Where do you put your Air Tag?

I bought a keychain attachment and just hooked it to one of the zipper pulls inside of my bag.

I have mine in an outer pocket on the bag. To make it harder to lose, I sealed it in a letter-sized envelope, on which I wrote with a red Sharpie "Home Notes" in some half-baked effort at making it "discreet"... (?)

Edit to add: My half-baked, homemade solution was born of a situation like yours—I impulsively bought the device just before a trip. 8 months and 4 trips later and I still haven't bothered rethinking it.

My backpack has a little zippered pocket in one of the shoulder straps. Airtag can go there.

For the roller-duffle, there is a zippered sleeve on the backside of the opening flap. We plan to hand-sew a little pocket there just to keep the airtag from floating around.

I bought a set of four. Since my phone is Android, I paired two to my iPad. The other two will be paired to my wife's iPhone. For this trip, I'll actually stick two in the backpack and two in the duffle, one each of mine and one of my wife's. That way there is backup if I lose track of my backpack (which might have both the iPac and my Mac).

I just got my 4 pack last week. I ordered them after reading a post here. We’re going to put them in the small zipper pouch in our suitcase. I never use it otherwise. The other 2 we gave to our travel companions as a gift.

For those reading, Target may have them as well. I got mine there last Spring.

I first started out putting it in a cute embroidered silk drawstring bag that I used to use for ear buds BUT I could not remember what I had in it (eye roll!). I put it back in the white cardboard folder and just tuck it in the small zipper pocket running along the back inside of my suitcase. It does shout out to someone if they open my bag but it's behind some stuff (packages of kleenex) in the zipper pocket.

Probably no help at this point, but I bought the keychain type holder for it and safety pinned it to the mesh zip cover that is on one side of my suitcase (inside). I am sure if someone opened my suitcase and looked for it, they could easily see it - I wasn’t thinking about hiding it, just about keeping it in place and intact. But they would have to be trying.

I also put one in my smaller carryon in case I put that down somewhere and forget it. It’s possible. My kids have threatened to attach one to me…..

I put ours in a Ziploc snack bag and buried it among the clothes.

I bought a 4 pack and some holders. I put one in a small zippered section in the back of my suitcase and tethered one to my carryon back. My hubby did the same with his.

I was in Oregon last week so stopped at the Bridgeport store and bought a 4 pack plus 4 holders. I purposefully waited to buy there Ruth no tax, but I probably lucked out that they had them! I plan on attaching it to a zipper pull inside or else at the base of where the toe firm straps are, so under the clothes.

We bought a 4-pack; 2 for each of us along with key ring holders. The Air Tag is so small and slippery. I put one in a zippered pocket inside my suitcase. We are flying today and it’s been reassuring to track my suitcase. So far so good. One more leg to go!
The other Air Tag is in my small daypack. I sewed rings inside the backpack and I hooked the AirTag to one of those rings.

Search the web for the topic and read some of the stories from experienced and novice AirTag users when traveling. The tag will not actually help you obtain your luggage, if that's what you're hoping for. It will tell you where on the planet the thing is as long as another networked device is within its range.

Be sure to read up on how AirTags work, how the software works, and practice using yours before you try to rely on it or expect it to deliver useful information in a situation. Put one in your spouse's pocket when he/she goes out for the day and see if you can find it and track it on your phone.

I put them in something that is harder to miss or slip out. You don't need to hide it - if a thief gets in, they'll take everything else first. I wrapped mine up in a wad of duct tape and taped it to the bottom.

I bought mine in Target. Seen them many other places.

Thanks everyone—this is helpful and interesting.

We do not expect it to help us obtain our luggage, but should the bag not arrive on the carousel with the rest of the luggage from the flight, we can at least figure out where it might be, and decide what to do then.

Mikliz—-what are “toe firm straps”?

Carol—hope you have a save and uneventful flight, with no lost luggage!

