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iPhone

The iPhone is a smartphone from Apple that runs the iOS mobile operating system. Between its apps, communication features, the camera, mobile internet access, and other functionalities, the iPhone has quickly become an integral part of many peoples tech lives.

How to Turn On Stolen Device Protection on iPhone

by Kevin Hollington

Apple introduced a hidden flaw when they made it possible to use your iPhone or iPad to reset the password for your Apple Account. There was a perfectly good reason to make this linkage: if you could access the password-changing part of the interface, that meant you possessed your device, could unlock it via your face, fingerprint, or passcode, and had the passcode for further changes.

If Apple hadn’t let people reset their Apple Account password with their device, they would have potentially hundreds of thousands of support calls a year dealing with this issue. Instead, resetting is a relatively trivial matter—easy to find instructions online and easy to help someone with if it requires an Apple Support call or text.

However, through subterfuge or violence, it’s possible to obtain both an iPhone and its passcode, at which point someone could hijack your Apple Account and leverage access to your phone and that account to take over your life.

Stolen Device Protection takes the fangs out of this viper. It has a number of tradeoffs, but it may be worthwhile for additional peace of mind for some people. Here’s what to consider:

  • It is not enabled by default. You have to choose whether or not it’s useful to your circumstances, and then opt in.
  • It’s available only on iPhone, with Apple ostensibly reasoning it’s the most at-risk device for theft coupled with passcode acquisition.
  • While enabled, your iPhone passcode cannot be used for a host of actions related to passwords, payments, tracking, and erasure. You must use Face ID or Touch ID.
  • Apple imposes a new one-hour delay between when you want to make certain kinds of Apple Account, biometric, passcode, or tracking changes and when you are allowed to make them.

Starting in iOS 18, if you turn off or restart your iPhone, the timer restarts, counting down again from a full hour. That new hour is counted from when your device finishes its restart cycle or from the next time you power it up.

That sounds a bit annoying, no? Well, here’s the kicker: when enabled, the biometric requirement for some features and one-hour delay for others apply by default only when you are in an “unfamiliar” location. That’s right: Apple uses secure device-based stored information—to which they don’t have access—to determine whether you’re at a place you regularly linger at, like home, work, or a neighborhood pub. If you aren’t, the extra protections are enabled automatically.

Many news outlets reported that Apple enabled Stolen Device Protection by default in iOS 26.4 in early 2026. However, I never saw any confirmation from Apple, or follow-up from the news outlets. Further, I installed iOS 27 on an erased phone and Stolen Device Protection was off when the iPhone first started up.

That means when you’re at a familiar location, you won’t notice at all that Stolen Device Protection is on. If you return while using your device from an unknown to known location, the restrictions drop, too. You can opt to disable this “familiar location” feature, too, if you want the same level of deterrence everywhere.

Should you enable it?

Even though not everyone needs the feature enabled, I’d argue that if you go out into the world, it’s possible you’d be shoulder surfed and robbed, so if you have any interest in staying safe, you should probably turn it on and deal with the inconvenience.

To enable Stolen Device Protection on your iPhone, you first have to ensure all the following conditions are met:

  • Two-factor authentication for your Apple Account: Nearly all Apple Accounts have this enabled already. If yours isn’t, Apple’s support site explains how to switch it on.
  • A device passcode enabled plus Face ID or Touch ID: It’s highly unlikely you have no passcode. See how to set up Touch ID and Face ID.
  • Find My enabled: I recommend this for everyone, and it’s specifically required for this feature. Go to Settings > Account Name > Find My.
  • Significant Locations & Routes enabled: Enable via Settings > Privacy & Security > Location Services > System Services > Significant Locations & Routes. (Significant Locations & Routes are derived from your iPhone, stored locally and securely, and never sent to Apple or anyone else.)

To enable Stolen Device Protection, go to Settings > Face ID & Passcode > Stolen Device Protection. Enable the feature. You can optionally switch from Away from Familiar Locations to Always to ignore Significant Locations & Routes and always have restrictions.

Once it’s enabled, there’s a laundry list of things you cannot do when away from a familiar location (or always, if chosen).

You must use Face ID or Touch ID for the following: to retrieve passwords or passkeys, use Safari’s AutoFill stored payment methods (like credit cards), disable Find My’s Lost Mode (see below), erase the device (Settings > General > Transfer or Reset iPhone > Erase All Content and Settings), remove hardware security keys, add trusted phone numbers for two-factor authentication codes (see how to prepare for losing access to your Apple Account), apply for an Apple Card or view its virtual card number, transfer money via the Wallet (like transferring money out of your Apple Savings account), or use Quick Start or other migration tools to set up a new device.

