JioTag Go Review: Your Tiny, Mighty Tracking Hero

If you have a knack for losing things, Bluetooth trackers are one of the easiest ways to stay in the know other than sharpening your memory. Although Tile pioneered compact trackers years ago, it was Apple who rejuvenated the category with the AirTag, a coin-sized tracker. Apple then opened up its Find My network to third-party accessory makers for enabling an ecosystem of reliable tracking service. As is the industry norm, Google wanted a piece of the action and came up with Find My Device. 

Known initially as Android Device Manager, Google modified it to make it function like Apple’s Find My network. Released to the public in mid-2024, Google’s Find My Device service promised a better map-based tracking experience than Apple’s Find My, courtesy of the platform’s larger user base. On paper, it promises to track phones, earbuds and object trackers. 

Sounds promising! (😮)

But can it deliver an AirTag-like experience? Since Jio is always optimistic about trending new technologies, it came up with a version of JioTag Air dedicated to the web of Android devices. They are calling it the JioTag Go and at a price of INR 1,499, it costs exactly the same as the JioTag Air. Equality for Android and iOS users ensured! (✅)

It looks cute and makes great promises, at least on paper. But does it work?

Since we were curious as the excited and ambitious folks at Reliance Jio, we got early access to a retail unit of the JioTag Go to share the overall experience. The results? Sit down, relax, grab some popcorn and read on. (😎)

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JioTag Go review: Is it worth buying?

To answer the question in a helpful way, we have divided our review into a couple of sections, starting with…

Design

Designing a Bluetooth tracker requires a lot of clever thinking. Apple’s AirTag goes for an aesthetic coin-shaped design that requires a protective jacket with a hole or a lanyard cable to attach to an article. Not so practical.

 Samsung’s SmartTag 2, on the other hand, features an integrated keyring hole that makes it easy to… tag. (😅)

The JioTag Go, just like the JioTag Air, gets a simple tile-like design with a provision for a lanyard cable attachment. 

Unlike the AirTag, the JioTag Go is almost as light as paper! For the duration of the review period, I tagged it with both my motorcycle and car keys and not once did it feel like a dumb weight. The lanyard, however, easily comes undone and you might need to hunt for better-quality alternatives. 

Jio provides a choice of four colours and other than the sombre black and white, the yellow not only adds a pinch of vibrancy to the accessory set but also makes it easy to locate (bright yellow is easy to spot). An integrated power cum reset soft-touch key and a tiny 120 dB speaker are neatly integrated into the sleek profile. 

Since the JioTag Go relies on a battery for power, you can easily pull out the back cover and get access to the coin cell battery (more specifically the CR2032 cell). Although Jio offers a spare battery in the box to keep you covered for up to two years, you can get this battery replaced at most wristwatch repair shops in the neighbourhood.

Setup and initialisation

The JioTag Go is meant for the Android ecosystem and that means you will need an Android phone running Android 9 or higher to start with the setup process. 

The setup process requires you to long-press the power key and activate the JioTag Go’s pairing mode. With modern Android phones, you should see a pairing prompt with your Find My Device network and within seconds, the device gets registered to your account. This is all on paper and theoretically, it sounds easy. 

In reality, though, the pairing process varies. For the review, I paired our JioTag Go with my ageing Motorola Edge 30 Fusion running on Android 14 and the process wasn’t as seamless as advertised. You will need to download Google’s Find My Device app from the Google Play Store app and register on it with your Google account. Newer Android phones running Android 15 come pre-installed with this app. 

On my Motorola, the pairing process took up to 30 minutes and it involved multiple resets. This shows that Google’s Find My Device service is still not as evolved as Apple’s Find My and requires a lot of backend improvement to make device pairing easy across all supported versions of Android. 

Nonetheless, after a hectic pairing process, the JioTag Go was tagged to the network and good to go. (☺️)

Tracking performance

Once the JioTag Go is paired, the Find My Device app pinpoints the last known whereabouts of the tracker on the map. You get to see the battery level along with options for quickly locating the tracker with sound. The ‘Find Nearby’ option is Google and Jio’s attempt at pinpointing the tracker in space without any ultrawideband chip and it requires a lot of guesswork on your part to locate the tracker. Hence, locating via the beeper is the ideal way to find the tracker. (📣)

The quick access panel also allows the location of the device to be shared with other contacts. However, dig into the settings and you get the option to rename the tracker, assign a product category and alter the ring volume. There’s also an option to share access with other Google accounts and contacts. 

With all that sorted, you leave the JioTag Go with your desired article and forget it. It is that simple. (😎)

The tracker keeps its location updated on the map every 10 minutes, relying solely on Bluetooth connections with nearby Android devices. Every time the tracker detects any Android device nearby, it sends its GPS coordinates via that device and the location is marked on Google’s Find My Device map. Since there are likely to be at least a dozen Android phones in your vicinity (kudos to Android’s accessibility), the JioTag Go pinpoints itself on the map with more accuracy even in sparsely populated regions. 

While on-ground tracking is almost accurate most of the time, the tracker suffers once it enters underground spaces. Our office is situated in a basement and despite a couple of Android phones always present in the vicinity, the JioTag Go pinpoints itself a few blocks away from our address. The lack of an ultrawideband chip in this ecosystem also prevents it from being located as precisely as Apple’s AirTag. (😐)

Privacy

The arrival of location trackers also highlighted the issue of privacy violations. Google and Apple came together to address most of the concerns with privacy breaches from location trackers. Android and iOS devices can now proactively inform unaware people of trackers affiliated with both Apple and Google networks. The JioTag Go benefits from this arrangement. 

To test this without violating any of my colleague’s privacy (😇), I kept my Android device at home and carried the tracker in my pocket all day. Within two hours though, my iPhone (my primary phone) notified me of the tracker’s presence and offered many options to either report the lost tracker or turn it off. 

Hence, if someone stealthily leaves a JioTag Go tracker on you, your iPhone or Android will notify you of its presence shortly. If you ever find a stray JioTag Go on you, here’s a quick tip: Turn it off by pressing the power button five times within two seconds. (🤓)

Our verdict on the JioTag Go

Despite the service’s early teething issues, Android’s Find My Device provides a convenient way to put your belongings on Google’s digital map. The JioTag Go is the first of many such Google ecosystem-exclusive trackers that do justice to this newly introduced service and is likely to encourage other manufacturers to bring more Android-only trackers. 

As a location tracker, the JioTag Go does its job well. The lightweight form factor makes it convenient to tag small articles like keys, bags, earbuds, helmets and whatnot! The sound beeper makes it easy to locate even in noisy outdoor locations and the easy availability of the coin cell battery ensures the product’s longevity. Despite the lack of an ultrawideband chip, the JioTag Go gels well with Google’s service to try pinpointing its location as accurately as possible in most scenarios.

That said, the pairing process leaves a lot of room for improvement (something Google and Jio need to work on for older devices) and the lack of provision for a keyring hole is a missed opportunity. The lanyard cable supplied in the box isn’t sufficient for a reliable attachment to your belongings. 

Considering its accessible price of INR 1,499 though, we believe that there will be a lot of takers for the JioTag Go. And I highly recommend giving it a try. (👍)

✅ Pros:

• Affordable 
• Compact
• Works well with Android Find My Device

❌ Cons:

• Pairing process is iffy on older devices
• Lanyard cable could be better
• No keyring hole 

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