I’ll admit that I’m not the most organized person. One look at my office shows a variety of piles of books, papers, and electronics that are in various states of use. As you can imagine, some things disappear into the void and are never seen again. Depending on what that item is, I sometimes have to tear up my office looking for it. Luckily my days of destroying my office may be over as I have a Tile Sport that should help solve that problem.
For those of you unaware, the Tile is a device that you can attach to a keyring or clip onto something. The device then pairs with your smartphone through the Tile app. Once the app and device are paired, you are able to ping your Tile from your phone as well as see its location on a map. This should hopefully prevent you from ever losing your belongings ever again.
The main function of Tile is to ping the Tile device so that it plays a melody. The user can then follow the melody straight to their device. In practice, this worked great. The Tile device is decently loud so that even when obstructed I was able to hear it and locate it. Once the device is found, pressing the button shuts off the ringing. This function always worked great and was reliable as long as the device was within Bluetooth range. One neat little feature of the Tile is that you can set different ringtones on a per device basis.
So let’s say you have a Tile on your keys, your wallet, and your bag. You can assign a custom ringtone to each of those devices so you can tell which one you are ringing and give every one of your belongings a unique identity. In reality, this means that you can tell just how often your roommate loses a certain belonging based on how often you hear the ringtone.
Your Tile is not just something that can be pinged, it can also ping your phone. If for some reason you only have your keys and have misplaced your phone, simply double press the button on your Tile and it will get your phone to play the melody. Your phone will ring even if it is set to silent so you never have to worry about that.
In my time with the Tile Sport, I only had one issue with it. This wasn’t even an issue with using the device, it is an issue that I worry might crop up in the future. That issue is with the device’s battery. I don’t see any way to charge the device or even know what the battery level is at any given time. While I’m not sure if this will even be an issue, it is something to think about.
The Tile Sport is a relatively inexpensive device. For only $35 USD, the device performs above what you would expect it to do. The different features, the ability to ping your phone from the device, and the relatively inexpensive cost really make the Tile a great device. If you are looking for something that will help you find your lost belongings for a relatively inexpensive cost, the Tile Sport is a great pick-up.
