In the event you’ve ever missed an on-time departure due to a set of misplaced keys or misplaced pockets, you’ll profit from a Bluetooth tracker. These small units connect to your stuff and use your smartphone to maintain tabs on the place they’re. AirTags are the most effective identified within the class, tapping right into a discovering community created via nameless iPhone pings within the space. Google now has an identical community utilizing close by Android telephones, and Samsung has its personal community that employs Galaxy telephones. Some third-party trackers work with both Google or Apple’s community and supply further options besides. We examined trackers from Apple, Tile, Pebblebee, Samsung and Chipolo, evaluating their discovering capabilities, sound ranges, reliability and design. We predict the Chipolo Pop is the most effective Bluetooth tracker for most individuals, however just a few different trackers have their deserves as nicely.
What to search for in a Bluetooth monitoring system
Bluetooth trackers are small discs or playing cards that depend on short-range, low-energy wi-fi indicators to speak together with your smartphone. Connect considered one of these devices your stuff and, if it’s in vary, your telephone can “ring” the chip so you will discover it. These monitoring units supply different options like separation alerts to inform you whenever you’ve left a tagged merchandise behind, or the place a misplaced merchandise was final detected. Some may even faucet into a bigger community of smartphones to trace down your system whenever you’re out of vary. Relying on what you need the tracker to do, there are just a few specs to search for when deciding which to get.
Gadget compatibility
Like most issues from the parents in Cupertino, AirTags solely work with merchandise within the Apple ecosystem. Each Apple and Google have opened up entry to the Discover My and Discover My Gadget networks to third-party producers, together with Chipolo and Pebblebee. These two firms make device-agnostic fashions that may work with the bigger monitoring community from both model, so iPhone and Android customers should purchase the identical tag. Tile trackers work with both Android or Apple units, however use Tile’s personal Life 360 discovering community. Samsung’s newest fob, the Galaxy SmartTag2, solely works with Samsung telephones and faucets right into a discovering system that depends on different Samsung units to find misplaced tags.
Discovering community
Crowd-sourced discovering capabilities are what make headlines, with tales about recovering stolen equipment or monitoring misplaced baggage across the globe. Utilizing nameless indicators that ping different individuals’s units, these Bluetooth monitoring units can doubtlessly inform you the place a tagged merchandise is, even when your smartphone is out of Bluetooth vary.
Apple’s Discover My community is the biggest, with over a billion iPhones and iPads in service all operating Apple’s Discover My app by default. So until an iPhone person opts out, their telephone silently acts as a location detector for any close by AirTags. Apple not too long ago elevated the AirTag’s discovering energy by enabling you to share the location of a lost tag with a 3rd social gathering, social gathering, like an airline. Chipolo fobs that work on Apple’s community have the identical potential. Google launched its Discover My Gadget community in 2024 and it’s an in depth second for the biggest within the US
Now that Google’s Discover My Gadget community is up and running, it’s an in depth second for the biggest within the US. Like Apple, Android customers are robotically a part of the community, however can opt-out by deciding on the Google providers choice of their telephone’s Settings app and toggling the choice within the Discover My Gadget menu. Samsung’s SmartTag 2 and associated community additionally defaults to an opt-in standing for locating tags and different units.
Tile gives a big discovering grid that features Tile customers, Amazon Sidewalk prospects and folks operating the Life360 community. Life360 acquired Tile in 2021, and, in response to the corporate, the Life360 community has greater than 70 million month-to-month lively customers.
In our assessments, AirTags and third-party tags utilizing its community, just like the Chipolo Pop and Pebblebee Clip Common, had been the quickest to trace down misplaced objects. They provided practically real-time location knowledge in reasonably to closely trafficked spots round Albuquerque, together with a bar, bookstore and occasional retailers in Nob Hill, together with numerous outside hangouts on UNM’s campus.
Samsung’s SmartTags had been in a position to find our misplaced objects more often than not, although not with the identical precision discovering accuracy as AirTags. Once we examined Google’s Find My Device network proper after launch, it was noticeably slower than Apple’s community when utilizing the group discovering function. Testing it once more in 2025, the time it took to find a misplaced merchandise was significantly improved, taking only a couple minutes for the group to trace a fob. In our assessments, Tile’s discovering community wasn’t in a position to constantly find its misplaced fobs.
