Are “GPS Trackers with No Subscription Fee” really GPS Trackers?
What a Real-Time GPS Tracker Is
Real-time GPS trackers continuously measure distances to satellites and compute locations. Trackers transmit these locations, as often as every few seconds, in a message sent via a wireless phone network to a central server, which in turn maps the position of the Tracker on a mapping application, typically cloud-based, accessible from a computer or mobile device. Users can see the positions of vehicles and assets in near-real time.
Most Btracking GPS trackers use both GPS and GNSS, and connect to the strongest local network to give users the most accurate positions in real time.
Of course there are ongoing costs associated with providing real time tracking. Besides the cost of the tracker, there’s the cost of sending data messages over a wireless network to a hosting server, the cost of maintaining a tracking application, and the cost of storing the tracking data for a period of time. There’s also the cost of developing a Fleet Management tracking platform and continually upgrading it with robust features such as Btracking.
What a No Subscription Fee Tracker Is
How do these devices actually work?
“No Subscription Fee” trackers have no wireless network modem, sim card or esim, which simply means, the tracking device itself cannot transmit data via a wireless network to a mapping platform. These devices rely on other devices that do have access to a wireless network, to transmit positions. trackers have a bluetooth low energy (BLE) modem that almost continuously broadcasts its unique identifier ID. These devices connect with any iPhone (or in some cases, Android) that has its GPS modem turned on, and is within a radius of approximately 200-300 feet. The iPhone transmits the location data, unique identifier ID, and timestamp via its wireless network to the cloud. The mapping platform receives the data and displays the last known location of the iPhone that the tracker was linked up with.
“No Subscription Fee” trackers are actually NOT GPS trackers. It has no GPS or GNSS modem, which simply means, the tracking device itself cannot acquire a location from GPS/GNSS satellites. These devices instead send the location of the nearby device that it connects with to send the data for it.
Locations will be updated on the mapping platform approximately once every 60 minutes, assuming an iPhone user was within a 200-feet radius of the tracker. Because it’s unknown how many or when location pings will come in to the mapping platform, the platform itself checks (usually) once an hour for new location pings. Some hours may have one or more locations, some hours will have none (i.e., when no iPhone was nearby). Sometimes there is data lag, with location pings coming through belatedly.
Some newer “No Subscription Fee” trackers also have a wifi modem and thus the ability to connect to decentralized wifi networks and transmit data via that network. These trackers will send the location of that wifi transmitter, not the actual location of the tracker.
Benefits and Limitations of a “No Subscription Fee” Tracker
The benefits of this type of device are:
- the tracker incurs no wireless data transmitting costs, because those costs are borne by the owner of the iPhone that it connects with, or by the owner of the decentralized wifi network it connects with
- the device can be smaller and use a smaller battery since it does not need to power a GPS modem or a wireless modem.
The limitations of this type of device are:
- if there are no iPhones or wifi devices within range (200-300 feet) of the tracker, nothing is transmitted to the mapping platform
- there can be data lag
- the location displayed on the mapping platform is actually that of the iPhone or wifi device that the tracker connected with, NOT the tracker itself.
A Note of Caution About the “No Subscription Fee”
Providing a mapping platform has a cost, and if a provider is not charging a subscription fee, they’re paying that cost with revenue from selling trackers. If tracker sales slow down, the provider may have issues paying for the mapping platform.
So What’s Better?
If you need near real-time tracking, reliability, and/or accuracy, a GPS Tracker is the way to go. A GPS Tracker like this offers:
- near real-time tracking
- near-pinpoint location accuracy
- high reliability with locations sent through wireless networks (so they work anywhere there’s a cell signal)
- store & forward capability, i.e., when out of cell signal range, the device stores GPS locations in its memory and transmit those when back in range of a cell signal.
A “No Subscription Fee” tracker (like our BTAIR tracker, which does have a small subscription fee) can work for you where:
- you’ll be moving in areas where many phone users are nearby
- real-time tracking is not needed
- it’s OK if locations come in once an hour or not at all for long stretches
- high accuracy of locations are not needed
