Technologies

Why I Use Apple AirTags to Track Everything From My Luggage to My Car

I have come to rely on Apple’s handy trackers to keep tabs on my most important things, and right now you can stock up with a deal on four-packs.

Not long ago, as I waited at baggage claim after a trip to Paris, I became increasingly nervous as bag after bag dropped onto the carousel, none of them mine. I knew there was no need to panic, though. Back at Charles de Gaulle airport, I had dropped a sophisticated little tracking device into my trusty rolling suitcase before handing it over and heading to my gate. So, I pulled out my iPhone and, with just a few taps, I could see that my bag had never left the City of Light. (Merde!)

Over the years, I’ve come to depend on Apple’s AirTags to keep track of many types of easy-to-lose valuables. They’re not just good for luggage. I also use them to track wallets, bikes, keys and even my car. I tell everyone who will listen that you can never have too many of these handy devices. That’s why I think it’s worth taking advantage of the current deal at Amazon that slashes the price of a four-pack of AirTags down to $75.

Here’s how the Apple AirTag (like the one that was in my suitcase on that fateful trip) works. It uses an ingenious method of tracking itself, detecting its location from nearby iPhones and using them to anonymously piggyback the coordinates to a secure server where I could look it up on my iPhone. Until just a few years ago, this would have seemed like a scene straight out of a spy movie.

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Instead of wondering if my belongings were stuck on an abandoned luggage cart or strewn across the tarmac, I could see in almost real time that my suitcase was still chilling at Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris. I was able to calmly tell the airline my bag didn’t make the flight, and it made arrangements to have it delivered to me a few days later.

Apple AirTags are all about peace of mind

By itself, an AirTag isn’t much. A smooth, round, 1.26-inch puck that looks like a glossy white breath mint, it sinks to the bottom of a bag or dangles from a key chain (with a compatible key ring, sold separately). It’s meant to disappear.

Activating the AirTag was a simple process of pairing with my iPhone. And then, because it obviously doesn’t really do anything out of the box, I forgot about it.

But the next time I couldn’t find my keys? Sorcery. My iPhone didn’t just tell me they were somewhere nearby — it walked me directly to them, thanks to the AirTag’s built-in Ultra Wideband chip. Suddenly, all that time I’d spent retracing my steps and overturning couch cushions in the past felt like ancient history.

Now I have AirTags in or attached to every significant item I’d want to keep track of: My everyday laptop bag, my camera backpack, the suitcase I use most when traveling, my key chain, my car and a smaller sling bag I take on walks. I can pull up the Find My app on any of my Apple devices (or sign in to iCloud on any web browser) and see where my items are and the last time the AirTags registered their locations.

AirTags aren’t just for my everyday items. People I know in the movie business tell me that AirTags are tossed into nearly every bag and Pelican crate, not solely to ensure that the valuable equipment inside doesn’t walk away but also to quickly differentiate equipment amid similar-looking containers. Some of my friends also attach AirTags to their pets’ collars (though experts say there are better ways to track your pets).

AirTags are also useful for things that you want to keep close by

Being able to detect my luggage a continent away provided a sense of relief, to be sure. But at the local level, my AirTags will also trigger an alert when I get too far away from them. For example, if I accidentally forget my camera bag in the car when I stop somewhere for lunch, a Find My notification appears telling me I’ve left it behind. It works the same for newer AirPods models as well.

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Sharing is now a big part of AirTag tracking

My family has two cars, and I wanted to be able to track them both. But it used to be inconvenient to pair the AirTag in the car my wife drives to her iPhone (and the one in my car to my iPhone).

To guard against unwanted tracking, an AirTag will notify nearby iPhones of its existence, so whenever I drove my wife’s car without her in it, I got a notification that an AirTag was traveling with me. (If the owner is near the AirTag, the alert does not appear.)

However, ever since the release of iOS 17, AirTags are shareable, which solves this problem. I shared my AirTag with my wife, and she with me, so regardless of which car I’m driving, I can find it more easily in a crowded parking lot without getting constant, unnecessary alerts.

A more recent feature to AirTags that arrived with iOS 18.2 is the ability to temporarily share an AirTag’s location with someone I trust. In my luggage example above, if the suitcase was in the airport with me, but the airport’s staff hadn’t yet been able to locate it (not uncommon during peak travel times), I could share its location with an attendant who could quickly retrieve it from areas inaccessible to the public.

