Airtag not reachable, Searching for signal

Question

Airtag not reachable, Searching for signal

I have tried for over a month to get Airtags to work for me.

I have purchased more than 20 Airtags and have found that only 3 of them have worked about 10% of the time. The remaining 17 never worked. The 3 work sporadically - usually they don’t.

They all pair perfectly. They all know I’m nearby since I see the green UP arrow button and not the blue directions button.

However, tapping on Play Sound results in an immediate failure and message of “Airtag not reachable” and if I tap on Find, I’m permanently stuck on “Searching for Signal”.

I have iPhone 12 Pro, iPhone X, and a new iPad.

I rebooted my phone, restored network settings, uninstalled the tags, and reset the tags. I’ve toggled all the location and precision finding and find my settings in iOS — nothing works.

Can anyone solve this mystery? Apple Support had no clue.

iPhone 12 Pro

Posted on May 26, 2021 7:52 AM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

_____sarah_e

Level 1

10 points

Jul 10, 2021 7:57 AM in response to simplegray1000

Mine was doing the exact same thing. I tested it by having my kids go a significant distance with it but it still said it was in the exact same location…. My house! I went thought my location settings & found that once I toggle the DEVICE MANAGEMENT to on, it worked just as it was intended.

settings>Privacy>Location services>System services (at the very bottom of the long list)>toggle DEVICE MANAGEMENT to on

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Answer 2

Jun 27, 2021 9:11 PM in response to simplegray1000

I bought 4 air tags, all seemed fine until today, about a month after buying. Got same message and tried other devices and found them. I

It appears I’m out a $600 diabetes glucose meter as it seems nothing is working on my end. As it seems to work on the others, I can only think this went south. I’ll be monitoring this site for any additional problem resolution, until then, they lost an airbag consumer.

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Answer 3

mluker78

Level 1

4 points

Jun 1, 2021 12:07 PM in response to simplegray1000

Just a follow up, I also called support and they didn't even know how an AirTag worked. The support person actually told me I have to attach it to something or else it will not work. She said it wont work in my hand. At that point I gave up and told them I am just going to return it. That was the worst Apple Support I have ever had.

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Answer 4

Jun 1, 2021 12:53 PM in response to mluker78

Yea you'd have to talk to Tier 2 or Tier 3 support to get more help. But what is really needed hasn't happened - sending logs to Engineering team and escalating.

That said, this is the 1st Apple Product that I've ever owned that hasn't worked out of the box on Day 1. Pretty shocking but glad it's a lesser important product overall. I'm sure the problem will get to Engineering at some point over the next year and it will "magically" be fixed. I'll be a buyer of AirTags again.

No love lost for Apple here :)

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