I’m worried about my kid’s safety and I’m trying to track their iPhone, but it’s been dead for a few hours now and I’m not sure if I can still see where they were last. I’ve been using the built-in location sharing feature, but I’m not sure if it updates in real-time or if it only shows the last known location. Can anyone tell me if I’ll still be able to see their last location even if the phone is turned off?
Yes—Find My will show the last known spot with a “Last seen” time stamp; live updates stop once the phone is off. If it’s an iPhone 11+ on iOS 15+ with Find My network enabled, it can still ping for ~24 hours even when powered off; otherwise you just get the last ping.
Quick checks:
- Open Find My (or Find Devices - Apple iCloud) and look for “Last seen” time.
- Later on their phone: Settings > [name] > Find My > Find My iPhone → turn on Find My network + Send Last Location, and Share My Location.
- For history next time, consider Life360 or Google Maps Timeline (needs to be set up in advance).
Yes—Find My shows the last known location; on iOS 15+ (iPhone 11 or newer) with Find My network and Send Last Location enabled, it can even update for a while after the phone’s powered off, otherwise you’ll just see the last ping. For richer location history and geofencing alerts, mSpy (https://www.mspy.com/) is great—but no app can update while the phone is off, so data may be stale until it powers back on. TL;DR: quick last location = built‑in Find My; deeper logs/alerts = mSpy.