The one-hour security delay

Across the entire history of Touch ID and then Face ID, Stolen Device Protection is the first time Apple has deferred to a biometric authentication method and disabled your passcode. In all similar cases, biometrics are either unavailable and you must use a passcode, or your iPhone, iPad, or Mac allows you to decline biometrics and enter a passcode.

The security delay of an hour works like this when you’re somewhere your iPhone thinks is unfamiliar, or you’ve disabled it:

  1. Attempt to make any of the following changes: with Apple Account, change your password, sign out on the device, or update security settings; or try to remove or change Face ID or Touch ID, change your iPhone’s passcode, reset settings (Settings > General > Transfer or Reset iPhone > Reset), disable Find My or, of course, disable Stolen Device Protection.
  2. Your device prompts you to authenticate with Face ID or Touch ID.
  3. You’re prompted to wait for an hour. Tap Start Security Delay, and a counter starts. You can also return to a familiar location within that period.
  4. When the hour is up, you receive a notification. Tap it or return to the feature in question and use Face ID or Touch ID to complete the authentication.

If Touch ID or Face ID works erratically for you, as it does for some people, you could wind up being unable to perform a number of tasks until you’re back at a familiar location.

You can disable Stolen Device Protection at any time by returning to its settings for your version of iOS. As noted above, if you’re not at a frequently visited location, it will require an hour delay to disable it. (But why would you disable it when at an unfamiliar spot?)

If you’re away from a frequently visited location and your Touch ID or Face ID stops working, you can be completely stuck until you have a way to access an iCloud backup from another device or return to a familiar spot. Apple doesn’t describe any way to override the biometric lockout except by being somewhere “familiar.”

Tags: iOS, Security
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How to Replace an AirTag Battery

by Moses Johnson

Apple expects an AirTag’s battery to work for more than a year. In my experience, it’s somewhere between 6 and 12 months.

Apple once published that 6 to 12 month range. Now, I can’t find it mentioned on their site at all.

To replace the battery, open the case, swap the cell, and close it again:

  1. Remove the back cover: Holding the glossy white front, push down to twist the metal back panel counter-clockwise. It only needs to move a small distance before the cover pops off.
  2. Remove the battery: Inside, you’ll see its small coin cell battery. Remove the battery, making note of the right side up: the + sign on the battery will always face you.
  3. Insert the new battery: Put the new cell in with the + sign up, facing you.
  4. Reattach back cover: Now you can look at the cover to see the extended tabs and align those with the hole in the top. Press in and then rotate the cover clockwise against its top until it’s firmly in place.

The small size of the AirTag, its cover, and the battery within are all choking hazards for small children or pets. If you have either or have visitors with them, keep track of loose AirTags or parts.

Many CR2032 lithium batteries are now sold with a “bitterant-coating”—a coating that makes it bitter to the taste—designed to deter a child who gets one in their mouth from swallowing it. They should spit it out instead. (The same danger is present for pets, though the coating may not fully deter animals from swallowing.)

Apple recommends using a battery with such a coating, and particularly notes that the “Duracell 2032 Lithium Coin Battery with Bitter Coating” works with an AirTag. Manufacturers all use different coating methods, so it’s possible you will buy a battery that will not correctly power an AirTag. I’d recommend buying one or a small package first before making a bulk buy.

The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission issued a “Notice of Violation” to Apple in January 2025, because their AirTag and packaging failed to include necessary child-protection warnings required by the March 19, 2024, Reese’s Law, named for a child who died after swallowing a coin-cell. Apple updated their packaging since. The company also provides safety information when the Find My app recognizes a battery reaching the end of its life.

If you are resetting an AirTag rather than changing its battery, the sequence is different. The folks at Elevation Lab have created many kinds of AirTag cases, but perhaps their two most striking are the extended battery models, which come in 5- and 10-year versions. The duration depends on two long-life lithium batteries: AAA for 5 years and AA for 10 years. The rugged case is secured with a screw with a difficult-to-find drive head. The company designed it to be installed in hard-to-reach places to provide maximum protection for an estimated 5 or 10 years.

Tags: Find My, iOS, iPadOS
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How to Check Whether Someone Is Tracking You

by Stacey Butler

It’s easy to see how Find My could be abused by someone trying to track a person surreptitiously. Someone with access or given too much trust can track a person or, via Family Sharing, track their devices. With Find My items, it can be even more insidious, although Apple built anti-tracking features into that network that they continue to evolve, including in cooperation with other tech companies.

There are three scenarios: tracking a person, tracking their devices, and tracking through a Find My item.

Someone following your location

Apple tries to balance safeguards against unwanted tracking with the utility that ostensibly most people use a feature for. When tracking people with Find My, Apple requires a transparent, consent-driven process when a person shares their location on an ongoing basis with someone else. (See how to get Find My alerts when someone arrives or leaves.) But even after someone has granted permission to be digitally followed, Apple requires more consent if their Find My follower wants to receive location-based notifications about when they arrive at, leave, or aren’t at a location.