We just flew from TPA to Dubrovnik on United. through Chicago/Frankfurt with airtags in checked bags and carry ons. Our last leg was on Croatian airlines (United Code Share). Once the plane landed in Frankfurt United stopped providing tracking info on our bags. It was comforting to see the bags in the Frankfurt terminal and again at the plane as you are bused out to an apron location away from the terminal. All went well. You can buy very inexpensive silicone cases that make it easer to find in a zipper pocket or use it to hook somewhere in you luggage.

Lola, I feel the same little bit of comfort in being able to see where my bag is, thanks to having the air tag. It was easily tracked for all my flights for two trips back and forth to Europe this summer. Mine is in a zippered pocket inside my bag. I also have one attached flat in a special holder to my dog’s collar so if he should decide to “travel” (escape) again, at least me or someone in my neighborhood will have an idea of where he’s headed!

I just traveled a short trip ABQ-BUR-ABQ on Southwest. I had left items and a bag at my daughter's house and had to check bags on my return home. I put my new AirTags (purchased 4 for $85 in the recent Amazon Days) in clear plastic tag holders (also on Amazon) and placed them inside small Brighton jewelry pouches that you get free when buying jewelry. I put each pouch in a side pocket of the bags.

I had labeled each tag with unique names when setting them up on my phone. I put a slip of paper with each item name inside the Brighton pouch, with the tag. I store travel items in dresser drawers between trips. This method ensures I will always know which tag goes with which bag or purse.

Lola--Omg, I was up with the puppy WAY too early today so that was a horrible auto correct! I meant the base of the straps inside the luggage that you cinch down once your clothes are packed. Does that make sense?

Great topic! I will be using an AirTag for the first time on my trip to Switzerland next month and have been thinking about where to put it. I may tape it inside the outside pocket of my checked bag. I experienced my first ever lost bag this past June returning from Ireland and while I know it wouldn’t have helped me retrieve my bag (it did finally get to me two days later) I would much rather have known where it was instead of the, “we’re looking for you bag” message I kept getting on the United website. Enjoy you trip!

Too funny! Yes, that makes sense now.

What kind of puppy? We have decided not to get another because losing our sweet Labrador after 13 great years was just too hard. So I have to get my “puppy fix” vicariously, from hearing about other peoples’ pets. You just reminded me how much work it is to raise a puppy!

Lola, sounds like you have plenty of ideas but I'll throw mine in anyway. :) I just toss mine into the mesh zippered section of my bag then throw a couple of innocuous things on top to (sort of) hide it, like notebooks or underwear. I figure no one will be rooting around in my undies.

Lola--Golden Retriever. We lost our older one to cancer back in January, and also have a 3 yr old one. The puppy is from the same breeder as the 3 yr old and she is actually her niece. We are so fortunate as our kids will dog/house sit for us and if they are busy, good friends have 2 Goldens from the same breeder and they dog sit for us a lot too. I know how good we have it! The new pup is not quite 4 months, so still isn't into sleeping in much;)

Lola, happy to report that we, along with our 2 suitcases arrived in Rome this afternoon. We had a long layover in Seattle and at one point our suitcases were .4 miles away.
We were delayed in Amsterdam, due to shortage of Air Traffic controllers, but we were thankful to see that our bags were right under us. So, delay did not cause us any anxiety.
I hope you and your Air tags make it to your destination together.

Carol, so glad to hear you arrived safely and with your bags!

Mikliz, we lost our Labrador to cancer too (melanoma). Apparently both Labs and Goldens are subject to this. The tumor was in her mouth and when it started bleeding we knew her time had come. The vet came to the house and I held her in my arms at the end. I just can’t do that again.

Lola--Ours has mast cell tumor and fight it for a year. They got it all, but it came back within 3 months. She was very happy until the end. With Covid, we used a service that comes to the house so all of us could be here. We fed her Dick's burgers and chocolate brownies at the very end. Our dogs never get human food except veggies, and she gobbled those up! It is so hard to lose them, but our other was lost without her and needed a companion. The new pup has been an amazing addition!

