I’ve got an AirTag for my children to wear when I go on holiday , we’ve been trial running them. They went out with my husband who has an iPhone and it only connected to their location when they arrive back home. And we’re near my phone surely this isn’t right.
[Re-Titled by Moderator]
AirTag
Apple did not design the AirTags for tracking. Whether that's for people or pets. They are designed to help you locate a missing "stationary" item, like your car keys.
Per chance, do you and your husband, share the same Apple ID? ... or have you configured this AirTag with your iPhone, and then, shared it with him?
Ref: Share an AirTag or other item in Find My on iPhone - Apple Support
Based on your answers, I can better offer you the reason(s) why you are having this "issue."
Hi, thank you for your reply. No, we haven’t got shared Apple ID. I also have airTag on my bike. Left it locked up at the shop while we went for a walk and it only showed up to date location once I was back with it , and it connected to my phone , I was away from it for 47 minutes and it said last located 47 minutes ago and as soon as I walked over to it updated lots of people walking past it constantly with iPhones surely it should update
Emkin wrote:
Left it locked up at the shop while we went for a walk and it only showed up to date location once I was back with it , and it connected to my phone , I was away from it for 47 minutes and it said last located 47 minutes ago and as soon as I walked over to it updated lots of people walking past it constantly with iPhones surely it should update
Yes, in theory is should have, but as you can see it doesn't always work out as we can expect it to.
The AirTags do NOT know where their location is. They have no means to do so. They rely on the Apple Find My Network, which is literally made up of millions of iPhones. In theory, if any of those iPhones are within Bluetooth range of the tag (and that phone has an active Internet connection), it could relay the tag's ID along with the phone's GPS location to the Apple servers. If I was to venture a guess, none of the "passing by" phones were either not able to receive the tag's Bluetooth signal or relay it.
So, basically when your iPhone is within range of the tag, it should appear on the Find My app on that phone. When the phone and tag are separated past that range, the tag's location would only show up if other iPhones are present (in theory).
Oh, and one other thing to consider. When the tag is separated after a certain amount of time, it will start beeping. We get posts here with folks that do try using these tags with their children or their pets where this beeping becomes a nuisance (to both the "wearer" of the tag or those around them.)
This is where, if you are concerned about your children's whereabouts for safety reasons, you may want to consider using a GPS tracker. These will provide you with pin-point location consistently. The only disadvantage of these trackers is cost and battery life.
Why is my AirTag only connecting at home?
