If someone steals your phone, the thief first turns off your device, making it hard to find. While Android devices allow you to locate your device with Find My Phone, it doesn’t work on a switched-off device. However, if you have a Samsung device, you can identify it even if it is off. Losing your smartphone is frustrating and stressful as your device contains all your contacts, wallet, car keys, and government ID.
In this case, it’s always better to register a police complaint about losing your device with your phone’s IMEI (International Mobile Equipment Identity) number so that in case something goes wrong in the future, you can avoid any problems. Try texting or calling your device; you dropped it at a local restaurant. By any means, if they intend to give your device back, then you are lucky.
Retrace your steps and report the loss of your smartphone to your carrier so they can disable your SIM and request a new SIM for the same mobile number. Even Apple devices have a similar feature introduced with iOS 15 in 2021. Samsung and Apple do this with the help of dedicated hardware support that requires keeping the Bluetooth chip active all the time, which makes it possible. This allows Samsung users to locate their devices even when turned off. Devices include smartphones, tablets, watches, earbuds, etc.
Track Samsung devices even when turned off
You can track your Samsung device, whether offline or switched off. Samsung offers the Find My Mobile feature, which allows you to locate, lock, or even wipe your device remotely. Note that the Find My Mobile Samsung tool only works with a Samsung account. Let’s first start with setting up Samsung Find My Mobile.
- Open Device settings, and head over to Biometric and Security.
- From there, go to Find My Mobile and keep it enabled. Ensure you have enabled features like Remote Unlock and Send the Last Location.
- Next, you can also check SmartThing Find from the SmartThing menu, which lets you locate your phone, smartwatch, earbuds, and tablets even if your device is offline.
How to use Samsung Find My Mobile.
- Open Samsung Find My Phone and log in with your Samsung account.
- After that, all your linked devices with your account will show here, along with several options to find your device, like the option to ring, lock, track location, erase data, backup, unlock, and more.
With this option, you can track your device and erase data remotely. Also, you can extend your device’s battery life, enabling the power-saving mode. Alternatively, if you have a Galaxy Watch running on WearOS, you can head over to the Find My Device toggle and tap on it, which you can use to ring your device at maximum volume.
Ensure that you have set up your Find My Mobile properly so that you can find your device later if something goes wrong. Even if you fail to recover your device, at least you can erase your device data from your lost device, have peace of mind, and prevent your personal information from getting into the wrong hands.
Samsung SmartThing Find Feature is coming to Google.
This feature is also available on other Android devices, known as Find My Device, which allows you to locate your lost phone with the help of GPS. Google is working on a similar feature to Samsung SmartThing Find Feature, enabling you to discover the device even if it is turned off.
On Android, you can visit Find My Device and log in to your Google account to find the lost device. Currently, devices use GPS activity to track your device, but it won’t be possible if it is turned off. According to 91Mobiles, the company has added a new hardware abstraction layer, “hardware.google. Bluetooth.power_off_finder,” allowing Google to locate your device even offline. This is said to first come with the Google Pixel and later might come to other Android devices. At this point, it’s still being determined if this feature will arrive on existing smartphones and the requirements for compatible smartphones.
This will be a helpful feature if introduced to Android. The Finder Network will make things easier to locate missing or stolen phones more conventionally and compete against Apple Find My Network. If you lose your device, changing your password and deauthorising your phone from Netflix, Spotify, Google, Microsoft, or any banking apps is always advisable. For the initial days, keep monitoring your account for any failed login attempts or find anything fishy. To avoid any potential future loss, consider enabling Find My Device if you haven’t set it up this time.
