Rita El Khoury / Android Authority It’s been over a year since Google rolled out Find Hub (a.k.a. Find My Device) and its AirTag-competing location network of phones and Bluetooth trackers. Although I had nothing but trouble with these trackers for the first months — for the first full year, even — I’ve finally had my first completely positive experience with them. Cherry on top of the cake? One tracker did its main job and helped me recover my forgotten luggage at the airport, all while saving several fellow travelers’ suitcases along with mine. Here’s the story. Do you have a Google Find Hub-compatible Bluetooth tracker? 15 votes Yes. 53 % No, but I'm considering getting one. 33 % No, I have a tracker from another brand (tell us in the comments) 13 % No, I'm not interested in them. 0 % One tracker saved a dozen bags from airport forgetfulness Landing: Bag with Pebblebee near the gate Landing: Bag with Chipolo near the gate Landing: Bag with Moto near the gate I landed on Friday in Athens and opened the Find Hub app to see that my suitcase and my husband’s suitcase were both near us. As we started the very long walk toward luggage pickup from our gate, I noticed that one suitcase, the one with both my Moto Tag ($29.99 at Motorola) and Chipolo LOOP ($39 at Amazon), was moving in the same direction. The other suitcase, the one with the Pebblebee Clip Universal Tracker ($22.99 at Amazon), was still immobile right next to where we landed. Fine, I thought, it must be on another belt loader; it should follow soon. I'm moving, all trackers are still at the gate Chipolo and Moto start moving It took over 10 minutes to get to the luggage pickup area in the main airport building, and my Moto Tag and Chipolo LOOP were both pinging as nearby. Sure enough, I found the right luggage belt, and one of my suitcases was there. The Pebblebee in the other bag hadn’t moved yet. It was still near the gate. One bag on its way to the luggage pickup area ... and delivered A few minutes later, most passengers I’d recognized from my flight had picked up their checked-in bags and left, leaving me looking in surprise at the “Last Bag” sign on the announcement board. Wait, what?! That’s when I started hearing rumblings in French (I was coming from Paris) of lost luggage and questions of “Are they really done or is this a usual thing in Athens?” from other travelers. It became clear that everyone there had also been on my flight and not on the Ryanair flight coming from Milan that was getting delivered on the same belt. The two passengers who spoke Greek explained that this had never happened to them before: When the sign says the last bag was delivered, then it’s usually all been delivered, even if the timing is usually off by a few minutes. Rita El Khoury / Android Authority I was still frantically refreshing the location of my Pebblebee tracker, but it hadn’t moved yet. The location was getting updated every two minutes or so, thankfully, keeping my panic levels from spinning out of control. One of the passengers who spoke Greek decided to talk to the airport staff, who channeled us to the lost baggage counter. We were told we had to start a claim process, and that’s where I mentioned, “But the suitcase is at the gate, next to where we landed. It’s not lost!” Second bag with Pebblebee still at the gate ... and not moving Honestly, I don’t know why I hadn’t mentioned it a few minutes earlier, but I assumed other passengers had trackers in their luggage, too. Turns out no one did, and they all thought their bags had been sent to another country. That’s what the staff had understood, too. Everything had happened so fast that this clarification didn’t occur to me, so when I said it, I was immediately asked, “How do you know?” “Are you sure?” “Here, in Athens? Is it really here?” I explained that I had a tracker in my suitcase, and it had been sitting next to the gate since we landed, not moving an inch since then. At least mine was, of that I was sure. I suspected everyone else’s luggage was there, too. The Greek-speaking person immediately relayed the info to the airport attendant, who made a few calls, waited for a reply, and relieved us all by saying that they’re taking care of it. Our bags should soon be dispatched to the luggage pickup area. Bag with the Pebblebee starts moving ... and is finally delivered! A few minutes later, as promised, my Pebblebee tracker started moving in the direction of the main Athens airport building. I relayed the info to the other passengers, and we headed back to the belt. A few people were glancing at my phone, observing the tracker’s progress after every refresh. It took another minute or two for my Pebblebee to say it was nearby, then suitcases started appearing on the belt, and mine popped up. 30 minutes after the “Last bag” sign went up, we actually got all our bags. Whew. Excuse the blurry pic; I was too happy to see it! Rita El Khoury / Android Authority Cue sighs of relief, and remarks about Bluetooth trackers such as, “That’s not dumb,” (the French people’s highest praise for a smart idea), “We should get one,” and I honestly believe if I had a stack of Pebblebee, Chipolo, or Moto trackers on me — other than the ones I was testing — I would’ve sold them all right there and then. Our forgotten bags would've been found sooner or later, but my Pebblebee tracker helped me locate them faster and get them to us in 30 minutes. And look, I’m sure the problem would’ve been solved without my tracker — after all, what are the odds of losing a dozen suitcases from the same flight like that? Airport staff would’ve certainly realized that a carrier, belt loader, or pellet was left somewhere near the gates and not delivered, but would it have been fixed this efficiently? I don’t think so. Best case scenario, they would’ve realized the mistake after a few calls and check-ups, and the luggage would’ve been delivered an hour or so later. Worst case, every passenger would’ve filed a claim, gone to their hotel or home without their bags, and received them the next day. What my Pebblebee Clip Universal did was save us the wait and the stress of not knowing what happened or where the suitcase really was. I can’t tell you how many relieved faces I saw when I mentioned that my bag was in Athens; that alone was enough to erase 50% of everyone’s stress. Google’s Find Hub is much more reliable now Rita El Khoury / Android Authority This story is an admittedly drastic example of Google’s Find Hub network doing what it’s supposed to, reliably, but it’s not a one-off success. I’ve been noticing excellent improvements in all of my tests, with my phones and my Pebblebee, Chipolo, and Moto trackers all updating their locations very frequently and very accurately when they’re away from me in and around Paris. I can finally confidently say that these trackers and Google’s Find Hub are essentially as reliable as the Samsung Galaxy SmartTag 2 and Apple AirTag, and their respective networks. There have been outlier situations where one tag performed better or worse than the others, but in most of my tests, I’ve noticed parity between them all recently. However, keep in mind that Google’s Find Hub trackers lack essential features like location history, out-of-range alerts (unless implemented through a standalone app), and UWB (only the Moto Tag has it). There’s also the ridiculously silly restriction of these Bluetooth trackers not working on Bluetooth only (i.e. when offline); you need to be online for Google’s Find Hub app to even load all of your devices and trackers. I don’t understand how Google hasn’t fixed this yet and made Bluetooth-only nearby finding available when offline. Rita El Khoury / Android Authority Back to the positives, though, I’d like to highlight again that this is a huge improvement for Google’s network. A few months ago, the situation wasn’t as good as this, and last year, it was downright ridiculously awful. The first few months were tough, with the network being unreliable, bordering on useless, because in its search for ultimate privacy, Google had kneecapped its network and made it opt-in, limited to busy areas by default, and only rolled it out to a subset of users to top it all off. It was destined for failure, and fail it did. I wrote thousands of words about my frustrating tests and experiences with the network and trackers, so this entire article is, to say the least, as unexpected as it is momentous. But just for this luggage-finding episode, I’ll give it 10 stars out of 10. If you’re traveling soon, get one of these trackers and save yourself the potential hassle. They finally have my blessing. Don’t want to miss the best from Android Authority? Set us as a favorite source in Google Discover to never miss our latest exclusive reports, expert analysis, and much more. to never miss our latest exclusive reports, expert analysis, and much more. You can also set us as a preferred source in Google Search by clicking the button below. Follow