Apple AirTag specs

Diameter: 1.26 inches (31.9 mm)
Height: 0.31 inches (8 mm)
Weight: 0.39 ounces (11 g)
Splash, water and dust resistance: Rated IP67 (maximum depth of 1 meter up to 30 minutes)
Connectivity: Bluetooth 5.0
Battery: Replaceable CR2032 coin cell battery

The only minor annoyance about AirTags

An AirTag includes Bluetooth, the U1 Ultra Wideband chip and an NFC chip to share basic details when it’s in Lost Mode. That’s all powered by a CR2032 coin cell battery, which in my experience lasts roughly a year before I need to replace it.

I get notified when a battery is starting to get low, although there’s no gauge to see how much is left until it goes into the red. And it’s easy to change batteries. But my small fleet of AirTags means I need to swap multiple ones each year. I buy them in packs of 20 that I slowly work through.

AirTags also make great gifts

Apple AirTags consistently appear in our gift guides throughout the year because you can always find another use for one. They’re often reduced in price when sold in packs of four. And there’s an ever-growing ecosystem of ways to mount them, from sturdy vaults that adhere to a car to discrete fabric holders that will keep your favorite classic bomber jacket from flying away. Whenever I show someone how I use AirTags on a bag or keychain, I kind of wish I had a pocket full of AirTags to hand out because once someone sees how it works, they’re sold.

When will this deal expire?

We don’t know how long this deal will last. We see four-packs available at this discounted price pretty frequently throughout the year, but it could expire at any time without notice. I recommend placing your order while you can be sure to get this price, because I’m confident you’ll find new uses for them once you have a few.

Technologies

How to Use the New Blood Pressure Tool on Your Samsung Galaxy Watch

You’ll need additional hardware to use the blood pressure monitoring tool on your Samsung Galaxy smartwatch.

After years of regional limits, Samsung is finally unlocking blood pressure monitoring for Galaxy Watch users in the U.S. Starting Tuesday, the feature is rolling out to the current Galaxy Watch 8 series as well as older models dating back to the Galaxy Watch 4. It’s a major addition for anyone tracking cardiovascular trends, but you shouldn’t expect a simple «plug and play» experience.

For starters, you’ll need to own (or buy) a traditional upper-arm blood pressure cuff to calibrate the feature on the smartwatch. And you’ll have to download a separate app, the Samsung Health Monitor app, on your smartphone. Then you’ll have to recalibrate with the cuff every 28 days to ensure accurate readings.

In other words, the blood pressure monitor requires a blood pressure monitor to function.

Samsung first introduced blood pressure monitoring on its watches in 2020, gradually rolling it out in other countries, but regulatory holdups kept it from being usable in the US.

Unlike Samsung’s ECG and sleep apnea detection features (both FDA-cleared), the blood pressure feature has not received FDA clearance and is intended for wellness purposes only. This means it is not a diagnostic tool and should not be used to identify or treat high blood pressure. Readings are also on-demand only, so you have to manually take them through the watch rather than having it happen automatically in the background.

That last part may change. Samsung’s announcement also noted that passive blood pressure trend monitoring is coming later this year.

Apple debuted FDA-cleared hypertension alerts on newer Apple Watch models in September 2025, which passively monitor and alert owners when it detects signs of high blood pressure. Oura and other wearable companies are working toward similar features through long-term data trends, though true on-demand blood pressure readings remain out of reach for most mainstream consumer smartwatches.

The blood pressure feature is compatible with Galaxy Watch 4 and will only work on watches paired with a Samsung Galaxy phone running Android 12 or higher. It will not be available on other Android phones or on Samsung’s Galaxy Fit tracker. And even if you check all those boxes, you might not get it right away. Samsung says it’s rolling out the feature in phases.

If you do have access (and a cuff handy), setup is fairly straightforward. Once your watch is connected to your phone, download the Samsung Health Monitor app, enable blood pressure tracking and follow the calibration steps while using your upper-arm cuff. Just know you’ll need that cuff nearby anytime you want to keep your readings accurate.

Technologies

Google Upgrades Maps Features With More Gemini and Faster Photo Uploads

Google Maps strengthens its crowdsourcing efforts for its 500 million contributors.

