AirTag reviews by former Tile users

[DoubleFlyaway]

I will add my own review to this soon-- my first couple AirTags will arrive today. What I'd love to see is people who have been long-term users of Tile talking about their impressions of AirTags. I can't really glean a whole lot from most of the reviews people have been leaving, because a lot of the people who are disappointed seem to have a completely different set of expectations than I would have for how this product will work. What I'm hoping for is: 1. better network than Tile, 2. better reliability than Tile (please actually respond when I am in a rush and trying to play a sound on my lost keys), 3. cool precision locating ability that Tile doesn't have.

Are any of you long-term Tile users out there? What has your experience been?

 

[countryside]

I am a long-term Tile user. We have probably brought 20 Tile devices over the years.

1. There is no question that Apple AirTags have a better network. It is simply a fact.
2. For me, I have had 100% reliability so far. Tile is 25-50% reliable for me. I often open the Tile app to see my keys, which are in my hand, have not had an updated location for a week. My FindMy devices all update regularly throughout the day.
3. The precision locating is a bit of a gimmick to me. I just use sound. BUT, it is helpful if looking for something that you know you lost in the living room, kitchen, etc. I like it. It works.

The ONLY benefit of Tile over Apple is that you can share Tile devices with other people. However, that is a small benefit that I have no doubt Apple will fix soon enough.

I have gotten rid of all of my Tile devices. I trust Apple more with my privacy, and these AirTags simply work better. My Tile devices worked horribly.

I highly recommend you make the switch.

 

[ZBoater]

I also have been a Tile user for years. Tile has saved my bacon more than once.

Having said that, I also experienced reliability issues with Tile. Sometimes it would not find my keys which I ended up finding in my room. It wasn't often, but often enough. Sometimes the Tile would make no sound when I was holding it. Not sure what that was about.

The Apple Airtag sound is not as loud, and the range is not as high, but reliability so far has been 100%. Too soon to tell though, but so far I am liking it. I had 8 tiles which I replaced with 8 Airtags. I still have the Tile Slim in my wallet though. That sucker has truly saved me more than once and I am not giving it up, until Apple comes out with a wallet card.

 

[dontwalkhand]

So far the only thing I miss from Tile would be the "hey! you left this behind!!!" notification. If Apple can enable this with AirTags, that would be amazing. Other than that, AirTags have been way more reliable for me than Tile any day of the week. The problem I had most with Tile would have to be the fact that it would just find a way to "disconnect" from Bluetooth, and just never reconnect. Which literally makes them entirely worthless. I do not have the same problem with AirTags, and they work every time I open the Find My App. It's been a wonderful experience. I have two of them now, but I plan on purchasing more of them now, I am hooked on these little things. I want to put one on my wallet somehow, but I don't know how to do it...I am thinking hot glue gun, LOL!

 

[Marli]

Long time tile user

Tile Pros
Greater BT range
Louder
BT signal/distance indicator
Hole in it (but I dont really care, and like the customisation of the Airtag holder)
Form factors

AirTag Pros
The network. This is the killer feature
Integration
build quality
Ability to customise via the holder
UWB ranging/finding


Airtags Need
To be louder
BT signal/ranging indicator
More form factors ie a wallet version


I continue to use both. The BT range/distance indicator is still an advantage in some cases

 

[mxrider88]

Airtags Need
To be louder
BT signal/ranging indicator
More form factors ie a wallet version

That’s for airtag pro plus SE xdr 9!

 

[Mr Retina]

I also have been a Tile user for years. Tile has saved my bacon more than once.

Having said that, I also experienced reliability issues with Tile. Sometimes it would not find my keys which I ended up finding in my room. It wasn't often, but often enough. Sometimes the Tile would make no sound when I was holding it. Not sure what that was about.

The Apple Airtag sound is not as loud, and the range is not as high, but reliability so far has been 100%. Too soon to tell though, but so far I am liking it. I had 8 tiles which I replaced with 8 Airtags. I still have the Tile Slim in my wallet though. That sucker has truly saved me more than once and I am not giving it up, until Apple comes out with a wallet card.

This is my biggest take away also. I wish the sound was more alarmingly loud like the tile, and that it persistently played the noise like the tile. I do also like the double tap to find my phone on the tile, which would be nice to have if I dont have my Apple Watch on.

 

[DoubleFlyaway]

This is my biggest take away also. I wish the sound was more alarmingly loud like the tile, and that it persistently played the noise like the tile. I do also like the double tap to find my phone on the tile, which would be nice to have if I dont have my Apple Watch on.

Thanks so much, guys. Got my first two yesterday, and so far so good—very reliable, which is my number one. But yeah I would like persistent sound.

