Following the rush at global airports, Apple’s authorized resellers are reporting a sharp jump in Airtag sales in Israel
Photo: Giktiim
In recent weeks we have witnessed photos and videos documenting the chaos that is taking place in the aviation industry: from huge queues, long hours of checks, flight cancellations and increasing cases of luggage loss, while sometimes the airlines themselves have no idea where your luggage is. But now it turns out that at least for the last problem – Israelis have found a technological solution: Apple’s AirTag.
Significant jump in sales in one month
AirTag is Apple’s accessible locator tag, which you can attach to items you do not want to lose, such as a wallet or keychain. The tag constantly transmits its location in the energy-efficient Bluetooth BLE, so that every iPhone that passes by the tag picks up its signals and transmits its location in the world via the very smart Find My network.
Talks we have had with a number of Apple’s authorized resellers in Israel show that in June, in parallel with the increase in reports of luggage loss around the world, there was a significant jump in AirTag’s sales in Israel. The KSP network, for example, reports a sharp increase in demand for AirTags during June – compared to previous months; Other industry sources we spoke to say that AirTags sales have doubled; And the iDigital network reports a 200% increase in Airtag sales from January to April compared to last year, and a 50% increase in sales in June compared to May. Another network reported that more customers prefer to purchase the AirTag Quartet package over the individual units.
Why AirTag
Can also be put on the suitcase. Photo: Giktiim
So what’s the point of using search tags like Apple’s to find out where your suitcase is? After all, she would not help the ground crews get her on the plane. Well, first of all, peace of mind. When you get on the plane, you can see that the suitcase is in your same location – that is, it is likely that it was loaded on the plane, and you will meet it at the destination, and as we have seen in recent weeks, it is not obvious.
In cases where the suitcase has not reached you, the Find My network will become your best friend. Your AirTag sends light and anonymous Bluetooth signals that are picked up by other Apple devices, and without being aware of it, they help locate your AirTag. Thus, it is enough for someone near your suitcase to move near it with an iPhone, and you can see in the Find My app the latest location of the airtag. If you enable Lost Mode, you will be notified the next time the tag is activated. It is likely that someday, someone with an iPhone will pass by your suitcase, wherever it is, thus allowing you to know where it is and how to act in front of the airline.
Then there is the extreme case we have come to in recent weeks. We’ve all seen videos of mountains of suitcases sitting in airports, and in case you find yourself in lost and lost rooms, you can use the U1 chip to accurately locate your suitcase in a pile in a kind of “hot-cold” game combined with some AR and effects The fetish vibration is pretty good.
And hey, even if just your suitcase reaches the carousel, you can turn on the locator mode to get a slight vibration if your iPhone manages to connect to the airtag on the suitcase, and save yourself the constant search and the question “is this really my suitcase?”. To the life of the troubles of the first world.
moment. What if I have an Android?
Photo: Samsung
In Israel, Android dominates a large majority of the smartphone market, and unfortunately, AirTag does not work in any way with Android devices – so if you do not have any iOS users at home, this is not the device for you.
Still, if you’re on the Android side of the map, you still have a few options: Until Apple manages to kill it, Tile and Chipolo are still marketing their tracking tags. The main disadvantage of tags is the chances of detection. Their networks do not rely on the Find My network, which has almost all the iPhones in the world, but on an internal network of Tile and Chipolo users, which means that the chances that another user with the app will pass by your tag drop drastically. So this is not a comprehensive solution like the AirTag in my opinion.
One that can become an interesting option is Samsung’s SmartTag: it already comes with a keychain hole so you can attach it to your suitcase with wire or all sorts of accessories you have, and it uses the Galaxy Find network to identify itself with its blood for an airtag. Samsung still sells and sells more smartphones than Apple, so theoretically, you have an even greater chance that a user with a Galaxy device will go past the SmartTag and help you authenticate it. Just like Apple, Samsung’s SmartTag only works with Samsung devices, so if you’re with a different brand – this is not your lucky day, and you may need to look for a true classic GPS component.
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A good old age
Born with a joystick in hand. He has far too many gadgets and far too little free time to play with them all. An unexplained hammer holder for calibrating device batteries. When he’s not busy writing about technology, he likes to talk about it, and a lot
