Findphone: Locate a nearby Bluetooth device by signal strength

inigyou•about 1 hour ago

When I lost my phone I put in one earbud and walked around the area listening for the connection sound.

Turns out it wasn't useful because someone else had taken it to lost and found within a few minutes of me losing it, before I knew I'd lost it. But it was a good idea.

ortusdux•13 minutes ago

A few years back I was shoveling knee deep snow when I completely lost a white earbud. The app had a 'find my bud' feature, but when I activated it I couldn't hear anything. I pulled out the 2nd bud as a test, and it started chirping like a bird. Ironically, it was a beautiful day out so the sound just blended in with the other chirping birds all around. I ended up slapping my snow shovel on the ice a few times until one chirp remained!

luma•about 1 hour ago

If you have multiple fixed BLE receivers, you can do full trilateration. This project integrates into Home Assistant using HA proxy BLE receivers to track phones moving around in your house: https://github.com/agittins/bermuda

ruskyhacker•about 2 hours ago

I thought unless an android or iPhone is beaconing, it only broadcasts ble on device wake?

Maybe I'm misremembering, but for example my esphome proxies in HA will show nothing for ages at night while my phone isn't being interacted with.

If the phone is lost, it's probably not super awake lol

HelloUsername•about 2 hours ago

Post inspired by "Lost my phone at the office. Claude suggested tracking Bluetooth signal strength" 07.aug.2026 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49215786 215 comments ?

stuaxo•about 2 hours ago

20 years ago I meant to write something like this, but so friends could find each other nearby in places like clubs.

ortusdux•11 minutes ago

I've seen a few versions of this idea for music festivals and the like - https://totemlabs.com/products/totem-compass

bouk•about 2 hours ago

Bluetooth now has something that does this more accurately on a protocol level: https://www.bluetooth.com/learn-about-bluetooth/feature-enha...

ComputerGuru•44 minutes ago

What an awful website for such a wonderful feature. I don’t expect to see this in the original Find My (Apple’s) as their implementation is fully custom and works altogether differently (and already had a protocol-level rewrite not too long ago), but this is still really cool. Of course needing to be in range of the device is always a problem; some ear buds will drop out altogether if you walk to the next room.

glenjamin•about 2 hours ago

Weirdly Apple seems to have something like this built-in for finding an apple TV remote - but the same flow doesn't appear to be launchable for any other device

mschuster91•about 2 hours ago

It works for newer AirTags as well, this isn't BLE based but Ultra Wideband.

That's an entirely different technology, and if you look at it from an RF lens, a highly impressive one.

ranger_danger•about 2 hours ago

Seems to be macOS only.

ck2•about 2 hours ago

Now turn it into a pervert-glasses detector and tracker

Make your phone alert when one walks into a room within several meters

luma•about 1 hour ago

Already exists, most of them advertise via BLE so you just need to watch for their adverts: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=ch.pocketpc.ne...

Findphone: Locate a nearby Bluetooth device by signal strength

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