 

[Gizmotoy]

We have been Tile users for years and I ordered some AirTags to compare. The main things I'd noticed were:

1. Substantially reduced range for the AirTags compared to the Tile. You have to be in the same room already with the AirTag for it to work, whereas with Tile you can be a few rooms away.
2. The sound is quite a bit louder on the Tile.
3. Precision finding on the AirTag is more useful than I expected, though takes a really long time to start up.
4. Lack of sharing for things like keys with AirTags

We really needed number 4, so we returned the AirTags. Maybe if they fix it one day we'd try again. They seemed generally nice otherwise. The "low battery warnings" on the Tiles are pretty annoying and we were hoping to switch.

 

[haruhiko]

We have been Tile users for years and I ordered some AirTags to compare. The main things I'd noticed were:

1. Substantially reduced range for the AirTags compared to the Tile. You have to be in the same room already with the AirTag for it to work, whereas with Tile you can be a few rooms away.
2. The sound is quite a bit louder on the Tile.
3. Precision finding on the AirTag is more useful than I expected, though takes a really long time to start up.
4. Lack of sharing for things like keys with AirTags

We really needed number 4, so we returned the AirTags. Maybe if they fix it one day we'd try again. They seemed generally nice otherwise. The "low battery warnings" on the Tiles are pretty annoying and we were hoping to switch.

1. I reported poor range of the AirTags and was accused of having a faulty phone or faulty tags.
2. Yes the sound of the AirTag is rather weak.
3. Yes but unless you’re really close to the item.
4. This.

 

[lordhamster]

1. I reported poor range of the AirTags and was accused of having a faulty phone or faulty tags.
2. Yes the sound of the AirTag is rather weak.
3. Yes but unless you’re really close to the item.
4. This.

I never used Tile myself. I think for finding stuff IN your home tile as an advantage from what I've seen. However for finding things lost outside your home, the sheer number of apple devices in the wild (in the US at least) gives Apple a massive advantage.

The airtag sound is weak, but I've not had any problems in my home. In a noisy place it might be a different story. The lack of family sharing is a big disadvantage as I see it. I also don't like the anti-stalking features as I feel they are largely BS and mean I effectively can't leave my airtag on my dog when I leave town... and also can't loan my car to my parents without the damn thing beeping after 3 days.

 

[Cycom]

I would love a built in solution that works within Apple’s ecosystem, but unfortunately airtags are not there yet for me.

Personally, I need a credit card form factor for my wallet. Also, being able to ping my phone from it would be useful, but not as necessary.

 

[DoubleFlyaway]

I never used Tile myself. I think for finding stuff IN your home tile as an advantage from what I've seen. However for finding things lost outside your home, the sheer number of apple devices in the wild (in the US at least) gives Apple a massive advantage.

The airtag sound is weak, but I've not had any problems in my home. In a noisy place it might be a different story. The lack of family sharing is a big disadvantage as I see it. I also don't like the anti-stalking features as I feel they are largely BS and mean I effectively can't leave my airtag on my dog when I leave town... and also can't loan my car to my parents without the damn thing beeping after 3 days.

The reason I am not sure tile will have an advantage in the home is that it is so unreliable. That’s the biggest thing I am hoping to get from airtags. Please actually ring when I tell you to. Half the time tile won’t even do that.

 

[lordhamster]

The reason I am not sure tile will have an advantage in the home is that it is so unreliable. That’s the biggest thing I am hoping to get from airtags. Please actually ring when I tell you to. Half the time tile won’t even do that.

Ok. Good to know. I never used Tile, but based on the Tile pro advertised range of 400ft, I would have thought the home usecase would be easy for them.

 

[Bromeo]

Been a Tile user from the early days when they had sealed units and planned to make money off annual replacements. I have four of the Tile Mate with replaceable batteries. At one time I had two of the Tile Slim (card), but those have sealed batteries and I just couldn't bring myself to replace them annually at that cost. I've also long since combined my phone and wallet with Apple's surprisingly durable leather folio case, which means built-in support for Find My on my wallet.

My primary frustration with Tile right now is the need for an app that constantly uses a bit of battery power: 6% over the last 24 hours, multiplied out over a million phones, that is a significant energy consumption. Early on, Tile app would use up too many Bluetooth connections, resulting in dropped calls with my AirPods. Tile eventually added a "Limit Bluetooth Connections" feature to address this. I notice now, that is gone, so maybe it has been solved in another way.

If I could make a change to Tile, it would be that when I disable the "Find iPhone" feature so pressing the button on the Tile doesn't make my phone go nuts, is that it should likewise no longer make the Tile go nuts with beeping.

Aside from those two items, I have a background concern about Tile's respect for my privacy... which "free" analytic frameworks do they use, if any? Is my usage data being sent to someone like facebook or some data aggregator? Unlike AirTags, Tiles have static Bluetooth MAC Addresses, so that means they can be tracked from store to store just like phones used to be.