Separation alerts
Right here’s the place a tracker’s day-to-day utility actually shines. A separation alert lets you already know whenever you’ve traveled too far out of your tagged objects, which is beneficial if you wish to be sure your laptop bag, or jacket or umbrella all the time comes with you whenever you go away the home.
These notifications work whenever you’re out and about too. In the event you’ve obtained a Bluetooth monitoring system in your pockets and stroll out of a restaurant with out it, the separation alert ought to kick in, leading to fewer misplaced objects. This function additionally tells you the place your tagged merchandise and telephone had been final paired, permitting you to retrace your steps for those who occur to overlook the alert.
Every tracker handles left-behind objects otherwise. AirTags and third-party fobs utilizing its community (equivalent to from Chipolo or Pebblebee) embody the function by default. Tile trackers require a yearly subscription to allow the alerts (at the moment $30 yearly). Tags working with the Google Discover My Gadget community don’t supply the function in any respect, however Chipolo Pop tags can subject left-behind alerts utilizing its personal Android app. Each AirTags and Tiles assist you to flip off separation alerts at sure places, which means you possibly can set your private home as a “protected” place the place objects could be left behind, however alerts will nonetheless set off elsewhere.
In our assessments, AirTags and others utilizing the Discover My community alerted us between the 600- and 1,400-foot mark. Tiles despatched a notification after about a mean of 1,500 ft and had been extra constant when utilizing an Android telephone than an iPhone. Chipolo Pop tags paired with an Android telephone and utilizing its personal app despatched an alert once we obtained round 450 ft away from our tagged merchandise.
Connectivity, quantity and design
The function you might use most frequently is the important thing finder operate, which makes the tracker ring whenever you hit a button within the app. With Apple’s AirTags, you possibly can say “Hey Siri, the place are my keys?” and the assistant will ring the tag (assuming it would not mistakenly assume you are asking for instructions to the Floridian archipelago). Asking Alexa or the Google Assistant to seek out your keys will work with Chipolo, Tile and Pebblebee trackers linked to your Android system.
You probably have your tag however can’t discover your telephone, some trackers will allow you to ring them to seek out your handset. SmartTag2 fobs reliably rang our Galaxy telephone once we double-pressed it. Tile trackers have the identical function. Chipolo Pop trackers can ring your telephone, however makes use of the Chipolo app to take action, which may run concurrently with the Discover My or Discover My Gadget connection. AirTags and any third-party tags utilizing solely Apple or Google’s networks don’t supply this function.
The amount of the Bluetooth monitoring system might decide whether or not you will discover an merchandise buried in your sofa cushions or in a loud room. AirTags have a popularity for being on the quiet facet, and that aligned with what we noticed (measuring roughly 65 decibels). Chipolo’s Pop tags and Tile’s Professional mannequin measure between 83 and 86 decibels on common. Pebblebee’s new Clip Common was the loudest of any tag we’ve examined, clocking in at 91 ear-splitting decibels.
Design will decide what you possibly can connect the tracker to. AirTags are small, clean discs that may’t be secured to something with out accessories, that are quite a few, however that’s a further price to think about. Chipolo, Pebblebee and Tile supply trackers with holes that simply connect to your key ring, and all three firms additionally supply card-shaped variations designed to slot in your pockets. Pebblebee Clip Common tags include a helpful carabiner-style key ring.
Batteries are replaceable for AirTag, Tile Professional, SmartTag2 and Chipolo Pop fobs and every ought to go for not less than a 12 months earlier than needing to be swapped. Tile Mate and card-shaped trackers don’t have replaceable batteries, which suggests you’ll have to exchange the complete unit at any time when it dies. Pebblebee trackers are rechargeable in each the disc and pockets selection. They’re additionally the one tags outfitted with onboard LEDs.
Stalking, theft and knowledge privateness
AirTags have gotten a number of consideration and even prompted some lawsuits for Apple because of dangerous actors planting them on individuals to be able to stalk them. Whereas this truth might not affect your shopping for resolution, any dialogue of Bluetooth trackers ought to observe what steps Apple, Google and Tile have taken to handle the difficulty. Final 12 months, all the most important gamers within the Bluetooth tracker enterprise teamed up to fight misuse and standardize how unauthorized monitoring detection and alerts work for iOS and Android.
