Rita El Khoury / Android Authority
Have you ever tried finding your Android cellphone whereas it is shut down?
4 votes
Check 1: Pixel 9 Professional vs Moto Tag vs iPhone 13 Professional Max
To check out Google’s offline-finding function, I needed to put my Pixel 9 Professional up towards some controls. I used the iPhone 13 Professional Max as an Apple Discover My controller and the Moto Tag as a comparability level for Google’s Discover My System community. In spite of everything, if all the community wasn’t working as anticipated, then I couldn’t blame offline discovering for not delivering an correct location.
At 3 AM, proper earlier than heading to mattress, I turned off the 2 telephones with loads of battery left (although this could work even when the primary battery is depleted) and took the battery out of the Moto Tag. The subsequent morning, my husband slipped them into his backpack and went to work. He put the Moto Tag battery again in round 11 AM, stored the 2 telephones powered off, and I began checking the place we had been at.
The iPhone had been pinging its location all morning and was final seen two minutes in the past proper subsequent to my husband’s work. The Moto Tag took a couple of minutes to catch up, however rapidly confirmed an identical location. The Pixel 9 Professional? Final seen at 2:56 AM at residence after I final powered it off. It hadn’t up to date its location as soon as within the 9 hours since. Take into account that my husband carries a Pixel 7 Professional with the Discover My System community energetic and taking part in all areas; he doesn’t have an iPhone.
I stored checking all through the afternoon, and the state of affairs remained the identical. Clearly, Google’s Discover My System community was working, however one thing was stopping the Pixel 9 Professional from displaying up.
Come 6:40 PM, when my husband was on his approach again residence, each the powered-off iPhone and the Moto Tag had been sharing his up to date location, whereas the Pixel 9 Professional stubbornly caught to “final seen 2:56 AM.” Even by the point my husband was residence and the Pixel 9 Professional was actually again subsequent to me, it refused to replace its location. It took till 8:15 PM for a miracle to occur and the Discover My System app to indicate me that the cellphone was seen at residence.
It up to date its location as soon as extra through the night, then went off the map once more. By comparability, the iPhone stored updating its location each couple of minutes till ~2 AM, i.e., it accomplished the promised 24 hours of offline discovering that Apple mentions in its description of the function.
The primary take a look at was a complete catastrophe and my cellphone wasn’t positioned till an hour after it was again subsequent to me.
I repeated this take a look at the following day with comparable outcomes and that is the place it occurred to me that my Pixel 9 Professional is working the Android 16 beta. I couldn’t discover a filed bug round this subject, so I wasn’t certain if it was a identified downside, a novel downside with my unit, or a basic discover when offline subject, no matter beta software program or not. However I didn’t need to dismiss Google’s efforts primarily based on a cellphone working beta firmware, so I carried on my exams with a Pixel 9 Professional Fold on Android 15 secure.
Extra exams: Pixel 9 Professional Fold on Android 15 secure
To start out off, I wanted a fast take a look at to make it possible for the Pixel 9 Professional Fold would behave as anticipated when powered off. I powered it off on 6:22 PM one night earlier than heading out to Paris and packed it in my very own backpack. It by no means left my aspect, so I wasn’t counting on some other cellphone or community to search out it — simply my very own main cellphone, the Pixel 9 Professional XL.
That fast take a look at was successful. The Fold was detected close to me all through the night, till 9 PM after I headed again residence. So the function works, in concept — not less than when the cellphone doesn’t depart my aspect. As soon as once more, I began blaming Android 16 beta for my early failure on the Pixel 9 Professional and was trying ahead to testing issues once more.
For my third take a look at, I turned off the Pixel 9 Professional Fold at 11 PM and despatched it with my husband once more the following day, March 28 (the date is essential). I stored checking Discover My System to see if it had detected the cellphone, however it stored insisting it was final seen at residence all through the day. I swear, at this level, I assumed I used to be going insane. How might the cellphone be “final seen,” i.e., actively updating its location at residence, within the jap suburbs, but additionally be bodily with my husband midway throughout Paris? I don’t know. I actually requested him to double-check twice that he had the Fold with him, and never another cellphone.