I'd like to try AirTag, so may order one. The lack of Family Sharing is a bit of a deal breaker, though. I hope that is resolved soon. Even better would be for Apple and Google to agree on a cross-platform standard, like they did with the Exposure Notifications, which uses a similar architecture as the Find My network.

 

[DoubleFlyaway]

Ok. Good to know. I never used Tile, but based on the Tile pro advertised range of 400ft, I would have thought the home usecase would be easy for them.

Yeah, I don’t think it’s the distance that’s the issue. Like literally I can have a Tile in my right hand and my phone in my left and a significant percentage of the time not be able to get it to ring until I like physically press the button the Tile to wake it up or something. I keep using Tile because sometimes it does work and it has been useful on those times. It’s just that the number of times I’ve had frustration have me ready to take a chance on AirTags.

 

[Hello...]

I have owned tiles Since they first came out it seems to me that every single generation has gotten worse from the first. Half the time it would not even work the other half I’d be lucky to hear it ended up switching and I’m happy I never go back again to tile

 

[lordhamster]

Wow. Glad I never bought them. For me what was missing with tile was the extensive network. With airtags that worry is solved. So far I'm pretty happy with them. Hopefully I'll never have to use them to find something lost outside of my house though.

The sunglass holder thing from Nomad is the most interesting thing for me as I ALWAYS forget my sunglasses everywhere. But because of that, I've moved to buying my sunglasses in bulk from Amazon. I'm not spending $45 (tag + holder) to tag my $3 sunglasses haha.

 

[xli_ne]

Are you able to find your phone with an AirTag? I’m usually losing my phone in the house as much as my keys so it’s nice with Tile to click a button if I have my keys and my phone starts playing a sound. That available with AirTags?

 

[fischersd]

Are you able to find your phone with an AirTag? I’m usually losing my phone in the house as much as my keys so it’s nice with Tile to click a button if I have my keys and my phone starts playing a sound. That available with AirTags?

Heh - that's one of the pluses of Apple Watch, swipe up, click on the Phone icon to have it generate a sound.

You can use other Apple devices to do the same with the Find My app. Just super-convenient with the watch.

 

[bushman4]

AIRTAGS sound needs to be louder.
product is superior to Tile or others I’ve tried
It’s Accurate, has a great Ecosystem and does the job
I’m sure AIRTAGS 2 will be greatly improved

 

[DoubleFlyaway]

Heh - that's one of the pluses of Apple Watch, swipe up, click on the Phone icon to have it generate a sound.

You can use other Apple devices to do the same with the Find My app. Just super-convenient with the watch.

Yeah, it's not available on AirTags, but I never use it on Tile because I wear an Apple Watch.

 

[Gregintosh]

Are you able to find your phone with an AirTag? I’m usually losing my phone in the house as much as my keys so it’s nice with Tile to click a button if I have my keys and my phone starts playing a sound. That available with AirTags?

If you have (or get) an Apple Watch you can press a button on the watch to have your phone generate a sound. If you hold the button down it will even make the iPhone's camera flash for a visual cue (if your iPhone's flash isn't obstructed, this can be useful). It's pretty neat.

If you don't have a watch, you can log in to iCloud and use the Find My website to have your phone generate a sound also.

 

[Davelfc]

I'm glad to be rid of Tile, thankfully a better (for me) system has come along. I generally hang my keys on a hook so I rarely need to find them, the tile didn't really let me down in that respect. But the price paid was a little too much battery power needed for the app each day.

I have lost count of the times I've picked my keys up and accidentally knocked the button on the tile which then starts my iPhone playing a tune. I know some people use this to find their phone but as I wear an Apple Watch I never purposely used this feature.

The cost of replacement car keys is crazy, a couple of hundred pounds here in the UK at least. I don't plan on losing my keys but I now have what I consider to be a pretty damned good chance of getting them back if I do lose them. Just a common sense reminder to all to never give anyone that has found your keys your address, bad things could happen.

 

[Zephar77]

Thanks so much, guys. Got my first two yesterday, and so far so good—very reliable, which is my number one. But yeah I would like persistent sound. I had

I’ve had four AirTags for about a month now. All I get are notifications that they are left behind. My wife has an iPhone yet it does not give her location and it says it still at home when she’s at work. She has an iPhone and the AirTag is paired with my Apple ID so why isn’t it using her iPhone to give location? In Apple community there’s a lot of discussion about AirTags not updating locations and pretty much worthless so far in my experience. It ought to give their AirTags location instantly since she hasn’t iPhone 11 Pro Max with unlimited data. Disappointed, Seth