Back to the Air tags. I need to pull them out of the bag this weekend and get them figured out so I am not scrambling at the last minute.

I'll chime in with my "Air Tags are helpful" experience.... we don't check bags, but we do have a special needs stroller for my son that gets gate checked on every flight. I put an Air Tag on it before our Spain trip earlier this year, and it was great to know that the stroller had arrived with us at each airport.

Then, on the way home, the stroller didn't show up at the gate in Burlington. The gate agent looked all over for it under the plane and then told us we'd better go out to baggage claim and see if it might be there. I was able to show her its location on my phone (it was still on the plane), and she went back and found it. Saved us a lot of time and back-and-forth at the end of a very long travel day.

FWIW, I have the tag attached with a keychain to the stroller frame, and it's been fine through several trips.

And Lola and mikliz, I'm sorry for your canine losses. We also have a retriever (Golden) who had a mast cell tumor when he was 5. So scary. Luckily, his was caught very early and he is now a happy 11-year-old. mikliz, enjoy your new baby! There is nothing cuter than a Golden puppy!!

There seems to be a theory that the AirTag is going to reunite you with your luggage. Nope. All you know it’s lost in airport x. Nothing will get it to you any faster.

Carol, true they won’t magically reunite you with your luggage but they are very helpful with staying up with it. Recently I got on a flight and for some reason my luggage did not. No huge deal except I could see ahead of time that it never moved terminals - so I knew ahead of time it didn’t come with me. Likewise, after I was home, I could see when it moved the next morning and when it got to my airport. Flip side a week later, it arrived and I didn’t. But I knew it had gone on ahead of me and where it was.

I could have used one a trip before that when for some reason it got sent ahead of me and my flight was delayed till well after after midnight arrival. Almost no staff on hand to send all of us looking for our luggage to the appropriate locker. It would have saved massively jet lagged me some time in the middle of the night. At that point even half an hour would have been appreciated.:) That, of course, would depend on someone with an iPhone near the locker but out of at least 50 of us trickling to the correct area, odds were good.

My daughter is headed to university overseas this fall, and most students in her situation are also using air tags. I saw a recommendation to put them in a jacket pocket or a purse/bag inside the luggage - less likely to get lost while unpacking and more memorable on arrival. Also not a bad place for them while travelling - I have been known to forget a light jacket in a restaurant on a pleasant day, or my purse on rare occasion.

I too am wondering whether this is a good thing or not. How healthy is it to be checking your phone for your bag the whole time you are waiting for it at the carousel? So you find out it is in the airport, because of all the other iPhones out there picking up its signal... What then? "Sir, my bag is downstairs in with all the other baggage... AANNNND....". I WANT to want one of these things, but fear it is not going to be that helpful after all. How often does the airline lose your stuff for good? Hardly ever. They get it to you eventually.

There seems to be a theory that the AirTag is going to reunite you with your luggage. Nope. All you know it’s lost in airport x. Nothing will get it to you any faster.

Probably true, but it could save some frustration. If your bag was still in the prior airport, at least you’d know to go fill out a claim instead of searching every carousel just to see if it had been put on the wrong one. I had a bag that was lost for 5 days. During that time I had no clue where it was. Neither did SAS. I wasn’t sure if someone had taken it, if it had been misrouted, or if it had been left behind. Had I known it was sitting in some airport, I could have at least communicated it to the customer service agent and would have assumed that the bag would ultimately be delivered to me. Instead, I wondered for 5 days if I would ever see it.

Now in Europe with Tiles in our bags, every time we leave our room there is a signal within a few minutes that our luggage is at whatever address we just departed.

I am thinking of putting a Tile in my husband’s pocket next time we are in Home Depot so I can ping him when he wanders off.

Laurel, with my AirTags, I have a feature to turn off notifications - just for that reason. I can still choose to track at any point in time, but I don’t have that pop up letting me know my backpack is in the room every time I walk off for dinner. LOL.