Find My uses the People view to list all the people you follow or who are following you. While that seems like great disclosure and an easy way to control location tracking, it doesn’t address a few situations:

  • A non-savvy iPhone or other Apple device user could have people added to Find My without realizing it. This might be a stalker who somehow gains brief access to equipment or an untrustworthy partner. They might create a pseudonymous account that takes the name of someone you trust. Once set up, Find My doesn’t provide additional, ongoing information about person-based tracking. This contrasts with on-device location tracking on an iPhone or iPad, where you’re regularly asked whether you want to continue sharing your location with an app.
  • A domestic abuser, problematic ex-partner, or abusive parent who demands access to personal devices could add themselves to Find My tracking and require—under threat of violence—that you keep it in place. The new Hide Location option in Find My in the version 27 operating system releases offers what might be a safer alternative: you can pause tracking and resume it at will or early the next day. The other person sees only “No location found,” while you’ve paused sending your location. They’re not informed when you pause or resume. Of course, a truly dominating person may be constantly checking, and be provoked if your location disappears, too. (See how to stop or pause sharing your location.)

There is, of course, a completely valid case for parents wanting to track their children at any age while they are minors and living under their strictures, however lax or tight—but that’s a separate matter from a parent or guardian who uses that information not for safety or conforming to promises or rules, but instead as an excuse for abuse and control of the child.

If you’re in the first group or know someone who is, ensure you or they have strong device protection and potentially check Find My from time to time to make sure only names appear they know about.

See how to stop or pause sharing your location for how to stop sharing with people you don’t want to.

When a person who follows you sets up a notification to alert them about your movements, they first have to pass through a dialog that explains you will be informed of this attempt. This is partly a deterrent. Someone who sees it and does not want you to know should think twice.

If you’re the subject of such a notification, like someone setting up an alert when you leave your place of work, you see an alert on your iPhone. A similar notification appears if you have the Find My app open.

Pay attention to these notifications, as they’re the primary way you’re informed.

Someone following your devices

It’s harder to track people via Find My Device than either through their presence in People or an item as noted next. That’s because devices only appear in Find My in stricter circumstances and have more constraints:

  • Only an iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, Mac, or Apple Watch can be tracked as a device: While I’ve read about people setting up an iPhone and attaching it to a car, keeping it charged over time would be a poser, though I guess they could plug it into a charging port or tap into a port within the car body. There are much less expensive GPS trackers that last far longer, and Find My network items like AirTags that have extremely long tracking lives.

Someone could track Apple and Beats audio hardware that shows their location via a paired device or the Find My network, but this category of hardware has short battery life and short range compared to GPS-based trackers with Apple devices for relaying at short ranges.

  • You must be signed in on a device or iCloud.com with an Apple Account: With the additional validation step of two-factor authentication enabled on nearly all Apple Accounts, it’s far more difficult to manage to sign in to someone else’s account.
  • Only your own and Family Sharing devices appear: You can’t add arbitrary devices, as they have to be registered to your Apple Account or, with a Family Sharing group, someone else in that group. While Find My trackers are similarly locked, they have the advantage of battery life and size.

The only warning here? Check to make sure that no odd devices appear in your list of devices, and heed any warnings about devices being added to your account.

Unwanted tracking by a hidden AirTag

Find My items use little power, don’t require a clear path to a satellite navigation network or cellular network, and are tiny. They can easily be hidden, and could track someone across a long period. (Apple applies the same rules to third-party devices as their own.)

The same things that make it possible for someone to be alerted when they accidentally have something with an AirTag or other item in or attached to it—or they stole it!—also may help prevent people from being tracked by stalkers, domestic partners, private detectives, and celebrity hunters, among other categories.

Here’s how to extract information about unknown trackers:

  • Traveling with you: An item traveling with you results in an alert described in what an “AirTag Found Moving With You” alert means. You can then pause that device’s capability to track you or find the item and disable it. (See how to reset an AirTag.)
  • Identify Found Item feature: With an iPhone or iPad, you can use the Find My app’s Identify Found Item link in the Items view. See how to identify an AirTag you have found.
  • Interoperability: With an Android 6 or later device with an update from mid-2024 installed, the device’s owner will receive “moving with you” alerts from any Apple Find My network items; see how to identify an AirTag you have found. Likewise, an iPhone or iPad user with iOS 17.5/iPadOS 17.5 or later installed receives alerts about Google Find Hub network trackers moving with them. See how Apple and Google detect an unwanted AirTag.
  • No Apple hardware: If you don’t have an iPhone, iPad, or Mac with you (or there’s no active network), other devices you may be carrying won’t relay the item and enable tracking. Likewise, even though you can detect unwanted Google trackers, they aren’t relayed through your Apple devices. That sounds like a solution, but if you live in or travel through anywhere other people’s Apple hardware is close enough, those devices will upload tracking updates. That includes driving on a highway or riding public transportation.
  • Separated device alert: If the Find My item’s location is being relayed by other devices around you, however, it will make a sound in the right circumstances if it’s moved between 8 and 24 hours since it last checked in with its paired device to alert you to its presence. See what an “AirTag Found Moving With You” alert means.