The cellphone was ‘seen’ at residence though it was with my husband, and the situation corrected two days later… in some way.
By this level, I had simply given up on attempting to see if Discover My System works with powered-off telephones. I turned off the app, didn’t test something once more, and simply went on with my life. I had different exams and extra essential issues to do than to maintain giving second probabilities to a function that doesn’t work. A couple of days later, as I noticed the powered-off Pixel 9 Professional Fold at my desk, I assumed, “Hey, see if something modified with that location.” And that is when… You’d assume I used to be mendacity if I didn’t have a screenshot for this.
Okay, so enable me to clarify. On March 28, when the cellphone was truly with my husband in the midst of Paris, it informed me it was “seen” at residence all through the day. However two days later, Discover My System tells me that the cellphone was truly seen two days earlier at 12:12 PM in Paris, proper the place it truly, bodily was. What occurred there, why the overlap, why the Schrödinger cat state of affairs, and why the buggy location whereas checking, and the proper location later? I don’t know.
If I had actually misplaced my cellphone and never given it to the protected palms of my husband, I’d’ve by no means been capable of finding it. Or by the point I did, it will’ve been too late.
Additionally, discover that the final time the cellphone’s location was up to date was almost 13 hours after it was powered off — removed from the iPhone’s 24 hours of energetic location.
You possibly can inform that by then, I used to be greater than annoyed with this little experiment, however I made a decision to provide it another go, only for the pleasure (learn: torture) of all of it. I powered off my Pixel 9 Professional Fold at 8:14 PM on April 10 and took it with me whereas looking for new backyard tools. I knew that, as soon as once more, I used to be giving it an unfair benefit by retaining subsequent to me, however I needed to see if it’d bug out even with that.
The primary couple of minutes had been peachy. The cellphone was detected close to me — I might even see the final battery stage and operator it was linked to. However half an hour later, the situation stopped getting up to date though it was actually in my backpack. I wasn’t in a distant location both, in case you’re questioning in regards to the privateness facet of Discover My System; I went to an enormous division retailer, took a crowded bus, and waited in the midst of a busy sq. for one more bus. For the following 4 hours, till previous midnight, the final seen location was 8:28 PM, and Discover My System wouldn’t inform me that the cellphone was nonetheless close to me, though I had already returned residence with it in my backpack.
Is it simply me? Perhaps I’m cursed.
Rita El Khoury / Android Authority
In spite of everything of this, I reached out to my colleague Mishaal Rahman who’s been overlaying Android 15’s offline discovering function because it first confirmed up as a teaser and proper till it was introduced after which rolled out to different telephones. I requested him if he’d truly examined it completely and the reply was that he did a couple of occasions, it labored for him, and he’s seen suggestions from different people who mentioned it really works, too.
Everybody retains telling me that the Discover My System community has improved loads too, and though I’ve seen that, I nonetheless run throughout extra reliability points than I’d like for a community that’s supposed to assist me discover my misplaced gadgets in a bind.
I’ve appeared for one million explanations and excuses, however actually, if my cellphone is true subsequent to me, it must be detected close by, should not it?
Perhaps it’s a weaker community round Paris, I inform myself. Perhaps it’s my telephones, although I’ve clearly tried this on two Pixels already. Perhaps it’s Android 16 beta on the Pixel 9 Professional the place I first examined it out. Perhaps it’s the privateness facet stopping the community from updating the situation of a tool when there aren’t many individuals close by. Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps…
However the actuality is that, in my final take a look at on April 10, my Pixel 9 Professional Fold on Android 15 secure stopped updating its location fifteen minutes after being turned off, though it was nonetheless in my backpack. (I’m not even going to say the entire March 28 head-scratching discrepancy of home-not-home, adopted by an accurate location two days later.) No beta, community, or account subject might clarify the April 10 unreliable conduct. It’s supposed to only be Bluetooth, from the powered-off Fold to my very own, main, turned-on Pixel 9 Professional XL. If that easy hyperlink isn’t working, can I belief it out on this planet with a thief?