Earlier this week, Apple rather unceremoniously and unexpectedly announced an updated product release of one of their most popular products.  Apple announced the second generation AirTags.  AirTags our among Apple’s most popular products.  I own several and have them in most of the bags that I regularly travel with use – suitcases, the backpack I take to work, camera bags, etc.  And unlike most Apple products they’re not particularly expensive – you can pick up a four-pack  for about 100 bucks.  So when the announcement hit (with immediate product availability), I immediately placed an order for a four-pack.  And when they arrived I, and I think millions of customers who also have the first generation AirTag who purchased them are all asking the same question:  Which AirTag is which?

if you go back and read that press release, you’ll note that Apple is not referring to the new AirTag as “AirTag 2” – they simply call it the second generation AirTag.  As of the press release, Apple is no longer selling the first generation AirTag – only the second.  The problem for the consumer is that there is absolutely nothing that distinguishes the first generation AirTag from the second generation.  Holding a first generation AirTag in your hand with a second generation AirTag, you’ll be able to tell the difference between the two.  Even when you tap one on your phone to add it to the FindMy App, iOS it doesn’t make any distinction between a first generation or a second generation AirTag.  I went back to the Apple website listing for the second generation AirTag and saw that indeed the only way that you know you’re ordering the latest version is the red highlighted word “new” in the product description:

The first thing I did when I received my shipment of second generation, AirTags was to go grab the first generation AirTag out of my carry-on suitcase with the intention of replacing the first generation AirTag that I kept in my carry-on with a second generation model.  I then started unpackaging one of the second generation AirTags and pulled the little piece of plastic out of it that prevents the battery from engaging during shipping.  That’s when I started looking at both closely and realized they were in distinguishable from one another.  I saw that my phone popped up with a notification asking me if it wanted to add an AirTag that it had detected.  But there was nothing in that process that told me I was adding a second generation AirTag or a first generation AirTag.  That’s what I said to myself “ Wait a minute… I must’ve ordered the wrong version.  I bet I’ve accidentally got a first generation four pack.”  I placed my order from the Apple Store, so I went into my account and looked into my order:

“Uh oh” I thought.  Looking at the order status. I was even more strongly suspecting that I had ordered the wrong AirTags.  So I called Apple customer service and explained that I was concerned that I had ordered the wrong version of AirTags.  Looking into my account, could see the invoice on their side that showed that I had indeed ordered the second generation of AirTags:

Then I asked the customer service representative, “ How am I supposed to be able to tell the difference between the first generation and the second generation?”  She looked at the two products, and after several minutes, she was forced to agree with me – there’s absolutely nothing on the AirTags themselves that would tell you which version you have.  Absolutely flabbergasted, the representative quickly put in a feedback into their system about the issue.

At this point, the only distinguishing characteristic I’m aware of  between the two versions of the AirTags is there respective weight.  Because the second generation of AirTag has a larger, louder speaker It weighs slightly more than the first generation.  So I got out my food scale and sure enough the new AirTag that I bought weighs more than the first generation:

1st Gen AirTag

2nd Gen AirTag

This lack of product version delineation is going to cause some real headaches for customers – particularly those upgrading from the first generation.  And it’s not like the first generation of AirTags are now worthless – like me, you’ll probably still want to use them in some circumstances.  if that’s the case I strongly recommend that you label them in your Find My app with custom labels identifying the first generation from the second generation.

How did this happen?  Knowing Apple it’s unlikely they’ll ever tell us, and they may not even acknowledge that there is a problem.  But most logical explanation is that this was a cost savings issue.  AirTags are no doubt high volume low margin products for Apple.  They probably manufacturer AirTag components by the thousands.  Whether or not they could have made the AirTags smaller or larger, they were probably designed to fit in the existing casings because they probably had thousands already produced.  So my guess is, at some point, Apple just stopped putting in first generation AirTags into the existing cases and switched over to second generation.  That would also explain why Apple didn’t release the second generation of AirTags as a part of a larger product rollout with a press event.  You wouldn’t want the pesky members of the press discovering and pointing out how indistinguishable the second generation was from the first, and the potential problems this could cause both vendors and customers.

It will be interesting to see in the coming days if online news outlets and tech media begin to report on this issue.  Buyer beware.