(See bottom for tl;dr.)
I’m the kind of person who loses their keys easily, so I love the idea of trackers: little devices that you can attach to your wallet, phone, or keyring that connect via bluetooth to an app on your phone to help you find it.
Problem is pretty much all the options I can find are run by companies with shitty privacy policies: Tile, Apple AirTag, Chipolo, and so forth.
- Tile collects shitloads of data and is partnered with Amazon to boot;
- Apple Airtags AFAIK only work with Apple devices, and besides it’s Apple so no thank you; and
- Chipolo also collects shitloads of data and shares information with data brokers and data collection companies of all stripes. No thank you.
In any case, I really don’t need a location network larger than maybe 200 meters (about 650 feet). If I lose my keys, odds are it’s either in my car or in my house, and my house is like 100 square meters (about 1000 square feet). So Bluetooth is really all I need. I don’t even need to see it on a map; I just need for it to ding or something.
I’m currently using Tile but I really want to get away from it. Worst case scenario, I’ll stop using the Tile, but I really am a forgetful little shit. Lol.
tl;dr – Looking for recommendations for ideally short-range Bluetooth trackers for keys with decent privacy. Max required range = 200 m (650 ft). Also, pie tastes great. Cheers.
Just get in the habit of checking for your keys before you go through any door. It takes no mental effort once it’s a habit. If they aren’t in your pocket (or in my case a lanyard) then they are in that room or vehicle, so you should recover them before going out. This method worked for me 100% for decades. It only failed after I got married and my wife started stealing them. But it’s usually not too hard to find her.
Agreed! “Keys-Wallet-Phone”. Say this every time you go somewhere. Been using this for decades and it always works.
Imagine losing your wife. That’d be a strange experience!
(Also, excellent idea. I used to do that, but didn’t work 100% of the time; maybe with some modifications it might work better than it did…)
Edit: I just realized that put me in a bookstore and suddenly I’m the wife that someone would lose. Lol.