Google’s upgraded Find My Device network is slowly rolling out worldwide to help Android fans find their lost belongings. And it looks like Google is already planning to add a key feature that the network lacks compared to Apple’s AirTags: support for UWB (ultra-wideband) technology.
UWB is one of the key technologies that powers the Precision Finding feature of Apple AirTags (below). This feature gives you clues, up to a few meters away, where your lost keys are located. But Google’s Find My Device network doesn’t currently support this technology – even though many of the top Android phones now support ultra-wideband.
While that oversight means the first wave of Find My Device trackers won’t have this feature, Google appears to have plans to fill the void. As noted by Android Authoritysome code references in the latest version of the Find My Device app suggest that Google is in the process of adding UWB to its new network.
That doesn’t necessarily mean Google plans to bring the feature to Find My Device anytime soon, but it’s a promising sign. And it might not be the only new feature in the pipeline for the network – another code reference hints at AR (augmented reality) features via the ARCore software development kit (SDK).
In theory, that could tie in nicely with the UWB support, where a camera user interface visually shows you how to track down your lost valuables. That would be true Google integration with echoes of Google Lens, but for now the Find My Device Network lags behind its Apple rival in a small but useful area.
A push in the right direction
The lack of UWB support on Google’s Find My Device network is certainly not a dealbreaker for the early trackers now available from the likes of Chipolo and Pebblebee.
Like Apple’s Find My network, Google’s new network anonymously taps millions of phones around the world to help you locate lost items. You can attach the trackers, which come in tag and card form, to valuables and tap to ‘play sounds’ in the app to activate a sound or have the tracker emit an LED flash .
Both of these things help make up for the lack of a visual Precision Finding feature like the one you get with AirTags. But those visual cues can still be very useful if you can’t quite tell where the sound is coming from, and Apple’s integration also gives you increasingly powerful vibrations in addition to the UWB-powered directions.
On the other hand, UWB is only really useful at very close range, so it only really becomes an advantage if you’re in the same room as your lost item. So while it’s certainly nice to have that will hopefully come to Find My Device, Google’s rebooted network and the new trackers that support it are still a big upgrade from what was previously available on Android.