Google finally turns on its new, global Find My device network for Android

Just as anticipated last week, today Google has officially announced that it's finally turning on its long-awaited revamped Find My Device network for Android, which works even with offline devices. This is going live on devices running Android 9 and later, across the world, starting in the US and Canada today.

The network will have over a billion devices, so it will make it very easy to locate yours, even when they're offline. As a bonus for the Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro, these will be trackable even when they're powered off or the battery is dead, thanks to some "specialized Pixel hardware".

Starting in May, new Bluetooth tracker tags will become available from Chipolo and Pebblebee, and these will be locateable in the Find My Device app, as they're built specifically for the new Find My Device network. They will also be compatible with unknown tracker alerts across both Android and iOS, to protect from - you guessed it - unwanted tracking. Additional Bluetooth tags will arrive later this year from Anker's eufy, Jio, and Motorola.

If you're close to a lost device but still can't see it, a "Find nearby" button will appear to help you figure out exactly where it is in your proximity. This will work with the aforementioned new Bluetooth tags from May onwards.

If you're at home and have Nest devices, the Find My Device app will be able to pinpoint a lost device's proximity to those Nest devices. Finally, you can also 'share' devices with people, so you can more easily find them if they go missing.

Google says it has implemented "multi-layered protections" into its new Find My Device network to help keep you safe and your personal information private. Location data is end-to-end encrypted, for example, while aggregated device location reporting is "a first-of-its-kind safety feature" which provides additional protection against unwanted tracking back to a home or private location.

In the near future, software updates are coming to headphones from JBL, Sony, and others, which will allow them to join Google's new Find My Device network.

Google's launch of this new Find My Device network has been held back for months while it has been waiting for Apple to implement unwanted tracking protections into iOS. It seems like this will finally be live in iOS 17.5, which should be released imminently, and that's why the new Find My Device network is now going live.

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