Google announced three new features for Maps on Tuesday that should streamline sharing your experiences. Despite being a strong maps application itself, Google relies on everyday users to contribute their reviews, photos and videos so others doing research can make more informed decisions about places they plan to visit. With the new updates to Google Maps, you can access your photos faster to contribute to information about places you’ve been. You can also choose to have Google’s AI model, Gemini, caption your photos and more quickly check the contributions you’ve made in the past.

New photo and video recommendations

It’s not hard to share photos or videos for a location on Google Maps, but the app will now offer photo and video suggestions from your saved images — if you give it permission to do so. The new feature will appear on the Contribute tab at the bottom of the maps app. When scrolling through the view, you’ll see photo and video recommendations or the option to upload other photos.

How the specific photo and video recommendations are determined isn’t clear, but the new feature will likely use a photo’s geolocation if that setting is enabled in your camera’s settings.

A Google representative didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

This feature is now available globally on Android and will expand to iOS in the coming months.

Gemini will auto-caption your photos

Google’s giving your photos some Gemini power by automatically analyzing and captioning them once you’ve selected them to share. This could be helpful in situations where you have selected several photos you don’t care to caption.

If you don’t like what Gemini comes up with, you can edit or remove the caption completely before publishing your photos to Maps.

Gemini captions are available in English on iOS and will expand to other languages globally and Android in the future.

New ways to view your contributions

You can now show off your prior contributions to Google’s Local Guide community program.

When you contribute, you gain points, and the more you contribute, the more you can level up as a Local Guide. All your points and badges are now prominently displayed on your profile. Google’s also adding gold profiles for high-level contributors, so you know you’re reading reviews from experienced users.

The new contributor updates are rolling out now on Android, iOS and desktop.

Technologies

This New Health-Tracking Pet Collar Is Like a Smartwatch for Dogs and Cats

Tractive announces two new smart collars armed with GPS tracking, AI-powered health monitoring and other tech tools.

Our pets can’t speak up and tell us how they’re feeling, or why and where they are hiding. Tractive, an Austria- and Seattle-based tech company that creates GPS tracking devices for pets, announced on Wednesday two new smart collars that, according to the press release, «will redefine pet care for millions of families.»

Is your pet stressed, breathing unusually or scratching too much? Much like the basic health-tracking features you can find on a smartwatch, the collars — the Cat 6 Mini ($79) and Dog 6 XL ($89) — are designed to track this behavior and communicate the issues to help maintain your dog or cat’s quality of life.

«Pets can’t tell us when something is wrong, but their bodies can,» Michael Hurnaus, CEO and founder of Tractive, said in a statement. «With cutting-edge sensors on every tracker, learnings from millions of pets and AI-powered insights, we’re turning one of the world’s largest pet data platforms into clear, simple information so pet parents can act sooner and care even better.»

When it comes to tracking collars, dogs have usually been the target pet audience for such devices. Tractive’s new Cat 6 Mini collar aims to provide the same service for your feline friend. You can use it to monitor your cat’s respiratory rate and resting heart rate and identify any health concerns early. It’s expected to ship on May 31.

The Dog 6 XL collar, an upgrade from the company’s previous dog wearable, is designed for dogs weighing over 55 pounds. It’s more durable for outdoor use and offers up to four weeks of battery life between charges. It comes equipped with a scratch-monitoring system that flags unusual scratching behavior caused by allergies, skin irritants and other stressors.

You can also use the app to access your pet’s travels and mark safe zones regarding walks, entries and exits. An AI-powered health hub displays your pet’s overall health stats and also acts as a GPS tracker in case your dog or cat goes missing.

How would a veterinarian interact with the data collected on the device?

A Tractive representative told CNET, «In our experience, veterinarians are most interested in baseline resting heart and respiratory rate, so it’s less about monitoring these vitals in real time during recovery from anesthesia/acute care and more about understanding if the baseline is changing day to day to identify the onset of new conditions or manage existing ones.»

Even though the collars use a SIM card and require a strong cellular connection to work properly, they can capture activity, sleep and health data while offline. However, without connectivity, the devices «ultimately will not provide any utility,» the representative confirmed.

You’ll need to download the accompanying app and select a separate subscription plan at an added cost. The one-year plan costs $120, the two-year plan costs $168, and the five-year plan costs $300.