Is the AirTag 4-pack cheaper per tag?

Yes — $99 for four works out at $24.75 per tag against $29 for a single, a saving of $4.25 each or $17 versus four singles. The number to add before deciding: AirTags have no keyring hole, Apple no longer sells its own loops, and third-party holders run roughly $8-15 each — which can add $30-45 to a four-tag setup and erode most of the discount.

Is there a new AirTag in 2026?

Yes. Apple released the second-generation AirTag on 28 January 2026 — still named simply 'AirTag' and still $29 single or $99 for four. It gains a newer ultra-wideband chip with Precision Finding reaching up to 50% farther, a speaker around 50% louder, and Precision Finding from Apple Watch (Series 9 and later). Size, battery type and the more-than-a-year battery claim are unchanged.

Can you put an AirTag in checked luggage?

Yes. The CR2032 battery's lithium content is far below the level requiring airline approval, and the industry has moved from wariness to endorsement — Lufthansa, which briefly banned them in 2022, now integrates Find My sharing into its own baggage tracing. The case for doing it: airlines still mishandled roughly 24 million bags in 2025, about 4.9 per thousand passengers, per SITA's baggage report.

Can you use an AirTag to track a pet or a child?

Apple's consistent position is no — the AirTag is designed for objects, not pets or people. For children it is doubly wrong: the anti-stalking system, co-developed with Google as a cross-platform standard, deliberately alerts people who are being followed by a foreign tag, and a moving child triggers exactly those protections. A pet that roams beyond passing iPhones also simply stops updating, since AirTags have no GPS.

How many AirTags can one Apple ID have?

Up to 32 items in Find My — comfortably more than most households need, though AirPods and other Find My accessories count against the same limit. Since iOS 17 each AirTag can also be shared with up to five other people, so shared car keys or family luggage no longer set off tracking alerts on other household members' iPhones.

AirTag or Tile — which is better?

For an iPhone owner, the AirTag: Apple's Find My network spans more than a billion devices, and independent testing still rates it more reliable in practice than Google's larger-on-paper Android network. Tile works across platforms and often costs less, but rides a much smaller network and some models have non-replaceable batteries. For Android owners the AirTag is not an option at all — a SmartTag2 or Chipolo Pop is the equivalent.

AirTag Single vs 4-Pack in 2026: The Real Maths, and What Four Trackers Are For

Apple sells the AirTag two ways: $29 alone, $99 as a four-pack. The four-pack works out at $24.75 a tag — a saving of $4.25 each, $17 against buying four singles. Whether that's a bargain depends on a question the pricing page never asks: do you actually have four things worth tracking, and what will the holders cost you?

First, the news most listicles missed

The AirTag was quietly replaced in January 2026. Apple still just calls it "AirTag", but the second-generation model that shipped on 28 January brings a new-generation ultra-wideband chip with Precision Finding that reaches up to 50% farther, a 50% louder speaker, and Precision Finding on Apple Watch for the first time (Series 9 and later). Same $29/$99 pricing, same size, same replaceable CR2032 battery rated at more than a year.

The practical upshot: if you're buying new today you get the better tag at the old price, and first-generation units in drawers and marketplaces are now worth less than they look.

The real cost table

	Single	4-pack
Price	$29	$99
Per tag	$29.00	$24.75
Holders (typical $8–15 each, third-party)	+$8–15	+$16–45 depending on uses
Realistic all-in	~$40	~$120–140

The line item nobody budgets: an AirTag has no keyring hole. Bare, it can sit in a bag pocket or luggage lining; attached to anything, it needs a holder. Apple discontinued its own loops years ago, so the third-party market at $8–15 per holder is the norm — which quietly adds 30–50% to the true cost of a keys-and-bags setup. Factor it before deciding the 4-pack "saves" money.

What four tags are actually for — with the honest caveats

Use	Verdict	The caveat
Keys	The best use there is	Needs a holder
Luggage	Excellent	None any more — airlines came around (below)
Wallet	Poor for the round tag	8mm thick — it bulges in a slim wallet
Car	Useful, with limits	Not GPS: updates only when iPhones pass nearby, and a thief's phone may alert them to it
Pets	Unsupported	Apple's consistent position is that AirTag is designed for objects, not pets or people
Children	No	Same — it is an item tracker, and the anti-stalking system treats moving people as potential victims, not luggage

The luggage story is worth a paragraph because it flipped completely. Lufthansa briefly banned active AirTags in checked bags in 2022, reversed within weeks, and by 2025 had gone the other way entirely — integrating Find My location sharing into its own baggage tracing. The regulatory basis was never in doubt: the CR2032's lithium content sits far below the threshold that requires airline approval. And the problem AirTags solve remains real: even after a 23% improvement in 2025, airlines still mishandled about 24 million bags — 4.9 per thousand passengers — per SITA's industry report.

Numbers worth knowing before you standardise on Apple

The network: Find My locates tags via more than a billion Apple devices. Google's rival network claims access to over 3 billion Android devices, but independent testing still finds Apple's the more reliable in practice.
The cap: your Apple ID tracks up to 32 Find My items — roomy, but AirPods count against it too.
Sharing: since iOS 17 an AirTag can be shared with up to five other people — the household's car keys no longer trigger "AirTag following you" alerts on your partner's phone.
Anti-stalking is cross-platform now: Apple and Google co-authored the unwanted-tracker standard, so Android phones alert their owners to a foreign AirTag travelling with them just as iPhones do.
Battery: a $1–3 CR2032, swapped in seconds — but Apple warns against bitterant-coated cells (the child-safety coating can break the electrical contact). If small children are around, treat the coin cell with the same caution as any other; child-shield batteries compatible with AirTags reached the market this year.

Or don't buy Apple

Tracker	Price	Network	Catch
AirTag (2nd gen)	$29 / $99×4	Apple Find My, 1B+ devices	iPhone required to own one
Tile Mate	~$25, often less	Life360's own network	Smaller network; some models have sealed batteries
Samsung SmartTag2	~$29	SmartThings Find	Galaxy phones only
Chipolo Pop	from $29	Apple's or Google's network	One network at a time, not both

The pattern: every ecosystem locks you to its phones. The AirTag is the best tracker an iPhone owner can buy and useless without one; the reverse holds for Samsung's.

So: single or four?

Buy the single if you have one genuine loss habit — keys, usually. Buy the 4-pack if you can name the four homes before it arrives: keys, each checked bag, the backpack, the car. Keys plus luggage plus two spares-in-a-drawer is how the saving evaporates; four named jobs is how it pays.

We stock the AirTag 4-pack, payable in Bitcoin, Ethereum or stablecoins with free insured shipping. If the privacy side is what brought you here — buying and using trackers without an account trail — our AirTag privacy and security guide covers it in depth, and the rest of the accessories range is here.