Rita El Khoury / Android Authority
It’s been nearly a year since Google launched its AirTag-competitor network, Find My Device. In the time since, we’ve seen more Bluetooth trackers released that work with this network, added support for people finding, and signs of more features to come, like ultra-wideband (UWB) for short-range direction and locating.
But nothing proves the network’s immaturity and lack of features more than the two best trackers you can buy today: the Chipolo POP and Moto Tag. Both are packed full of extras, but in order to get those, you have to use a third-party app.
Motorola and Chipolo took a workaround to add more features
Rita El Khoury / Android Authority
Google’s Find My Device is as barebones as tracking and finding application could ever be. You can see a device or a Bluetooth tag’s current location and battery level, navigate to it if it’s far, or ring it if it’s nearby. Plus, you can change its name or category, and share it with another family member. That’s it. Even Apple has added a left-behind notification option for its AirTag and other Find My-compatible trackers, but Google doesn’t offer this feature yet. And let’s not talk about Tile or Samsung’s Find apps, because those offer way more features, like a location history, customizable tracker ringing volumes, and smart home compatibility.
So, in order to differentiate themselves, the best Find My Device trackers out there have had to circumvent Google’s lack of options by adding more features through their own apps. When I set up the Moto Tag and the Chipolo POP, I saw pop-ups recommending I download the Moto Tag app and Chipolo app, respectively.
Rita El Khoury / Android Authority
The two tags still work with the Find My Device network and still appear inside the official Google Find My Device app, but installing their apps opens up the door to many more useful options.
Without their standalone apps, the Moto Tag and Chipolo POP would be limited to Find My Device’s barebones features.
With the Moto Tag, I can choose the tracker’s ringtone among four options, set up a reverse-finding feature where double-pressing the Tag’s button rings my phone (with the option to pick loudness levels), use that same button as a remote shutter for my camera app, and update the tracker’s firmware.
The Chipolo POP offers similar features with even more extras. 12 ringtone choices, the option to turn on the flashlight when reverse-finding the phone, a basic selfie shutter, plus the ever-useful out-of-range alert which reminds me when I’ve left my tracker behind.
All of these are essential features that other trackers like the Samsung Galaxy SmartTag2 or Tile trackers had implemented many moons ago, and that traditional Bluetooth trackers had before Google’s Find My Device became a thing. I didn’t know how much I needed the left-behind alert until it saved me from walking away from my house keys once. Or how much I appreciate the reverse-ringing feature in a house with three floors — I never know where my phone is until I ring it.
I thought the whole point was to avoid proprietary apps
Rita El Khoury / Android Authority
All of this really highlights the weakness and basicness of Google’s Find My Device platform. Motorola and Chipolo had to go the proprietary route to add necessary features to their trackers, while other brands and earlier trackers are left with a more barebones feature set because they stuck to the official Find My Device spec.
And it leaves me feeling even more disappointed with Google’s implementation. It seems relatively easy to add more features on top of the network — essential features that many people are used to seeing on Bluetooth trackers, like reverse-finding, left-behind alerts, customizable ringtones, and more. So why not add them to the default Find My Device spec? Why not let every tracker benefit from them instead of forcing me to run two extra apps in the background and give them location access with many extra permissions?
Requiring a third-party app to offer more features negates half of the benefits of the Find My Device unification.
The whole point of Apple’s Find My and Google’s Find My Device networks is to unify tracking across iOS and Android devices, respectively. They both want to provide a larger and more reliable network, plus an easy base on which many companies can build their trackers. No more proprietary apps, no more fragmented networks. Yet the reality is different today, and the Moto Tag and Chipolo POP are the best examples of this: We still need standalone apps because Google (and Apple, but that’s not my focus here) can’t offer the basic features on its own.
Personally, I’d prefer if the differences between trackers were hardware-based: shapes, dimensions, battery longevity, charging or replaceability, etc. Not software-based, with some trackers going the extra mile to add more features while requiring me to download an extra app. Fix this, Google, please.