Apple once promised an update that would alert you when a separated device is nearby on an iPhone or iPad, with an option to play the sound again or use Precision Finding. That apparently never rolled out.

Apple adding location sharing to Find My items might make it easier for someone to track you without alerts. Someone could place a Find My item in your stuff or a vehicle, then share the item with you and accept the invitation on any of your devices to which they had access when unlocked or if they knew how to unlock it; or they could share one of your items with themselves without you knowing.

However, this is a two-way street: all shared devices appear in your Items tab. If you suspect a shared item, check the Items tab for ones you’ve shared or shared with you that you don’t recognize.

Where to get help

There are many organizations beyond law enforcement eager to help people trapped in situations of domestic abuse or child subject to violence and an unsafe environment. For adults in the United States, that includes the National Domestic Violence Hotline; for children or those concerned about their welfare in the United States and Canada, the Childhelp National Child Abuse Hotline.

For those being stalked, one starting point is Safehope. It’s more likely you will need the help of police or federal authorities. Local police departments have their own paths to navigate, but for online or cyber stalking, it may be better to start with the FBI.

If the person you are worried about may be watching your device, use one they cannot see. Removing a tracker or turning off sharing can be noticed, and advocates warn that it can make a situation worse rather than better, so it is worth talking to someone before you act.

Tags: Find My, iOS, iPadOS, macOS
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How to Set an iPhone Passcode Stronger Than Six Digits

by Kevin Hollington

Your single best protection against anyone unauthorized having access to data is enabling the passcode lock. This allows you to set a code required to wake and gain access to the device.

When Touch ID or Face ID is enabled, you must also have a passcode set, and Apple will ask you for that passcode on a regular basis.

A small number of people seem to avoid adding a passcode to their devices. That is extremely dangerous given how much of our lives can be affected by someone gaining access to an iPhone or other device. So the place to start is making your passcode stronger.

Set up a passcode

If you are setting up a new phone or helping someone else, here are the basics, just in case:

  1. Go to Settings > Touch ID & Passcode or Face ID & Passcode.
  2. Tap Turn Passcode On.
  3. If you want to use the default, a six-digit passcode, tap it in and re-enter it when prompted.

Passcode Options, below, lets you pick an alphanumeric password of letters, punctuation, and numbers.

Many mobile security gurus say that not only are four digits too few to resist cracking, but six aren’t enough, either (six being the default that Apple now suggests when you set up an iPhone or iPad). Experts recommend picking something that’s as long as you’re comfortable with while remaining memorable, with six digits being the absolute minimum.

Picking a three-word phrase separated by a punctuation character is often recommended and provides real security, but can be a pain to enter over and over again. (This is what I do.) For instance, horse-stapler-cracker is 100 million times more difficult to crack than 672940 through brute force algorithms. The former could take under a minute, depending on the hardware; the latter, a couple of centuries.

Apple lets you change your passcode whenever you like via Settings > Touch ID/Face ID & Passcode > Change Password, so you can improve your password today. To choose a stronger password than one that’s six digits long, tap Passcode Options and then tap Custom Alphanumeric Code.

Make sure that however many words it is, it’s at least 20 characters with a special character (like a hyphen) dividing them.

Apple has built-in features to prevent tapping in passwords rapidly using an onscreen keyboard or through external hardware, making even weak passwords difficult to crack when they’re not 0000 or 4567. However, from time to time, companies that provide software to law enforcement and governments have developed workarounds. These hacks typically work only for short periods.

There’s one big waving flag you should notice—what’s the opposite of a warning flag? Your iPhone or iPad retains the previous passcode for 72 hours. Apple lets you know you aren’t sunk if you forget your password during that grace period.

You can also enable the passcode lock remotely if you have an active iCloud account and Find My iPhone enabled on the device.

Require passcode and lock screen access

The Require Passcode option offers a few choices if you don’t enable Touch ID or Face ID, depending on your device:

  • With Immediately, you’re asked for the passcode whenever the device wakes—this is also the only option for Touch ID and Face ID. (You can set it to sleep automatically, using Settings > Display & Brightness > Auto-Lock.)
  • Longer intervals let the device be unlocked without a passcode for up to the time duration you’ve chosen from the list.

