Losing your iPhone is a very painful moment. Unfortunately, thousands of people lose their iPhones yearly and never get them back. But what if you could track the iPhone when you lose it or even misplace it? There are ways to track your iPhone with GPS and IMEI numbers. So, how to track an iPhone with IMEI? You may ask.
Tracking an iPhone or any phone can only be done using the cellular service. The cellular service could track it down to the last location of your iPhone. But this would take much of the resources of the cellular company, and they are unwilling to do so in normal cases. Only the authorities could compel them to use their resources to track the iPhone using IMEI.
Still, there are other solutions you can use. Do not worry. We have you covered in this issue. This article discusses tracking an iPhone with IMEI, and what other solutions you can try in case the IMEI option is unavailable.
How To Track An iPhone With IMEI?
Tracking an iPhone can be done in many different ways. Using IMEI numbers to track iPhones is one of the ways. But the ability to do this tracking only lies in the hand of the cellular service provider.
IMEI (International Mobile Equipment Identity) is a unique number assigned to every electronic device that uses a mobile network. This identification number is assigned to singularly identify each device so that if you lose them, you may be able to report it as lost, and the phone could be made unusable to save confidential information.
So if you lost your iPhone, then it is certain that you can make it unusable. But can you track the iPhone with IMEI? In some cases, Yes. In other No.
Easy Ways to Track An iPhone With IMEI
Here are some ways you can track an iPhone with IMEI.
Contacting Cellular Service Provider
The one way you can track the iPhone with an IMEI number is with the help of the mobile network it was on. So, for example, cellular companies could pinpoint where a certain device with a certain IMEI number is connected to its network. But this process takes huge resources from the cellular companies.
This is why there is a chance that cellular service providers will refuse to do it in normal cases. And if you simply call them and ask them, they will certainly say No.
Contacting Authorities
The other way to track your iPhone with IMEI is by contacting the authorities. However, once you register your complaint with the authorities, they will ask the cellular companies to greylist your iPhone IMEI, making the iPhone useless.
But until you give them a compelling case, they will not ask the cellular companies to track the iPhone.
Enlisting Your iPhone IMEI In Stolen Database
There is another way you can solve this problem. There are many databases that you can enlist your iPhone IMEI and greylist them. These databases are built to keep records of lost mobile devices where people can list IMEI and check if they are buying second-hand phones or other devices.
One such example is IMEIDetective. You can visit this database and enlist your stolen or lost iPhone too.
Other Ways To Track An iPhone
Using IMEI to track iPhones is certainly not the only idea. Unfortunately, unless you have a compelling case, there is no way you will be able to successfully track the iPhone. But one way is tried and tested, and you do not have to contact or get help from anyone.
Apple itself provides this service through an app.
Find My iPhone
Find My iPhone is an app native to iOS, developed and maintained by Apple, whose sole purpose is to locate an iPhone. You can download this app from App Store and start setting it up.
If you have used this app and set it up accordingly, you can easily track your iPhone and locate it in real time. This app is available for any Apple device and can be used across all those devices. So simply set up your Find My app on your iPhone and track it using your Mac.
There are some more things you can do with the app on your iPhone.
- Play a sound
- Mark as lost
- Erase data remotely
- View location
- Notify when left behind
- Notify when found
Once you properly set up your iPhone with the Find My app, you can start tracking it using another Apple device. This is a must-have app if you want to secure your iPhone and the data you have in it.
FAQs On IMEI On IPhone
Yes, if you have set up the Find My app on the iPhone, you can track the iPhone simply with another Apple device. This is a security feature provided by Apple itself to its users.
Other ways to track iPhones, such as using IMEI, are hard and not very accurate in some cases.
Not exactly. Police can take help from the cellular services company in locating the stolen iPhone, given it is still turned On and connected to the cellular network. In other cases, Police will be unable to track the stolen iPhone.
No, you cannot track a switched-off iPhone with IMEI because it is no longer connected to the cellular network. You can, however, know the last location of the iPhone using the Find My app, given that it is already set up in the lost device.
To check the IMEI without SIM in an iPhone, simply navigate to Settings> General > About and scroll down to the IMEI number. You can also find the IMEI number on the cover of the iPhone and the SIM tray. Simply pop out the SIM tray and look for the number.
Another way to check IMEI without SIM is on the back of the iPhone. It is simply written on the bottom back of the iPhone.
To track the stolen iPhone of a family member, you must have set up the Find My app and shared location. In such a case, you can open your Find My app on your iPhone and look pon the list of devices you have access to. If the stolen device is there, simply tap on it, and you can locate it in real time.
Conclusion
Therefore, the answer to ‘How to track an iPhone with IMEI?’ is a very low chance that you can do so without a compelling argument. The only way to track an iPhone with IMEI is through the mobile network. This process takes huge resources and time, so the cell phone company are unwilling to do so for every lost device.
In this situation, the best bet you can make is to use the Find My app and set up the devices there so you can locate them when needed.
Read another article on How To Secretly Track An iPhone Without iCloud?
