A 10-Year Battery for AirTag

Cool idea for a product but you either have to be a serious airhead or just lazy to miss or ignore all the low battery notifications. Also, that case should have a spot to store the back plate.

> Just discard the AirTag's back plate

It's a cool hack, but a terrible idea for a product. There are more components than the battery that will fail over a 10 year period (both in hardware and in software) - which is why ignoring notifications, and assuming that this product solves your problem is a big issue.

But when you have 4 -- and I bet people have more -- it does get a bit boring having to switch them out. It's no longer an annual event, it's now quarterly.

I mean, first-world problem. But if it could be less frequent, of course I'd take it.

its not about missing the notifications, its about not needing to worry about it.

This seems incredibly pessimistic to me. Do you really not expect things to last for over ten years?

In my experience most electronic things - and especially things that are simple and solid with no wear and tear like an AirTag - easily last 10 years. I’d expect an AirTag to work for, at least, decades.

My amplifier and speakers date from the 70s.

I have about 8. They used to run low at the same-ish time frame, but over time they drift apart due to frequency of moving around. (e.g.: the AirTag in my luggage runs out months after the one in my wallet)

I've got a 10 year old Bluetooth headset that works fine with a 2024 iPhone so why would something even simpler so obviously not?

This guy replaces his garage door opener every 2 years...

But these don’t exist in a vacuum. Replacing one battery a year is not a big deal. But I’m also replacing the 8-10 door sensor batteries yearly, 3 water leak sensors, etc. In a set it and forget it product that you may not use for weeks or months at a time, but also really need to work the one time you do need it, increasing the lifespan by an order of magnitude can have real value.

Do they run a proprietary Apple software, and have NFC and UWB inside them?

When the software is fixed we're back to thinking of the object as a single piece of hardware. My Gamecube and Xbox 360 have been working for (nearly) 20 years now.

Unless there's a known failure mode in these devices that gets worn down over time you should probably expect them to outlive you. The worst you'll probably get is corrosion from the AA batteries in the pack.

Your smoke alarm has a ten year battery.

I have frequently had the batteries run out on mine and I can't recall ever getting a proactive notification about it. However, "airhead" would potentially be an accurate term to describe me when it comes to how I usually handle such notifications, so maybe that's the problem!

The software isn't fixed.