In the Allow Access When Locked section, you can also set which services are available when your device is locked, which is a good way to prevent leakage of information, such as viewing appointments, having access to Siri, or using Messages to reply.

This list used to be a few items long. Now it has 11 choices!

As a nuclear option, you can set your device to self-destruct—destroy its data, at least—by switching on Erase Data at the bottom of the settings list. If there are more than ten failed attempts to enter the passcode, boom! What do you lose? Only items created since the last iCloud backup (or Finder sync if you back up via a Mac).

Apple says entering the same wrong passcode doesn’t count toward the ten failed attempts limit.

A passcode may be required in several cases, as described in how to set up Touch ID and Face ID.

Revert to a passcode for safety

There will be times when you will want to revert to a passcode instead of Touch ID or Face ID for personal safety, extra security, or in certain legal situations. In the United States, while the law isn’t yet fully established, it appears that in criminal proceedings, the government can compel the use of a fingerprint but can’t compel you to give up your password.

You can accidentally trigger an Emergency SOS call when using some of the below sequences. Apple’s support site explains how to avoid that.

If you want to force the operating system to disable Touch ID or Face ID, you can:

  • Power down: Power down your device via Settings > General > Shut Down or one of the methods below. On restart, it’s disabled.
  • Disable biometrics: You can use a feature designed for emergencies to disable biometrics. With all new phones starting in 2017, holding down either volume button and the side/top button disables Touch ID and Face ID, while bringing up the Slide To Power Off option. You can tap Cancel, which prompts entry of the passcode, or use the slide to power down.
  • Five bad logins: Make five bad login attempts with your finger or face.
  • Use Medical ID on an iPhone: Tap or press the side or top button and swipe to show a passcode screen without using an enrolled fingerprint or having your face straight on. Tap the Emergency link and then Medical ID. After you exit Medical ID, a passcode must be used to unlock the phone.
Tags: iOS, iPadOS, Security
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How to Identify an AirTag or Tracker You Have Found

by Dave Johnson

Find My items lack an interface: they’re a one-way conduit of information. The owner of an item can see it displayed on a map, with details updated whenever qualifying Apple devices are nearby and relay the Bluetooth beacons.

A user's iPhone 17 Pro shows an alert that reads,

While a 2nd-generation AirTag has minimum requirements for pairing and tracking via the Find My apps, the new model still reveals information to people using devices that aren’t paired with it. This is part of both helping people find lost objects and Apple’s strategy to deter and detect unwanted tracking.

However, when someone finds one, whether marked lost or not — see what someone sees when they find your lost device — their interaction is limited.

If a device paired with a Find My item is near it, like an iPhone, an AirTag, or other item, it won’t appear to other devices when using a Find My app. This makes sense: if the owner and the paired device are in proximity, it’s not considered lost or tracking you separately. Any AirTag you have shared access to also won’t show up.

Here’s how you can obtain information about an AirTag you’ve found and have in hand, or if you’re trying to find if there’s an AirTag nearby.

Tap an AirTag against a phone

Hold the white side of the device close to an NFC-capable iPhone, iPad, Android, or other device that knows how to read NFC information. That should result in a message appearing that has a link embedded.

Following the link takes the finder to a webpage associated with the AirTag’s serial number. If the item was marked as lost, then the owner’s phone number or email address appears there.

If an item was not marked as lost, the information page shows a “masked” phone number, the last four digits of the phone number connected with the paired Apple Account for the item. This appears to be related to reducing potential abuse; see how Apple and Google detect an unwanted AirTag.

Identify a third-party tracker

With all other Find My items:

  1. Launch Find My, tap the Items button, swipe down, and tap Identify Found Item.
  2. Your iPhone or iPad will list any Find My item nearby that’s out of Bluetooth range of its paired device. Tap the item and tap Continue.
  3. Apple provides information and instructions on how to proceed. For instance, with a Chipolo ONE Spot, you will be told you have to press the button in the item’s middle to retrieve information.
  4. Click Continue on Website to see the tracker’s associated details.

If the tracker is not an Apple Find My item but one that works on Google’s Find My Device network, there’s no way to trigger information about it appearing on your iPhone or iPad. However, because your iPhone or iPad will notice a device that’s not yours that’s following you, you will eventually receive an alert and can tap that to obtain more information as above. See what an “AirTag Found Moving With You” alert means.

If you have an Android phone

With Android 6 or later and an update released in 2024 by Google, you’ll be alerted to any devices moving with you without your knowledge. See how Apple and Google detect an unwanted AirTag.

If you have an Android 9 or later device, find an AirTag, and lack NFC or find any Find My item, you can install Apple’s Tracker Detect, an Android app that performs an active scan for Find My items in the vicinity similar to Identify Found Item in the native Find My apps.

