Tile Mate Review

This versatile Bluetooth tracker offers the greatest compatibility among operating systems to help you keep track of your most important items. With a far-reaching range and plenty of choices for ringtones and volumes, this tracker helps find whatever you attach it to.

Finding Keys

If I lose track of my keys, I'm confident I can find them again with the Tile Mate thanks to its long range and location history. The tracker's ringtone continues playing until you hit stop on the app, and it's loud enough to hear even in fairly busy environments like a crowded gym. While it may seem like an obvious design choice, I appreciate that Tile included a keyhole for its tracker, making it easy to loop onto the keyring (not all trackers have this feature). Once you throw it on a keyring, the tracker's flat shape and beveled corners make it comfortable in your pocket or purse. If someone happens to find your lost keys, it's easy for them to scan the QR code on the back of the tracker to alert you directly.

When it comes to tracking keys, the most common scenario for me is forgetting them at home or work. In those cases, the Tile Mate has a major drawback — its Smart Alerts feature, which pings you if you leave something behind, is locked behind premium plans that require a monthly fee. Without this crucial feature, using the Tile Mate means you might not realize you left your keys behind until it's too late.

Finding Luggage and Bags

When paired with a keyring, it's easy to attach the Tile Mate to a backpack's gear loops. You can also keep the tracker tucked away anywhere in your luggage or bag, and it will still be loud enough to hear from several feet away. Weighing only a few grams, I don't notice any significant weight difference when attached to or inside my bag. In the worst-case scenario where your bag or luggage is stolen, Tile includes a clever Anti-Theft Feature that prevents a thief from scanning for this tracker in a stolen bag. Thanks to this, you have a better chance of the tracker going undetected, so you can eventually track it down.

It's not as common to leave a bag behind compared to keys, but you may run into the same issue. Since the Tile Mate doesn't offer separation alerts for free, you might not know you left your bag or luggage behind until you're too far down the road and have to double back. If you want to see the 30-day location history (beyond the most recent location), you'll have to pay for the premium Tile plan. This makes things tricky if you're trying to keep an eye on where your stolen bag is moving.

Finding a Pet

The Tile Mate is right at home on any dog collar's D ring, meaning you only need a keyring to start tracking your pup. The tracker's low-profile design makes it not much larger than most dog tags, so there shouldn't be much of an adjustment period when adding this to a collar. For fussier pets, the tracker's shell is durable enough to survive any scratching or pawing. With an IP55 rating, the tracker can keep up with your dog even if it decides to go outside in the rain or splash around in puddles.

For tracking dogs, don't forget that the Tile Mate heavily relies on noise. If you train your dogs to respond to certain noises, they could react negatively to the tracker's extended ringtone and its different trills and beeps. In my testing, activating the tracker's ringtone to locate a dog usually causes some unnecessary alertness or mild annoyance — especially when they tuck themselves into an out-of-sight napping spot. In the more serious cases of a lost pet, the Tile Mate falls short since it's limited to a finite Bluetooth range. If your lost dog is on the run and goes beyond the Bluetooth range, you have to wait until the tracker comes into range of someone else using the Tile app to get the last seen location.

Finding Bikes and Vehicles

Considering its compact design, it's easy to chuck the Tile Mate into your car's glove compartment or center console. It's just as effortless to throw into your bike's storage bag or clip it into the frame when using with a carabiner. Thanks to a three-year battery life, you can leave the tracker attached or hidden in your vehicle and forget about it for several years. During my testing, I liked using this tracker when I forgot where I parked, since the app can tell you if you're getting closer with signal strength indicators.

As a warning, you might not be able to hear the ringtone when pinging a Tile Mate that's inside a car. When the tracker is inside a car's center console, you'll have a hard time hearing the muffled ringtone even if you're a few feet away. Even when I leave the tracker in the car's cabin, I find it difficult to easily locate it by sound alone. Just like with a lost dog, the Tile Mate won't be as reliable in locating a car that's in constant motion. In my testing, you have to wait until your car or bicycle comes to a stop and pings someone in the Tile network if it's outside the Bluetooth range.

Usability

Tile products have an impressive range, which means your tracked items have a large radius. When you're out of the Tile Mate's Bluetooth range, you can lean on the Tile Network, which will automatically update your tracker's last-seen location when it comes within range of another Tile device. It doesn't take long to start tracking — just download the Tile app and attach the Mate to your keyring. The Mate even comes with a “Find Your Phone” feature that you activate by pressing the tracker's built-in button twice. While the Tile Mate's ringtone wasn't the loudest, there are plenty of customization options letting you choose between 10 jingles and three volume options. I'm also a fan of the way the ringtone constantly sounds off until you manually turn it off instead of having to repeatedly hit a replay button.

The most glaring shortcoming of the Tile Mate is its overtly freemium design with several paywalled features. This tracker can handle the most basic item-finding tasks just fine, but it lacks several quality-of-life inclusions like separation alerts and month-long location history. To unlock these features, you have to subscribe to Tile's premium monthly plans. When you lose your tracked item, it could take longer to get a ping off the Tile Network, since it's not as comprehensive as Apple or Samsung. If sustainability is an important consideration for you, it's worth noting that the Tile Mate has a non-replaceable battery that lasts a max of three years.

Should You Buy the Tile Mate?

If you're looking for a simple tracker that works across multiple operating systems, the Tile Mate is a cheap way to keep tabs on smaller things like keys and bags. It's not as great at locating larger items that are often in motion, like a car, but can still be useful.

What Other Tracker Should You Consider?

Since the Tile Mate primarily operates via Bluetooth, a GPS tracker like the Tracki GPS offers more precise location tracking, particularly with fast-moving things like a vehicle or a lost dog. If you're already heavily invested in the Apple or Samsung ecosystem, either the Apple AirTag or the Samsung SmartTag2 is a better pick, since they have precision tracking features.