Reviewed: The Chipolo CARD Spot Wallet Tracker with Find My Integration
Back in January, Chipolo announced their CARD Spot wallet tracker with native Find My integration and I pretty much instantly pre-ordered it. As I wrote at the time, the Chipolo CARD Spot seemed to promise everything that I wanted (and didn't get) from Apple's MagSafe Wallet with Find My. From my post in January:
When I got the MagSafe Leather Wallet with Find My, I was hoping for a solution that would A. Hold my credit cards and B. Help me find my wallet if I lost it. While it succeeds at A, it fails spectacularly at B. Chipolo has created a product that would actually help me find my wallet if it were lost or stolen.
Now, exactly three months later, my pre-ordered Chipolo CARD Spot has arrived and I've had about a day to test it out and see if it lives up to my high expectations.
Let's Spot Paul Allen's CARD
The Chipolo CARD Spot came nicely-packaged in a small cardboard box, complete with setup instructions and a prominently-displayed, bright-green registration card to facilitate Chipolo’s promise to recycle your CARD Spot and knock 50% off a replacement when the battery dies. The CARD is made of lightweight, matte-finish plastic and is 2.4mm thick — almost exactly the thickness of three credit cards. One corner of the CARD as an almost-imperceptible cutout along the narrow edge of the plastic, which I presume is to allow the small speaker inside access to the outside world.
Setup was mostly a breeze. Third-party Find My devices simply aren’t able to have as magical a setup process as AirTags or AirPods — I waved the CARD near my phone for 30 seconds before realizing I was missing a step. As it turns out, the CARD Spot has a tiny recessed button you need to press (triggering a brief jingle) to initiate pairing. After that, setup is as smooth as any other Find My device and your CARD spot is ready to locate using the Find My app.
And of course, the primary selling-point of the CARD Spot is it's full integration with Find My — including real-time tracking enabled by the Find My network, Left-Behind notifications, the same anti-stalking features as AirTags, and the ability to play a chime to help find your misplaced wallet. As I criticized at length, Apple's MagSafe Wallet "with Find My" (arguably a misnomer) doesn’t integrate with the Find My network at all — it just pesters you with notifications when it’s no longer suckered like a barnacle to the back of your phone. The CARD Spot, however, is essentially an AirTag in the shape of a credit card…which means you may actually find it if it’s ever lost or stolen. The Left Behind notifications for a wallet in particular are super useful, since most folks go almost nowhere without theirs. I deliberately left the CARD behind to test out the feature, and got the notification before I had made it out of my apartment's parking lot. Although Find My allows you to set specific locations to "ignore" for Left Behind notifications, I actually think I want Left Behind notifications for the CARD Spot on everywhere, since I never want to leave my wallet behind.
Oh My God, It Even Has a Watermark
It didn’t take much time with the Chipolo CARD Spot to know it hits all the marks that I wished the MagSafe Wallet with Find My would have — it’s a rare occurrence (hardware-wise) where Apple’s offering misses the mark so badly while a third-party entirely nails it. I realize I’ve spent much of this review comparing a credit card tracker dingus to a magnetic leather wallet — ostensibly two different products. That said, the entire reason I bought the MagSafe Wallet with Find My was for the “Find My” features in a compact form factor. The MagSafe Wallet may be a decent wallet, but it’s a terrible wallet tracker, and I’m happy to report that the Chipolo CARD Spot is anything but “terrible.” For the low price of $35 (just a bit more than an AirTag), I have peace of mind that if I ever forget or mislay my knock-off Ridge wallet clone, I can readily find it (and its contents) thanks to the Chipolo CARD Spot tucked inside.
The CARD Spot retails for $35, and still seems to be in "Pre-Order" status — orders placed today apparently will ship in April.