Apple didn’t update the app between February 2022 and December 2025. Reviews are extremely poor, although some people think the app offers Find My features rather than generically revealing nearby Find My items. The adoption of built-in alerts for Android releases dating back several previous releases replaces its purpose.

Find the serial number

If you want to find and potentially make a record of the serial number of a Find My item, select it in the Find My app. On a Mac, also click the Info button next to its name. Now tap or click the label for the last-seen time (like Now or a date and time), and Find My toggles to show its serial number and firmware revision. For third-party Find My items, swipe down to see the serial numbers, as well as the maker, model, and firmware release.

Tags: Find My, iOS, iPadOS
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How Third-Party Find My Trackers Differ From AirTags

by Tyler Stephen

Several companies have released Find My items under Apple’s licensing program. Find My technology is embedded into some backpacks, bike components, iPad cases, and bike-mounted alarms, while companies also make AirTag-like trackers and wallet-card-sized trackers.

Third-party Find My items only include Bluetooth. I don’t believe Apple blocks third parties from including NFC or UWB; Apple doesn’t say. It’s more likely too expensive for other firms to build a device that includes two or three forms of wireless.

As a result, third-party items lack Precision Finding via iPhone 11 and later models, and have no tap-for-information option for someone finding an item. Apple also requires a slightly more cumbersome pairing process.

Fortunately, this makes them only a tiny bit less useful and a little bit more cumbersome to use than AirTags.

Pair a third-party item

You can pair third-party items only via a native Find My app on an iPhone or iPad, as with AirTags. The instructions are nearly identical to adding an AirTag. Here’s an abbreviated process to add a third-party item:

  1. In the Find My app, swipe up on the People, Devices, or Items tabs, tap the plus button, and tap Other Item.
  2. Third-party devices mostly have a button you press, so press it. For example, the Chipolo ONE Spot can be squeezed to trigger pairing.
  3. When the item type appears, tap Connect.
  4. Name it and tap Continue.
  5. Choose an emoji and tap Continue.
  6. Tap Agree to link the device to your Apple Account. The information is identical to that shown for an AirTag.
  7. Find My displays a summary screen explaining how to use the item in the future. Tap Finish.

Remove and reset one

As with an AirTag, you must first remove a third-party item from Find My to make it possible to pair with another device. Go to the Find My app on an iPhone or iPad, tap the Items button, select the item, tap Remove Item, and tap Remove to confirm.

Failure to unpair makes the Find My item unusable by anyone else. See how to reset an AirTag.

Also, as with an AirTag, if the item is in range of the device removing it, the device sends a reset signal over Bluetooth to the third-party item. If it’s not, however, you have to perform a factory reset.

With a Chipolo ONE Spot, for example, after you hold the item in its center for 30 seconds, it starts to beep at 1-second intervals; release it after the fifth beep. The ONE Spot makes a confirmation sound, after which point it can be freshly paired.

Disable one

Each Find My item from manufacturers besides Apple will have its own procedure for disabling transmission without removing the item from an Apple Account. Many third-party items have an integral battery that can’t be removed. As a result, you usually have to press and hold a button or squeeze a spot on a wallet card for some period of time to disable.

If an unknown tracker is found with you, the process for getting more information links to details from the manufacturer, including how to disable it.

Tags: Find My, iOS, iPadOS
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What’s New for Apple Pay and Wallet in iOS 27

by Kevin Hollington

Wallet bulges with the addition of even more features to an already stuffed portfolio.

You can create entries for cards, membership cards, and other kinds of barcode/QR code-related proofs of entry or membership from scratch, a task formerly available only for third-party apps and websites.

Tap the Add button in Wallet, then tap Create a Pass. You’re guided through a few steps, one of which lets you scan the existing card, so that Wallet can pull in its number, barcode, or QR code. You can fill out details that aren’t present on the card or captured by Wallet.

A “poster”-style card display used for passes now extends to membership cards, gift cards, and loyalty/reward cards. This new display allows up to two tappable actions.

In unrelated updates, Wallet now shows trip details and other real-time updates to hotel keys at hotels that support these new options.

Finally, a new Preauthorized Payments section in Wallet gives you a one-stop insight into what you’ve allowed other companies to charge you for. Apple describes this as “subscriptions and auto-reloads to installment loan repayments, recurring billing, and deferred payments” among other preauthorizations.

Apple Pay and Tap to Share

Apple made one systemwide change, with big updates to Apple Pay and point-of-sale payments.

After many years of mostly unchanged experiences, Apple offers a blowout with iOS 27 and iPadOS 27.

The updated Apple Pay checkout sheet lets you change your payment card directly without canceling, exiting, and starting over. It will also show information like available rewards, debit card balance, and alternative payment options. These changes are noted as coming “this fall,” while “later this year” you’ll be able to add funds to a debit card during a checkout session without exiting, or within Wallet.