TTMom, we find it amusing.

Laurel--that is funny;)

I bought the Air Tags for our trip next month, but will get to test it out for a domestic trip this upcoming week. I am only doing carryon, but am still taking the AT with me. I need to mail some valuable items home from my moms, so I will put the air tag in that box, so if UPS loses it, I will know exactly where it is. A test run of sorts.

phoffen2001 - I see your point, but here was how everything worked out. While at our origin airport, we could see 2 of 3 bags had arrived at our planned gate - and one had not. We boarded the plane, and it still was elsewhere at the airport. Daughter was able to process it's status and accept it wouldn't arrive. Husband and I were able to start discussing a Plan B in case we had to go search for it in the massive warehouse that our destination airport was using to hold lost luggage. As we had a few days of college shopping to do, this was both problematic, and important to discuss before we landed, exhausted and jet-lagged.

15 minutes before we taxied away from the gate, the bag showed up on the last luggage cart to load onto the plane. All bags arrived at our destination. But if we had known only 2 would arrive, we would have collected just those and gone to complete the lost luggage paperwork. Without the Air Tag, we would have believed all 3 bags must have come together, and waited a LONG time before completing the paperwork.

We also learned if you don't turn off the Air Tag locator search when you no longer need it, it will seriously drain your battery.

I used my Air tag for the first time yesterday. I had to gate check my bag as they ran out of room in the overhead bins. We had to walk to the plane outside so I handed it directly to the man who was going to load it onto the plane. About an hour into the flight I get a notice saying my bag was left behind at SEA and the pin location on the map showed it in Shelton. I panicked as I absolutely had to have that bag. Turns out once we landed it said it was at OAK so all was good, but it sent me into a frenzy for a while.

Yes, the trick is to look at the last known time. AND to know it won’t register when not in range of an iPhone. I have seen mine sitting by (or in) the plane after I board but before we take off. But watching it be delivered to me in Gdansk after being left at Newark was tricky. Apparently not as many people had iPhones there, so following the delivery was not seamless. But definitely useful since I needed to wait for it in the dark outside my apartment building! When it started to ping off my phone I knew to start looking for it walking around on the street somewhere! 😂

Texastravelmom--Yes, that gave me quite the scare!

I needed to ship home some family heirlooms so when I took it all to UPS, I tossed my AirTag in with it. I can see today exactly where the package is. It will be interesting to follow it for the next few days.

I had done a couple of test packs a few weeks ago and yesterday did my final pack. AFTER I packed I could not remember where I'd stashed the dang AirTag....thought I was going to have to unload the whole thing but no, there was the white cardboard holder peeking out from behind some ziplock bags. Moved it to the toe of my spare shoes! Now to remember how to check it, hahaha!!

I bought four air tags for my just-completed trip to Italy. I have an iPad and MAC, but Android phone, my wife has an iPhone, MAC, and iPad. I paired two of the tags to my Apple account, one each for my bag and backpack. The other two i paired to my wife's account, ditto bag/backpack. I simply took the two "baggage" tags and folded a packet from a 3x5 card stapled together, and slipped them into an internal zippered pocket in my bag.

Returning yesterday through ORD baggage from my flight from Zurich was grossly delayed (2 1/2--3 hours!) due to broked outside baggage transfer belt, and my connection in Zurich was tighter than planned due to delayed departure from Rome, so it was reassuring to see that my bag was in fact in Chicago.

Like TexasTravelmon said, pay attention to the time stamp on location information. The location info wont update unless someone with an Apple device (phone or tablet) passes nearby. You can get a false sense of security when actually the bag has moved on.

My UPS package arrived yesterday and while I had an email from UPS saying it was out for delivery, it was nice to be able to look at my phone and see just where the truck was. It was a good little test run for it!

mikliz97, glad it worked for you!

Mine has been fun and reassuring, but was extremely useful at the beginning of this trip….