My wife lost her phone tonight. It fell out of her pocket while we were out getting ice cream. And here is my story about how Apple’s Lost Mode and Find My iPhone made us feel a lot more comfortable.

When we got home, my wife quickly asked, “Do you know where my phone is?” I pulled out my phone and asked Siri “Where is my wife?”1 I saw that she was on the other side of the river from our house. It was then I knew her iPhone had slipped out of her pocket. I quickly opened Find my iPhone, and since we have Family Sharing enabled, I was able to put my wife’s phone in “Lost Mode.”

screen shot of lost mode

This mode is amazing. It suspends Apple Pay, and puts up a message saying the phone is lost. 2 This message is my favorite, because not only does it say this phone is lost it also displays and prompts the finder to call a number you enter when placing the phone in this mode. On my drive back to get it, I even got a call from the shop informing me they had found the phone and were holding it behind the counter.

All in all everything worked great. All we lost was a few minutes, a bit of gas, and possibly some dignity. But the phone – and all of its data – was safe.

  1. All you need is for Siri to know who your spouse is, be connected with them inside of Find My Friend and you can be the most creepy person ever! ↩

  2. This is all we needed because her phone is always locked with a passcode. ↩