Apple now allows merchants to let you pay with a third-party browser using Apple Pay with a scannable code and an iPhone as the glue. Start the payment in a third-party browser, choose Apple Pay, and the merchant’s site will display a code that can be scanned by an iPhone to authorize Apple Pay.

Entirely new is Tap to Share with merchants at the point of sale, such as in a store or at a fair. This makes in-person Apple Pay more akin to Apple Pay in Safari. Tap to Share lets an entire set of interactions occur before you pay. You start by approving a connection with a merchant’s iPhone that has a supported payment app. (Ostensibly, this may encompass not just companies like Square and Stripe, but in-house developer apps for retailers like Old Navy or Lowe’s.)

Once you begin, you can choose what you share with the business—like contact details, a shipping address, or your email. This also means you don’t have to state this information aloud or rely on the merchant typing it in correctly! A merchant can offer to sign you up for a membership or loyalty program. You can use a pass from the merchant, or they can issue one, related to discounts, credits, or other transaction-related purposes. Finally, you see the full cart as a digital receipt before completing payment with Apple Pay.

Tags: iOS 27, iPadOS 27
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Where to Find Apple Intelligence in Each App

by Chris Smith

In the iOS 27 and iPadOS 27 updates, Apple expanded the use of Apple Intelligence across more apps and added features to apps that already had some Apple Intelligence support. Apple Intelligence is designed to synthesize information, like creating summaries, as well as generate stuff, such as text or images. Some of the elements are distinctly more useful than others.

Where to look for Apple Intelligence in individual apps:

  • Calendar and Reminders: Enter text that is more freeform in nature than rigidly structured in Calendar or Reminders, and the apps offer suggestions for structured data replacement.
  • Camera: Visual Intelligence is integrated as a Siri option in Camera alongside Photo and Video. With Siri selected, pointing the camera at certain items, like food, a restaurant receipt, or an event’s details, will result in a prompt you can tap. You can also tap the Siri button to analyze what’s in the view.
  • Mail: Mail offers suggestions as you type to insert information from other apps and libraries, such as photos, or to take action, like creating an entry in Notes.
  • Messages: Messages makes a suggestion when it thinks it makes sense to insert something from another app, like a photo.
  • Notes: After making a sketch with an Apple Pencil on an iPad in Notes, you can use Image Wand to make it photorealistic.
  • Passwords: The Passwords app scans for weak or compromised passwords at websites that support Apple’s method for automated password updates, then offers to fix those passwords for you.
  • Photos: Photos improves its Clean Up feature to provide much better generative image replacement. It adds two new Apple Intelligence tools: Extend, to extend the borders of an image, and Reframe, which allows slightly changing the point of view and perspective of an image.
  • Phone: While on a call, Phone may suggest contextually appropriate information, like a flight number when you call an airline.
  • Safari: You can have Safari automatically organize tabs, bookmarks, and Reading Lists into a grouping within a tab group. Keep tabs (ha, ha) on changes to webpages with Notify Me, which lets you describe what you want to monitor and have it automatically checked at a recurring interval.
  • Shortcuts: You can describe what you want via Siri AI in Shortcuts, and the app will attempt to write a shortcut for you.

Two more sit outside the apps themselves: Siri AI across the system, and Visual Intelligence on whatever is on your screen.

Tags: iOS 27, iPadOS 27
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The Action Button Feature Apple Promised and Hasn’t Shipped

by Dave Johnson

Accessibility is a catch-all term for a large number of features, apps, and adjustments that Apple designs to improve access to kinds of things that may be harder for some people, whether due to motor limitations, eyesight or hearing, or the language they speak.

Many of these features can benefit a much larger group of people than any narrowly defined as “disabled”; automatic, high-quality captioning of video content is a great example, as is having a voice read text aloud from webpages or describe images.

Apple’s key accessibility features for iOS 27 and iPadOS 27 relate to describing things in a visual field, captioning, and understanding.

Act on what you see

Apple has offered three features independent of one another that have brought a lot to the table for accessibility for people with low vision or who are blind, as well as more generally:

  • VoiceOver: Apple’s VoiceOver accessibility feature, added to iPhone in 2009 and iPad in 2010, describes what’s on screen, such as buttons, interface elements, and text.
  • Magnifier: A Control Center item, Magnifier (from 2016 on iPhone and iPad) provides a toolbox full of options for your cameras—zoom, contrast, flashlight, capture, and more—which can make the tiny, low-contrast, and hard-to-see for whatever reason much easier to get a look at.
  • Visual Intelligence: This camera-based feature requires Apple Intelligence and first appeared in 2024 (in iOS 18.2, for select models). Visual Intelligence lets an iPhone identify objects, buildings, and other things, read text aloud, and more.

