Apple’s AirTags Could Land as Soon as by October

• The AirTags may land very soon, and some claim that Apple prepares a launch for October.
• There are renderings of the product that look sleek but aren’t depicting a realistic or practical tracker.
• AirTags would work from within the “Find My” app and with the help of a global network of users.

According to the various rumors that amass online, Apple’s Tile-like Bluetooth tracker called the “AirTags” is about to be made available in October. People were hoping to see this product in the recent WWDC 2020, but that didn’t happen, so the unveiling date was postponed for Apple’s next big event.

So, it is only natural to see more details surfacing as we move closer to that date, but not many things are certain right now. Apple always strives to keep everything related to unreleased products a secret. Still, in the case of the AirTags, they didn’t manage to succeed due to the several clues left in multiple corners of the iOS code to support the product’s functionality.

One of the things that aren’t known yet is the appearance of the product, which, according to alleged leaks, is going to be pretty close to the following rendering.

The product would push location data to the “Find My” app, enabling users to see specific points on the map. MacRumors is even mentioning the existence of an augmented reality map that will help users find the precise position of an item.

Still, there’s no way to tell how close to reality this suggestion could be.

iOS 14 isn’t going to have the AirTags functionality exclusivity, as iOS 13 also features code that lets Apple products communicate with each other even when they’re offline. Similarly to how Tiles work, finding a lost item wouldn’t be an endeavor for a single person, but more of a case that brings the entire community of AirTags users into play. If a device declared lost by a user comes close to another user of the network, the owner will get notified about the position of the lost item.

Tile and Apple are already fighting on the legal field, with the former accusing Apple of engaging in anti-competition practices, and the latter denying all allegations saying that their only concern is to protect their users’ privacy. It is a complicated case that is still under review by the EU Commission, and the release of the AirTags is going to make it even more entangled.

Questions that remain are, a.) what will be the case with the battery, b.) will there be a hole to attach the AirTag to a keyring, c.) will there be an AirTags “Pro” edition - and of course, d.) how much is this new product going to cost? Tiles cost about $40, so you could be looking at a price of around $70 for AirTags.