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Comment by _yb2s | Hacker News Reader

There is something wrong with your configuration/setup, it is not supposed to start chirping unless it is out of range of your phone for at least 8 days, and not in one of the predefined geofence regions you can setup where it won't chirp.

I have them on tons of my devices, including my kids personal items that go to school, etc. and they never chirp, and I can and have found items that were misplaced in public locations (but not actually stolen).

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>it is not supposed to start chirping unless it is out of range of your phone for at least 8 days, and not in one of the predefined geofence regions you can setup where it won't chirp.

Does it even chirp then? This is news to me, I have an airtag in my car and have certainly left it for 2 weeks during vacations. I've never heard the airtag chirp unless I make it play a sound through "Find My"

Your home is usually automatically geofenced, so if you left it there it shouldn't chirp. If you parked your car elsewhere, e.g. an airport lot it was probably chirping while you were gone, but you wouldn't hear it because you weren't there.

oh lol interesting. I wonder how many people I have been annoying with the constant sound. This seemed like a perfect setup, but apparently not.

They only chirp when disturbed (when separated from their paired device). I've got an iPad paired to a set on my keys, no iPhone. If I let the iPad die, eventually the airtag will start chirping when I pick up my keys, but when I'm not touching them they don't chirp.

> There is something wrong with your configuration/setup

Something is off for sure, but it's not like there are any user-configurable parts here. I literally just threw it in the trunk - and it's not like there's a right and a wrong way to do it. :-)

I guess it's because I don't have a garage and my car is parked in a carport, about ~100 feet/~30 meters away from my apartment, so it "normally" doesn't sense my phone "nearby". Then, I suspect, when I walk down and sit in the car (which takes just a minute or two) there is not enough time for it to reconnect with the phone and realize the owner is around. Because an AirTag on my wallet doesn't do this. But that's just my guess - I'm too lazy to pull an SDR and listen to the radio traffic to confirm.

You can configure the geofencing locations where it won't alarm in the 'Find My' app.

I have an AirTag in wallet. Every month or so it will chirp for no obvious reason. My phone might be with me, or upstairs, or whatever. It's just random.

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