3 Ways How to Find Lost iPhone

If you are using an iPhone, you might be comforted that Apple has included a function in which you can find your iPhone if you misplaced it or got your iPhone stolen. As your iPhone is one of the most critical and expensive gadgets that you own, this function will come handy to you in the future.

Your iPhone might also have relevant files or photos that you would not be able to replace. By knowing these three ways how to find your iPhone in case you got it stolen or lost, this tips can increase the chance of you retrieving back your iPhone.

Here are the three ways how you can find your iPhone. 

HOW TO USE “FIND MY IPHONE” TO TRACK LOST IPHONE

Use Find My iPhone to track lost iPhone Step 1 and Step 2

Step 1

Open a web browser using your laptop or your friend’s smartphone.

Go to https://www.icloud.com

Step 2

In the website, sign in to iCloud by inserting your Apple ID and password

Use Find My iPhone to track lost iPhone Step 3

Step 3

Tap the “Find My iPhone” section below

Use Find My iPhone to track lost iPhone Step 4 and Step 5

Step 4

Once you are logged in in the “Find My iPhone” menu, click at “All Devices.”

Step 5

Choose the Apple device or iPhone that you have lost here

The location of your lost iPhone will be shown in the map

Use Find My iPhone to track lost iPhone Step 6

Step 6

Click at “Lost Mode” here to set your lost iPhone on a “Lost Mode” settings remotely

Alternatively, you can also erase your iPhone remotely if you afraid that the person who stole it might access to your private data in your iPhone

HOW TO USE GOOGLE MAPS TO FIND LOST IPHONE

How to Use Google Maps to Find Lost iPhone

Step 1

Go to https://www.google.com/maps

Step 2

Go to “Location Sharing” or “Your Timeline” to see your iPhone’s location

However, you should have activated the Google Maps location sharing first before you lost your iPhone as pre-requisite step or this method would not work.

Here are the steps.

How to Activate Google Maps Location Sharing Step 1 and Step 2

Step 1

First, you need to install the Google Maps app on your iPhone. Once installed, in your iPhone, go to Settings.

Step 2

In the Settings, tap “Google Maps.”

How to Activate Google Maps Location Sharing Step 3 and Step 4

Step 3

In the Google Maps settings, tap “Location.”

Step 4

Enable the Location Sharing to “Always”.

By enabling this to “Always”, your iPhone continuously transmit your location sharing data to Google as long as your iPhone is turned on and connected to the internet.

HOW TO USE IMEI NUMBER TO FIND YOUR LOST IPHONE

If all the above tips did not work for you, the last resort is to use your iPhone IMEI number as a way to find your iPhone. You can ask for your service network provider the assistance on this as they can use their vast network of a cell tower to track your iPhone based on your IMEI number. However, not all countries allow this. It is very much dependent on your country as well as the services that are being offered by your service network provider.

Use IMEI number to track lost iPhone

So, if you have tried all the methods above but still could not track down your iPhone, the first step you need to do is to:-

  1. Report your lost iPhone to the police
  2. Use your iPhone’s IMEI number as a reference to your lost iPhone
  3. Use the police report to get assistance from the network service provider to track your lost iPhone

However, it is also essential that you know your iPhone’s IMEI number beforehand. Here are the steps on how to find your IMEI number.

HOW TO FIND YOUR PHONE’S IMEI NUMBER

How to Find IMEI number on your iPhone Step 1 and Step 2

Step 1

In your iPhone, go to “Settings.”

Step 2

In the Settings, go to “General.”

How to Find IMEI number on your iPhone Step 3 and Step 4

Step 3

In the General Settings, go to “About.”

Step 4

You will see your iPhone’s IMEI number here. Keep a record of your iPhone’s IMEI number somewhere safe.

So, there you have it — three ways how you can find your lost iPhone. Please leave us a comment below on what other methods that you have used to try and find your lost or misplaced iPhone.

Please also read our previous article on the ultimate guide on how to find your lost smartphone.

3 Ways How to Track iPhone Without Internet

The device that tracks the location of a phone is not the internet but the GPS chip embedded in your phone. However, the phone needs an internet connection to transmit the GPS location to a third party provider such as Waze that incorporates it in their app. The GPS data is required as input for the location data based on its usage and objectives.

So, can you track a phone if the phone is not connected to the internet? There are several ways how you can track a phone without the internet. However, the steps shown here is more for your friend or family to send the location to you voluntarily.

If your phone is stolen or lost, it might be hard to find and track your phone without internet. This is due to the need for the app on your iPhone to be sending you the location using the internet. So, if there is no internet connection, the next thing is the mobile network connection that your iPhone already has.

So, here are several ways how you can ask somebody to send you their location using their iPhone.

USE SMS TO SEND LOCATION OF iPHONE

First of all, you need to Install Google Map on your iPhone. Once that is done, you can then send SMS to send the location of your iPhone.

Here are the steps

Use SMS to send location of iPhone 1

Step 1

Open your iPhone. Tap “Messages”

Step 2

In “Messages”, tap the edit button at the top right

Use SMS to send location of iPhone 2

Step 3

At the “New Message” window, tap the Google Map icon below

Step 4

iPhone will then show your location below. Make sure that the iPhone is GPS enabled. Read here if you want to know what is GPS and how to enable GPS in the iPhone.

