Tile Trackers Integrated with Life360 App

Tile trackers are becoming more integrated with the Life360 app. In a blog post published this week, Life360 announced that users will now be able to set up and manage the Bluetooth location trackers without needing the Tile app.

Life360, a family safety and location app, acquired Tile’s Bluetooth device-tracking business for $205 million in 2022. Since then, Tiles have been part of the Life360 app, enabling users to track the locations of both people and items within a single app. However, users previously needed to utilize the Tile app to set up the tracking devices. As part of this transition, the Life360 app will incorporate several features from the Tile app, including automatic push notifications if an item is left behind and the ability to view location history for Tile-tracked items.

This move appears to be aimed at encouraging Tile users to transition to the Life360 app. The company indicated TechCrunch that the Tile app is not being retired “at this time,”, which is not surprising, as it may take time to migrate customers to the new app. Considering that as of last month, the Tile.com domain now redirects toLife360.com, the future of the Tile app seems uncertain.

As part of the update, Life360 is also reorganizing its paid plans,, adding the SOS Alerts feature that allows users to call 911 by triple-tapping on a compatible Tile to its $7.99 per month Silver membership, which includes seven days of location history. SOS Alerts were previously only available with the $14.99 per month Gold plan, which also provides 30 days of location history. Users can access Life360 for free to track both people and items, but they will only have access to two days of location history.

Life360 is designed as a location app for families. Similar to Apple’s Find My app, it allows authorized members of a “Circle” to view each other’s real-time locations within the app. Each member has control over whether their location is shared and can determine how precise the location information is for other members at any given time. The service can send alerts to circle members when someone arrives at or leaves a location, as well as when a flight lands. This functionality effectively eliminates the need for “text me when you get there” requests from parents and family members.

In addition to location services, Life360 positions itself as a comprehensive family safety app, offering features such as crash detection and roadside assistance. Its paid plans also include driver reports, which provide insights into phone usage, top speed, and hard braking data. Families with teenagers considering this service may want to carefully evaluate how this data is shared before subscribing.

While Life360 claims it no longer sells precise user data, its current privacy policy indicates that it may share data with business partners, including driving analytics services. These services may, in turn, share data with insurance companies, as detailed in this report by Kashmir Hill in the New York Times.