A cheaper AirTag alternative
Jared Newman | Welcome to Advisorator! I’m Jared Newman, and this is my weekly tech advice newsletter. Did someone share it with you? Sign up here.
A couple things to share before this week’s newsletter:
First, I’m going to try flipping around Advisorator’s free and paid offerings for a while. That means you’ll get an in-depth feature column every week, while the remainder of the newsletter—with news roundups, quick tips, apps to try, and my weekly deal list—will require a membership.
We’ll see how it goes, but my gut says it’ll make the free edition more enjoyable (with no more subscription upsells in the middle of the content) while also making the value of a subscription a bit clearer. As before, paid subscribers also get full online archives—check out my newly-revamped Archives page—along with a growing list of helpful tech tutorials and access to Advisorator’s Slack chat room.
On a related note, my almost-autumn sale on Advisorator memberships ends in two days. Sign up by Thursday to save 20%, plus you’ll get a three-week trial of the full newsletter to start. Advisorator has no ads or sponsorships, so it’s only possible thanks to paid subscribers. Thanks for considering it!
Got questions or feedback about anything I just mentioned? Send me an email and I’ll be happy to answer. Thank you!
This AirTag alternative does more for less
Let me share with you all a recent moment of triumph in the Newman household:
- My wife exclaims that she cannot find her phone—a common occurrence.
- This time, instead of having me call her to ring the misplaced phone, she retrieves a Eufy Security item-finder from her desk.
- After a double-click on the item finder, the phone starts making noise and is quickly located.
- We all rejoice, having removed a significant point of friction (specifically, me) from the phone-finding process.
Of course, you can also use a phone to find the Eufy tracker itself, but being able to use it in the opposite direction was a big reason I bought it over Apple’s own AirTags (which I subsequently also bought for testing purposes). The fact that it’s about half the price—$20 list, but routinely on sale in the $15 range—also helped.
Still, Eufy’s lower price and phone-tracking feature come with some notable downsides that make an actual AirTag worth considering instead.
Find My and more
The Eufy tracker—officially dubbed the (deep inhale) Eufy Security by Anker SmartTrack Link—is one of several third-party item finders compatible with Apple’s Find My network.
Find My taps into the iPhone’s popularity to locate items even when they’re not connected to the internet. If an iPhone passes within Bluetooth range of an item with Find My support, Apple updates that item’s last known location so you can see it on a map in the Find My app.
Because of that distributed nature, people have used AirTags to keep track of car keys, purses, pets, luggage, drones, beloved stuffed animals, and anything else that’s liable to go missing in the outside world, all without the ongoing cost of cellular-based trackers. (They’ve also used it for stalking, hence the creation of unwanted AirTag detection for iOS and Android.)
The Eufy tracker’s Find My support means you can locate it in the same way. It appears under the “Items” tab in the Find My app, and its location will update on the map whenever another iPhone, iPad, or Mac is close by.
Meanwhile, Eufy’s tracker offers a few extra tricks that AirTags lack:
- There’s the aforementioned “Find Phone” function, which plays an aggressively loud rendition of “BINGO” on any devices where you’re logged into the Eufy app.
- The Eufy app also works with Android devices. It won’t display updates from the Find My network, but if the tracker is within Bluetooth range, you can tap the “Find” button to play a sound on the tracker and get notified if you leave it behind.
- The tracker itself has a keychain loop, so you needn’t buy an extra accessory for that purpose. (Eufy also sells a card-shaped version for wallets.)
Not-quite an AirTag
Eufy’s tracker does have a few trade-offs compared to an actual AirTag:
No Precision Finding: When an AirTag is nearby, you can get directions to its exact location by tapping the “Find” button in the Find My app. With Eufy’s tracker, you’ll have to rely on your ears to track it down.
Feature overlap: Eufy’s app has its own versions of certain Find My features, like a Lost Mode that works by scanning a QR code on the tracker, and notifications when you’ve left the device behind. It took me a while to realize you can just ignore these features and use the versions built into the Find My app.
Chintzier design: Eufy’s plastic tracker isn’t as well-built as the stainless steel AirTag. I’ve already broken one of the small plastic tabs on the rear cover, which I removed a couple of times to examine the replaceable battery inside, and some light scratches on the backside appear to have rendered the QR code unreadable for Eufy’s version of Lost Mode.
Still, Eufy’s tracker is unique among third-party AirTags alternatives in supporting Apple Find My while also offering a phone finder function through its own app. A competing tracker from PebbleBee makes you choose between its own app or Find My—you can’t use both simultaneously—while Chipolo’s One Spot tracker only works with the Find My app.
Given that my wife’s phone is what goes missing the most, I’m willing to accept a few trade-offs to find it more easily.
🔒 News, tips, and deals
Here’s what I’ve got for paid subscribers this week:
- One thing AI’s actually good at.
- A time-saving social media tool.
- A big list of already-available Labor Day tech deals, including some deep laptop discounts.
- Plus, the usual roundup of tech news that effects you, with no boring business coverage to sift through.
Sign up by Thursday to save 20% and get a three-week trial to start:
Thanks for reading!
Got tech questions for me? Just reply to this email to get in touch.
Until next week,
Jared