Don't use the AirTag or Tile to track your car!

can you use the Apple Air tag or the tile tracker to track somebody's car it certainly seems to be that way when you see all these headlines so I set up an experiment to find out in this car I'm placing the air tag and the tile tracker and then I'm going to send them on their way now that nervous laughter is because the hardest part of this test is that they have to drive without their phones being on Android phone and iPhone are both switched off now in this car I've actually got a lowjack GPS

tracking system which is going to give me the most accurate information of exactly where they are we're going to use that to compare it to any updates that we get from either the tile or the Apple Air tag and with that in mind let the test begin on the left hand side you have the tile tracker on the right hand side you have the Apple Air tag and of course I mark them both as lost and now we just wait for that notification let me just speed this up so you don't have to it until

something comes in oh hold on there we go already 331 the first notification has come in on the Apple Air tag it's been updat that was super super quick did not expect it at all now looking at the tile tracker uh it's still in Lost mode and still no update let's quickly check the GPS location let's refresh that and okay it actually says they're in Campell road so not quite where the a tag says but at least we have an update from it right 332 let's go check back on the tile and the air tag

tracker and no update has been received and we're going to check back with the GPS tracker and as you know you can travel pretty far if you are driving in your car at 30 or 35 mph right let's go back to our tracking system so far not so useful any updates there we go 335 a second update from the Apple Air tag somewhere in that vicinity of that particular Circle but the uh tile tracker is still zero updates let's fast forward until we get our next update and see which one's going to give us anything

right 3:38 2 minutes later we have another update from the Apple Air Track this time a little bit more precise than that Circle tile tracker Man Zero updates still and if 340 now we can see you can really zoom in and they obviously must have pulled over to park somewhere because now we have a real accurate location tile tracker uh no go now the reason they're driving around with their phone switched off so that there are no advantages with the phones being active in the car they also don't have any Apple watches or any other

smart devices with them we are purely relying on the system working when the tags are in close proximity to an iPhone or to an Android phone who will relay the location of the tag anonymously the only thing they know is that their instructions are to keep their phones off and then after 10 minutes switch it on and then to read their next task so let's check back with our drivers and on to test number two um it's been about 10 minutes so we're going to pull over now and check my phone okay our next instruction

is to drive to a busy parking lot and sit there for 5 minutes and have the phone switched off after 5 minutes switch the phone back on and then look for the next instruction okay busy parking lot where would be a busy parking lot how about Target Target that's good let's go to Target so we've made it to the busy parking lot Ari if you can text and say that we are here and then switch off your phone for about 5 minutes we made it to Target okay I'm going switch off the phone right I

got the Tex they're at the parking lot and of course they've gone to Target I mean where else would they go Apple Air tag has been updated pretty accurate on the Apple Air tag side but once again the tile tracker has got an update on koit road but not anywhere near that Target now since they're not moving I'm going to fast forward this 5 minute period and see if I'm going to get any updates from the tile tracker right 418 no changes 419 no changes 420 still no changes 421 no changes 5 minutes in the

parking lot at Target and not a single update from the tile tracker I guess it's on to test number three we go so we're going to switch the phone back on and see what he said okay so we are done with the experiment and we can head back now in my last instruction I didn't tell them to switch off their phones as they drive back I want to see if there are any difference in how often The Trackers update if there are phones actively on in the car will it use those phones to relay their

posss 531 let's see if we're going to see any difference now that the phones are on and look at that immediately 531 first notification for the tile saying it's been updated with its new location nothing from the Apple Air tag it looks like it's still parked in the Target parking lot let's fast forward a little bit until our next notification which comes in at 534 and that's the air tag has got a new up update for its location the tied tracker well that's still with the old notification and nothing further all right let's fast forward

to our next notification and that CES in at 5:36 where the Apple Air tag has been updated once again and once again the tile tracker is still stuck on the original notification and a minute later at 5:37 we get yet another update from the Apple Air tag I'm assuming it's using the iPhone that's in the car to give us a better update of its location but the Android is not doing anything at the moment let's just keep an eye on that before we fast forward oh look same 537 another update has just come in on

the Apple Air tag let's wait for the full 5 minutes to see if there's any more updates so that's 538 no more updates 539 no more updates 540 no more updates one thing that's curious is why did the Apple Air tag stop broadcasting its location I mean the iPhone is still on in the car so what what's going on okay besides stressing them out about having to drive around ah without their phones on which was pretty funny there are a couple of things we need to note here firstly the Apple Air tag is clearly the

winner as far as tracking is concerned whilst it certainly didn't give us an accurate information in real time like the GPS tracker did it did update whilst they were driving it also did a great job at identifying the location when they were parked in both the coffee shop and the Target parking lot so why did the tile tracker suck you would think it didn't update because it's an Android thing and statistically in the US there are more iPhones users this is not the case the ti app works on both Android and iPhones so technically it

should have a much bigger Network versus the Apple Air tag that only works with iPhones but there is a catch with the tile in order for you to get the location of the tile that you mark As lost it needs somebody to be within range of that tire plus they also need to have the Tile app installed on their phone so even if the tag is surrounded by iPhones and Android phones and not a single one has the Tile app installed the tile is not getting found when it comes to tracking a moving car the

odds of having someone with the app installs driving by a tile that was marked as last the odds are greatly reduced whereas with the air tag it just needs an iPhone to be near it as the iPhones are mostly part of the find my network which means they will relay that information of that last air Tags location and that was super smart of Apple to do now would these results be any different if we ran them in a country where Android is more prominent than an iPhone perhaps but it would still require the app to

be installed on those Android phones so it's not an automatic yes and if we now go back to those headlines how did those people actually track their car with an air tag North Long Beach man surprises car thieves after finding a staren BMW with an air tag sounds great but then let scroll further down and let's see where the car was actually tracked to so we can can see spotted it by a gas station so the car was stationary right next headlines air tag helps Las Vegas man find stolen K pursue suspect where was this

car found was it whilst driving no it pinged at a home near Nellis Air Force Base across town the car was tracked when it was stationary when it was parked and just to be clear there is a real danger of a stalker or thieves using the air tag or the tile tracker to track their victims so definitely be aware of any Rogue trackers that are around you and if you do find one do not drive home drive to your local police station and let them handle it now I will say when it comes to tracking

your lost luggage at an airport both the air tag and the tile work really well I personally have had my luggage lost uh three times by the Airlines and in all three cases I could tell the airlines exactly where the bags were however when it comes to tracking a car both suck for realtime tracking but I will say that the air tag will do a better job at tracking the car when it is parked so now that we know that you cannot really track someone's location accurately with these trackers what about tracking their location when

you have their cell phone numbers or an IMI number H check that on out right over here give the video a quick Thumbs Up Before You you head out and I'm going to see you in this video Let's Go