past Apple to charge $50+, but they’re only $29 (or $25 each, if you spring for the $99 four pack). They also offer free engraving. If you’re in the market for AirTags and know you want one or two, go ahead and get the four-pack. Once you have them, you’ll find things you want to attach them to (and even if you don’t, they make nice little gifts).
The accessories, though, are a bit pricier. Apple’s AirTag loop and AirTag Leather Loop ($29 and $39, respectively) are nice options if you want to attach an AirTag to something like luggage, but my personal favorite is the Leather Keyring ($35). Of course, it was a bit peculiar and price-grabby that Apple didn’t just put a hole on the AirTag itself to attach a keyring or a cord, but alas, they did not.
Miscellaneous
It would be nice if AirTags had a button which could be used to find your iPhone or something like that (though you can already use your Apple Watch for that), but they did something similar: the NFC coil in AirTags can be used as an automation trigger in the shortcuts app. Basically what that means is that you can set your AirTag up to prompt your iPhone to perform an action (just about anything you want) when you hold the AirTag within an inch or two of your iPhone. For example, I set up the AirTag on my keys to trigger an automation that starts directions to my home. It’s not a button, but in some ways it’s actually more versatile.
Final Word
The bottom line here is that AirTags work well and they’re fairly inexpensive. I have five (one for my keys, wallet, backpack, dog, and car), and when I’ve had to use them, they’ve been able to lead me back to my items in under a minute. If you’re an iPhone user who occasionally misplaces things, a pack of AirTags will probably be a good investment for you.