If you or your friends would like to monitor each other’s locations and meet up while out and about using Apple’s iPhone iOS location features. You will be pleased to know that Apple has made it easy to share your position and locate a contact using the Find My iPhone app which is part of its iOS operating system by default. Once a friend has shared their location with you it can be seen in the Find My app on your iPhone or iPad using the Apple maps service.
Apple has also made it easy to see how far away your friends are from your location, allowing you to calculate just how quickly you will be able to meet up whether you are walking, driving or taking public transport using your messages app or Find My location services and choose share.
It is worth mentioning that if you want to see the distance, your friends are away from you, you will need to make sure that you have enabled Precise Location within the Find My application.
Share your iPhone location with friends
If you would like to share your location with friends and family you will need to set up location sharing on your iPhone or iPad. To do this, go to the Find My iOS application and press Me at the bottom of the screen. You will then see an option to enable Share My Location simply tap share.
Person location
If your iPhone is not currently sharing your location with others, you can force it to do so by pressing Use This iPhone as My Location. Now when friends or family check on their iOS devices for your location they will see the position of your iPhone not your iPad or MacBook computer.
To share your location with a friend follow the instructions below.
- Open the Find My app
- Halfway down above your contacts list on the right-hand side you will see a + , pressing this will allow you to share your location.
- Once pressed Apple will ask you to enter the name of the person you would like to share your location with. Or simply once again tap the + to view your contacts and select one from there.
- Confirm your choice by selecting Send and then how long you would like to share your location with this contact.
Find your friends
- Open the Find My app and select the People tab.
- Under People, choose the name of your friend who is sharing their location with you.
- Choose Directions to open Maps and then follow the directions to arrive at your friend’s location
To find out where your friends and family are at any time of the day, just open the ‘Find My’ app on your Apple device and choose the person you want to locate from the list at the bottom of your screen.
If your friend’s location can be found, you’ll see it on the map, telling you exactly where they are. You can even use Siri to help locate a friend who’s sharing their location with you. Just ask Siri by saying, “Where’s Steve?”, replacing ‘Steve’ with your friend’s name.
However, if they’re in an area with no cell service or if their iPhone or iPad is switched off, you might see ‘No location found’ under their name. This means that you can’t find out where they are right now.
Once you’ve located a friend on your iPhone, you can use the Maps app to get directions straight to their location for a meet-up. You can also label your friends’ locations, like ‘Work’ or ‘Home’, to remind yourself where they might be.
To do this, tap on the person you want to label, then tap their name to set a location label. Press ‘Edit Location Name’ and type in your custom label. For your best friends, you can mark them as favorites by choosing their name and pressing “Add to Favorites”.
Location changes
It is also worth remembering that you can notify your friends and family members when your location changes to do this follow the instructions below.
1. Open the Find My app
2. Select the name of the contact from the list in the bottom half of the screen
3. Below the Notifications section press Add and Notify
4. Select whether you would like to tell your friend when you arrive or leave a specific location
5. Choose the location or tap New Location to create a location radius for the notification. If you set the radius wider your friend will be notified when you enter that area and not when they specifically arrive at a location.
6. Finally select whether you would like your friend or family member to be notified a single time or every time you enter or leave that location
7. Finalize the setup by pressing Add
Turn off share location on iPhone
If you would like to stop sharing your location and change the ability for your iPhone to share your location with friends and family. Simply enter the Find My app and tap on the contact, you would like to remove from notifications.
- Open the Find my app.
- Select the Me tab.
- Turn off Share My Location.
Stop sharing with one person
- Open the Find My app and select the People tab.
- Choose the person that you want to stop sharing your location with.
- Scroll down and select Stop Sharing My Location.
Turn off Allow Friend Requests
- Open the Find My app.
- Select the Me tab.
- Turn off Allow Friend Requests.
Under ‘Notifications’, pick one of these options: To change an alert, click ‘Change’ and then hit ‘Done’. To stop an alert, hit ‘Delete Notification’ and then confirm by hitting ‘Delete Notification’ again.
You can also use the location-sharing on your Apple device to get an alert when your friend comes or goes from a certain place. Just pick a contact and under ‘Notifications’ press ‘Add’ and ‘Notify Me’.
Family sharing
Remember, any alerts you set will be sent to your friend or family member to make sure you’re not tracking them without their knowledge. Apple lets you make up to 25 ‘Notify Me’ alerts.
If your friend or family member is okay with you tracking their location, you can choose to get an alert when they arrive or leave a certain place. You can make the alert area bigger if you want to know when your friend leaves the city, not just a specific place.
If you make these alerts happen regularly, your friend or family member will need to agree to the location requests. They’ll get an alert asking them to okay the location sharing you’ve set up.
There are some apps and software that will allow you to track someone by cell phone number without them knowing for free. Of course, this is not recommended as you should not be tracking someone without having their permission and this could be against the law depending on which country you are in. You should always have permission from the person you are tracking.
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