Final 12 months, Tile launched a function referred to as Anti-Theft Mode, which lets you render considered one of its trackers undetectable by others. Meaning if somebody steals your tagged merchandise, they gained’t have the ability to use the anti-stalking options to seek out and disable the tracker. That type of negates one of many main methods potential stalking victims can keep protected, so Tile hopes ID verification and a $1 million penalty will deter misuse. Individually, Tile was not too long ago hit by a data breach, elevating completely different privateness issues. The corporate issued a statement concerning the occasion, which it shared with Engadget:
Just like many different firms, Life360 not too long ago grew to become the sufferer of a felony extortion try. We acquired emails from an unknown actor claiming to own Tile buyer data. We promptly initiated an investigation into the potential incident and detected unauthorized entry to a Tile buyer assist platform (however not our Tile service platform). The possibly impacted knowledge consists of knowledge equivalent to names, addresses, e-mail addresses, telephone numbers, and Tile system identification numbers. It doesn’t embody extra delicate data, equivalent to bank card numbers, passwords or log-in credentials, location knowledge, or government-issued identification numbers, as a result of the Tile buyer assist platform didn’t comprise these data varieties.
We consider this incident was restricted to the particular Tile buyer assist knowledge described above and isn’t extra widespread. We take this occasion and the safety of buyer data severely. Now we have taken and can proceed to take steps designed to additional shield our methods from dangerous actors, and we have now reported this occasion and the extortion try to regulation enforcement. We stay dedicated to protecting households protected on-line and in the actual world.
As a theft deterrent, a Bluetooth tracker might or might not be the most suitable choice. Anecdotal tales abound wherein individuals have recovered stolen items utilizing a tracker — however different tales are more cautionary. Neither Apple nor Google promotes its trackers or discovering networks as a approach to take care of theft. GPS trackers, however, are sometimes marketed for simply that goal.
How we examined
Earlier than deciding on which trackers to check, we researched the sphere, person evaluations on Amazon, Greatest Purchase and different retailers, together with discussions on websites like Reddit. We additionally checked out what different publications needed to say on the matter earlier than narrowing down our choices to Apple AirTag, Tile, and Chipolo trackers. When Samsung’s SmartTag 2 got here out in October of 2023, we added that to our testing, together with Pebblebee’s rechargeable Clip tracker. After Google launched its Discover My Gadget, each Chipolo and Pebblebee launched trackers in 2025 that work with both community and we examined the Pop and Common key fob fashions and up to date our high picks accordingly.
Right here’s the complete listing of each tracker we examined:
After buying the trackers, I examined each over the course of some weeks utilizing each an iPhone 11 and a Samsung Galaxy S22 Extremely. I recreated probably person experiences, equivalent to dropping and leaving objects behind at residence and out within the metropolis. I planted trackers at completely different spots close to downtown Albuquerque, principally concentrated in and across the College of New Mexico and the encompassing neighborhood of Nob Hill. Later, I carried out assessments within the Queen Anne neighborhood of Seattle. Every take a look at was carried out a number of occasions, each whereas strolling and driving and I used the measure distance function on Google Maps to trace footage for alerts. I paid consideration to how straightforward the app was to make use of, how dependable the phone-to-tracker connection was and some other perks and downsides that got here up throughout common use.
Different trackers we examined
Tile Professional and Tile Mate (2024)
Tile not too long ago got here out with a brand new suite of trackers, changing the Tile Mate, Tile Professional, Tile Sticker and Tile Slim with updated models. Along with enjoyable new colours for the Mate and Slim, Tile added an SOS function that may ship a notification to your Life360 Circle whenever you triple press the button on the tracker. It’s a intelligent addition that turns your keys right into a panic button, one thing provided by private security firms as standalone units.
There are just a few caveats: You and the individuals you wish to notify in an emergency will want the Life360 app put in in your telephones. If you’d like your Tile to additionally set off a name to emergency providers, you’ll want a $15-per-month Life360 subscription (that’s along with a Tile membership, which begins at $3/month or $30 yearly). And enabling the SOS triple-press disables the flexibility to ring your telephone with the fob.
I examined the SOS function and it did certainly ship a textual content message to my Circle, with the message that I had triggered an SOS and a hyperlink to a web site that confirmed my present location. I believed it odd that the hyperlink didn’t open the Life360 app (which reveals the placement of customers’ telephones), however I wasn’t as a lot involved with Tile’s private security options as I used to be with the monitoring capabilities, which turned out to be lower than preferrred.