With iOS 27 and iPadOS 27, Apple has brought aspects of Visual Intelligence into the VoiceOver and Magnifier contexts.

You can use VoiceOver and enable a sub-feature that used to live only in Magnifier, called Live Recognition, to read aloud or provide a summary, details, or analysis of what it sees. You can set Live Recognition features at Settings > Accessibility > Live Recognition, though the features aren’t available unless you have VoiceOver enabled.

In Magnifier, if the Ask button isn’t present, go to Magnifier > Settings > Ask Magnifier > Show in Control Panel. Tap Ask, which triggers Live Recognition as well. For example, point it at a bill and ask it what the bill’s total is.

Where’s the Action, Apple?

Apple said in their accessibility preview press release in May 2026, before the June 2026 announcement of iOS 27 and iPadOS 27, “With updates to Live Recognition, VoiceOver users can press the Action button on iPhone to quickly ask a question about what’s in the camera viewfinder and get a detailed response.” They also wrote, “Magnifier also works with the Action button so users can quickly ask questions and get answers.”

These options for the Action button haven’t appeared. I’ll update this information if and when the Action button function appears for VoiceOver or Magnifier.

Apple also rebuilt Accessibility Reader, added generated captions for any uncaptioned video, and taught Voice Control to take plain descriptions of what you want tapped. Those are covered in the Apple Intelligence accessibility features.

Tags: iOS 27, iPadOS 27
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What’s New in FaceTime, Messages, Phone and Wi-Fi in iOS 27

by Abigail Shilets

Following significant overhauls to their three communications apps in iOS 26, iPadOS 26, and macOS 26—FaceTime, Messages, and Phone—Apple has relaxed a bit with changes in the 27 series of releases. Here’s what you should pay attention to.

To recap: in the 26 series of releases, Apple revamped how favorites appear in FaceTime and Phone, making both apps more consistent with each other, and extended the Phone app to the iPad and Mac.

I’m including cellular and Wi-Fi improvements in this roundup, since they are an obviously necessary part of our ability to use real-time (and semi-asynchronous) communications apps.

FaceTime

After many, many years of FaceTime supporting a single camera view on iPhone, you can now use the front and back cameras simultaneously. The proviso? You need an iPhone 17, iPhone 17 Pro, iPhone 17 Pro Max, or iPhone Air and iOS 27. The other person or people can see your dual-camera feed only if they have iOS 27, iPadOS 27, or macOS 27. (This builds off the dual-capture mode in the Camera app on those models introduced in iOS 26.)

To use the dual-camera mode, in an active FaceTime session (or before someone has joined), tap the Flip Camera button in the inset selfie view. This shows both cameras by default.

Messages

Messages received a tune-up, not an overhaul. Most changes are related to RCS, the industry-supported messaging protocol that Google uses in Android. The changes are:

  • Outgoing messages show a send indicator so you can see progress on slower networks or with larger files.
  • When you’re sending large photos or videos in a conversation that uses RCS (with Android users), this no longer slows down the typing part of the conversation.
  • Reply threading now works with RCS messages.
  • RCS messages also support a wider range of tapbacks and reactions.

Apple added support for end-to-end encryption over RCS between their ecosystem and Google’s as a beta release in iOS 26.5.

The only update related to Apple Intelligence so far is that Messages makes a suggestion when it thinks inserting a photo, adding something to Reminders, creating a note, sharing your location, or other actions are contextually appropriate. I haven’t been able to get it to trigger such an alert in testing.

Phone

Apple Intelligence brings Call Context to the Phone app: during a call, Phone offers information from other apps that seems contextually appropriate, like a reservation number or a flight number when you’re calling an airline.

Wi-Fi improvements

Apple tried to tune up a key issue years ago with a feature they called Wi-Fi Assist: when you had a weak signal, there might be a better, higher-speed cellular connection available instead. Your device would then tap into the cell signal while the Wi-Fi signal was poor.

While Wi-Fi Assist helped, it didn’t solve the common problem you are certainly familiar with, when your iPhone won’t unclasp its Wi-Fi grasp as you walk out of one space—like your home or office—and there’s still a tendril of signal left.

Apple rebranded the feature as Connectivity Assist, and if you had Wi-Fi Assist enabled—it was by default—you’ll find the new feature already turned on in Settings > Wi-Fi.

I know how aggravating it is, because my house Wi-Fi barely reaches where we park our cars out front on the street. Whenever I try to pull up Maps for directions, I have to turn off Wi-Fi most days. Connectivity Assist promises to solve that precise issue.

Also in both iOS 27 and iPadOS 27 is an AirDrop speed up. Apple says AirDrop transfers could be as much as five times faster.

Tags: iOS 27, iPadOS 27
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