Find a Lost iPhone by Signal Strength from the Command Line
Findphone: Locate a nearby Bluetooth device by signal strength
findphone is a macOS command-line tool that locates nearby Bluetooth devices by signal strength, ideal when Find My is disabled by MDM. It surveys all Apple handhelds, tracks a specific device by name, and offers audible feedback like a parking sensor. The tool combines GATT, BLE advertisements, and classic link RSSI, with honest measurement handling. It requires macOS 13+, is unsigned, and needs Bluetooth permission.
Clicks stop when contact goes stale, so silence means no signal rather than no device.
- inigyou
When I lost my phone I put in one earbud and walked around the area listening for the connection sound.
Turns out it wasn't useful because someone else had taken it to lost and found within a few minutes of me losing it, before I knew I'd lost it. But it was a good idea.
- luma
If you have multiple fixed BLE receivers, you can do full trilateration. This project integrates into Home Assistant using HA proxy BLE receivers to track phones moving around in your house: https://github.com/agittins/bermuda
- ruskyhacker
I thought unless an android or iPhone is beaconing, it only broadcasts ble on device wake?
Maybe I'm misremembering, but for example my esphome proxies in HA will show nothing for ages at night while my phone isn't being interacted with.
If the phone is lost, it's probably not super awake lol