Tap the Send icon below to send your location using SMS

Use SMS to send location of iPhone 3

Step 5

Your new message will show the GPS of the iPhone current location

Step 6

Fill-up the email here and tap send

Whoever the receiver of the SMS message will be able to use that GPS location to track the iPhone.

HOW TO EXTRACT LOCATION FROM PHOTOS IN IPHONE

Another method of tracking your iPhone is by extracting the location from the photos that was taken. Photos taken by iPhone actually have details such as the location and also GPS coordinate. Read here on how you can track location based on EXIF data on JPEG.

Here are the steps.

How to extract location from photos in iPhone 1

Step 1

Take a picture of your current location. In the iPhone, tap “Photos” to open your iPhone’s photo gallery

Step 2

Select the photo where you have just taken

How to extract location from photos in iPhone 2

Step 3

In the selected photo, swipe up

Step 4

iPhone will show the place where the picture is taken

How to extract location from photos in iPhone 3

Step 5

You can then choose to see the picture in a map, hybrid or satellite format

Step 6

The location of the iPhone can be tracked based on the map shown there

USE COMPASS APP TO GET THE LOCATION OF THE IPHONE

Another way how you can extract the GPS coordinates of your iPhone is by using the Compass app. The Compass app is normally pre-installed in your iPhone.

Here are the steps.

Use Compass to get location of iPhone 1

Step 1

In your iPhone, tap the “Compass” app. Make sure the iPhone is enabled for the GPS Location Sharing

Step 2

In the Compass, the coordinate of the iPhone will be shown below

Use Compass to get location of iPhone 2

Step 3

Tap the coordinate more than 3 seconds, and tap “Copy.”

Step 4

Open the Message function in iPhone. Paste the coordinate and send the location using your mobile data via SMS.

So, there you have it — 3 simple ways how to track an iPhone without the internet. Please leave us a comment if you do know other ways on how to track a phone without using the internet.

Feel free to read our previous article on the ultimate guide on how to find a lost phone.

Top 3 Ways to Track Your iPhone

However, unfortunate event does happen when you least expected and this also involves losing your iPhone. This can happen either you misplaced it or it was stolen. Good thing for the users of iPhone is that iPhone can be considered as a small powerful computer that have GPS installed in it. With the wonders of modern technology, you can actually track your iPhone as long as it is not switch off and is connected to the internet. Here we will list down the top 3 ways you can track your iPhone if you did lost it.

find iphone

1. Track using Find iPhone App

The best method to track your lost iPhone is by using the ‘Find iPhone’ app that already pre-installed in your iPhone. The app is available for any Apple devices that have iOS 5 and above. Any users of Apple devices will have a unique Apple ID in which they are recognized within any of their Apple devices. If you have an iPhone and an iPad, it is likely that you are using the same Apple ID.

The good thing about having the same Apple ID throughout your Apple devices is that all your Apple devices interconnected to one another in iCloud. The reason for this is for the seamless interaction you can have with your data or files that you can share or upload across multiple Apple devices. With the iCloud environment, you are able to track where are your Apple devices are located in a map. Below are the steps.

Step 1
Login to your Apple account or iCloud account using other devices such as iPhone, iPad or MacBook.

Step 2
It will then show your iPhone location in a map. However, the iPhone must be connected to the internet via Wi-Fi or Cellular network for it to show in the map

Step 3
You have the option of play sound if you find that the iPhone is nearby, or erase the data if your iPhone is stolen and do not want any confidential information to fall in the wrong hand, or put it on lost mode.

find iphone 1


2. Track your iPhone using the internet

Besides the Find iPhone app, you can actually use other different apps and also services out there to track your iPhone. Remember that your iPhone is a small powerful computer that has an embedded GPS in it. Therefore, you can use this function to track your iPhone using other options such as Google and also third party apps. If you want to track your iPhone using Google Timeline, below are the steps.

Step 1
You can start by visiting Google Timeline. Just type Google timeline in the Google search engine.

Step 2
Login to your Google account. The Google timeline will then show the last location of your iPhone was connected via the internet or cellular network.

find iphone 3

3. Track your iPhone using IMEI

IMEI stands for International Mobile Equipment Identity and which typically consists of 15 numbers. Your iPhone have a unique IMEI number. You can obtain your IMEI number by typing *#06# at your keypad and it will show you a 15 string of numbers. That number represents your iPhone IMEI and only unique to your iPhone.

Another way to know your IMEI iPhone number once you lost your phone is by looking at the back of your iPhone at the bottom. However, if you already lost your iPhone and did not recorded your iPhone’s IMEI number, you can always look at the box packaging that comes with your iPhone when you first purchased it. Normally, it is included together with the Box. What you can do with that IMEI number is to bring the number to your cell phone network operator and request for it to be blocked once it is connected to the network.

However, some disclaimer here - Not all network operator have a tracking services for lost phone. Read more on how to find your phone using IMEI here. Below are the steps.

Step 1
Type *#06# at your keypad. Your iPhone screen will show a 15 digit string of number. That is your iPhone's IMEI number. Record it and keep it somewhere safe.

Step 2
Give the IMEI number to your Cellular Network Provider for them to track it. However, please check with your service provider as not all provide this services.