A new AirTag is coming next year with enhanced privacy, security features

Macworld

It looks like the long wait for a new AirTag is almost over. After sparse and tentative rumors earlier this year that Apple was working on a 2nd-gen model, a new report indicates that the project has made firm progress and is on track for a launch in mid-2025.

In the latest edition of his Power On newsletter, Bloomberg reporter Mark Gurman writes that Apple has been running “manufacturing tests” on the device (codenamed B589) and that thanks to progress in these tests, Apple “is getting ready to bring it to market.” The likely release timeframe remains midway through 2025, which will be roughly four years after the launch of the original AirTag.

In May we were told only that the AirTag 2 would feature a better chip with improved location tracking, but Gurman is now prepared to disclose a little more about what Apple has in store. Aside from better range and a bolstered onboard wireless chip the new device will, he claims, offer improved privacy, as Apple wrestles with one of the most controversial issues with the first product.

Gurman doesn’t mention a design change—or the addition of a much-needed keyring hole—so expect the new AirTag to be virtually indistinguishable from the old one.

To a minority of unethical customers, the AirTag’s attraction is that it can be used for stalking, and there have been numerous high-profile incidents where people have discovered strange AirTags in their cars or personal effects. The company addressed the issue with software updates to warn people who find themselves accompanied by an unknown AirTag, but this can to an extent be neutered by removing the device’s speaker. So the speaker on the AirTag 2 will be harder to remove.

The AirTag is a fascinating product with bags of potential and a troubling flaw, so we look forward to hearing more about the 2nd-gen version. I remain unconvinced that it’s possible to thwart stalking without also thwarting the device’s function as an anti-theft measure, since the two situations are functionally identical, even if they are ethically different. But perhaps Apple will change my mind next year–especially if they’ve been reading my list of ways to improve the AirTag.