For my assessments, I planted Tile trackers in a densely populated space of Seattle (about 15,000 individuals per sq. mile). After setting the trackers to “misplaced” within the Tile app, I waited. After 4 hours, one of many trackers was not found by the discovering group, so I went and retrieved it. One other fob I planted alerted me that the tracker had been discovered by the Tile group after three hours — however the location it gave me was off by a 3rd of a mile. I then determined to plant a tracker in probably the most populated place I might consider — the dried fruit and nuts aisle of a Dealer Joes on a Friday night earlier than a significant vacation. It nonetheless took over a half an hour earlier than one other Tile person anonymously pinged my misplaced tracker.
In my assessments with Samsung’s trackers and the fobs on Google’s Discover My Gadget community, it took round ten minutes for them to be found. AirTags took half that point and all had been examined in a far much less populated metropolis. 4 hours with no ping and over a half hour earlier than getting successful in a crowded TJs had been fairly lengthy stretches.
Our high decide, the basic Chipolo, has nearly no discovering community. However for those who’re getting a tracker for that function alone, it’s best to go along with AirTags if in case you have an iPhone or the Google-enabled Chipolo or Pebblebee trackers for those who use an Android telephone. We choose the Chipolo as a result of it really works with both iOS or Android units, it rings loud, it’s fast to inform you whenever you’ve left it behind and it connects practically immediately whenever you’re looking for a misplaced tracker round the home.
Tile units additionally work with each cellular working methods and its newest fashions are certainly louder than they had been earlier than. However they aren’t as fast to attach and it’s worthwhile to pay for a membership to activate left-behind alerts. And whenever you do, these notifications don’t kick in as shortly as they do with competing trackers.
Bluetooth tracker FAQs
Which Bluetooth tracker has the longest vary?
Each the Tile Professional and the Samsung Galaxy SmartTag2 declare a most vary of round 400 ft, which is longer than the 300-foot declare for Chipolo’s Pop tags. The Pebblebee Clip Common claims a 500-foot vary, although different trackers with a shorter claimed vary carried out higher in our assessments. Apple doesn’t make vary claims for AirTags. Any Bluetooth sign, after all, relies on just a few elements. Obstacles like partitions and folks can block the sign, so a transparent line of sight is the one approach to obtain the utmost vary. Different indicators, like Wi-Fi, can even intrude with Bluetooth connections. Even excessive humidity can have an impact and reduce the gap at which your telephone will hook up with your tracker.
Bear in mind, when contemplating the vary of Bluetooth trackers, the dimensions of the “discovering community” additionally comes into play. That is the variety of close by telephones that can be utilized to anonymously ping your tracker when your personal telephone is out of Bluetooth vary. As of now, Apple AirTags have the biggest community, adopted by Google’s Discover My Gadget, Samsung’s discovering group and Tile’s Life360 members.
What’s the finest Bluetooth tracker for a automotive?
Bluetooth trackers are designed to trace small, private objects like keys, jackets, backpacks and the like. All trackers have safeguards to ban the tag from getting used to stalk individuals, so most will alert somebody if a tracker that doesn’t belong to them is detected following them. Meaning a automotive thief might get tipped off that there’s a tracker within the automotive they’re making an attempt to steal. That mentioned, you’ll see loads of stories about individuals discovering their automotive due to a Bluetooth tracker. Some police departments have even handed out trackers to fight excessive charges of carjacking. In most cases, the tracker of selection has been AirTags due to their large discovering community. In the event you’re in search of a tracker in your automotive, you might wish to look into GPS trackers, a few of that are designed for simply that goal.
How correct are Bluetooth trackers?
Accuracy for Bluetooth trackers could be checked out in two methods: Discovering objects close by and discovering objects misplaced exterior your private home. For close by objects, you’ll most frequently use the ring operate on the system to hunt it down. Two tags, Apple’s AirTags and Samsung’s Galaxy SmartTag2, additionally use ultra-wideband expertise, which creates directional navigation in your telephone to get you inside a foot of the tracker.
Precisely discovering misplaced objects exterior your private home will depend on the dimensions of the discovering community. Since this depends on the serendipity of a random telephone passing inside Bluetooth vary of your tracker, the extra telephones on a given community, the higher. And since Bluetooth ranges and distance estimates are solely exact inside a few meter or so, getting pings from multiple telephone will assist finding objects. Right here once more, it’s price noting that Apple’s Discover My community is the biggest, adopted by Google, Samsung and Tile (each Chipolo and Pebblebee have fobs that work with the Apple and Google networks).
This text initially appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/computing/equipment/best-bluetooth-tracker-140028377.html?src=rss
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