I tried this wallet-sized tracker for a month — and I wouldn't recommend it

In addition to best key finder contenders like the Tile Pro and Tile Mate, the Tile lineup also includes speciality trackers for more specific tasks. Chief among them is the Tile Slim, a credit card-sized tracking device that slips into a wallet or purse for easy monitoring from an app on your phone.

Or at least it would be easy, if the Tile Slim wasn't beset by limitations to both design and performance. I generally like the 2024 lineup of Tile tracking devices, but the Slim is clearly the weakest of the bunch. My Tile Slim 2024 review looks at why.

Tile Slim 2024 review: Price and availability

The Tile Slim costs $30 — more than the $25 Tile Mate but less than the $35 Tile Pro.

That $30 cost only applies to the black version of the wallet tracker. Tile offer the Slim in eight color combinations total, but versions in green, aqua, navy and pink raise the price to $34.

The additional colors are certainly more eye-catching than the basic black version — I certainly liked the look of the green Tile Slim I tested. But with the tracker tucked into a slot inside your wallet — and thus out of view most of the time — is that splash of color really worth an extra $3?

Tile Slim 2024 review: Design and features

With its 3.4 x 2.1 x 0.1-inch dimensions, the Tile Slim was built to slip into a wallet, and at 14 grams, it's not adding any appreciable weight.

A device that thin doesn't leave much room for a replaceable battery. Indeed, like the Tile Mate and Tile Sticker, the Tile Slim uses a non-replaceable battery, though the manufacturer reckons on three years of use before requiring a replacement.

A Life360 logo in the lower left corner — Life360 now owns the Tile brand — doubles as a button. Press it twice, and you can make your phone ring. New for the latest model is integration with the Life360 app, which lets you set up the button for a triple press to trigger an SOS alert to your trusted Life360 contacts.

It's a nice addition, though you're forced to choose either the two-way find feature for your phone or the SOS alert. None of the new Tile products can support both alerts.

Apart from that addition, the Tile Slim's feature set remains the same as its predecessor's — and indeed, for all the Tile tracking devices. You pair the tracker with the Tile app (Android, iOS), which allows you to buzz the finder from your phone. Doing so triggers an alarm to help you track down the location of your misplaced wallet or purse.

The Tile Slim connects over Bluetooth, with no support for the Ultra Wideband connectivity offered by Apple's AirTag or Samsung's Galaxy SmartTag 2. Of course, neither of those products are wallet-sized nor can they work on phones that aren't either iPhone or Galaxy devices, respectively. The Tile Slim enjoys wider compatibility.

Tile Slim 2024 review: Performance

The Tile Slim promises the same 350-foot range as the Tile Mate, giving you a lot of space to find your wallet, should you leave it behind. And in my testing, which I conducted in a public park by setting down the tracking and seeing how far away I could get before I lost range, the Tile Slim posted numbers consistent with the Tile Mate I reviewed. In fact, the Tile Slim even offered a longer maximum distance, even if the range was about the same on average.

That's the good news. The bad news is that Tile's 2024 trackers fell far short of their promised range in my testing. The farthest I ever got from the wallet tracker was 75 feet before the connection dropped, and distances of 50 to 70 feet were more typical. That's a far cry from the 350 feet on the label.

I try to take a nuanced view of these results. Results in Bluetooth trackers can vary widely in my experience, and the important thing is that tracker performs consistently — something you could certainly say of the Slim. However, I can't overlook the fact that my best range with the 2024 model was worse than the Tile Slim 2022 — and limited range was one of that device's biggest cons.

A 104-decibel alarm helps you find the Tile Slim when you love misplaced your wallet or purse, though after about 60 feet, I had trouble hearing the beeping over any ambient noise. Burying the Tile Slim in a pile of laundry — hey, I can't count the number of times my wallet has stayed in the back pocket of a pair of pants I've put in a clothes hamper — I also had difficulty hearing the alarm from a room away.

There are Tile Premium accounts for all these key finders, the Tile Slim included, where you pay $30/year for some extra features, the most important of which is Smart Alerts. These alerts will send you a ping when the Tile tracker is left behind, though there's some delay before that notification arrives. Once I went for a 10-minute stroll around the block without my wallet, and the Smart Alert only arrived on my iPhone by the time I was walking back up my front steps.

The bottom line? You can get plenty out of Tile's trackers, the Tile Slim included, without paying the annual Premium fee.

Tile Slim 2024: Verdict

Of all the things that Bluetooth trackers let you keep tabs on, wallets and purses would seem to be the most valuable — losing your keys can be an annoyance, but losing something with your cash, credit cards and ID can have serious repercussions. So naturally, you'd want a device that delivers time and time again.

Despite a design that's built for wallets, the Tile Slim 2024 just doesn't deliver the kind of consistent performance I'd want to see from a wallet-specific tracker. If the range were longer in testing and the alarm a bit easier to hear at a distance, I'd be more confident in using it in a wide variety of settings. As it stands, it works best for finding where you've left your wallet in your house, but in other circumstances, it's too hit-and-miss for my taste.