Is Fi Collar the Best Tracker For Dog?
After in-depth reviews and comparisons, we found that Tractive Collar and Fi Collar are the most accurate and reliable devices for when your dog stages a breakout.
A great pet tracker should connect quickly to the GPS signal and give you fast, accurate location updates. Its battery should also stay charged long enough for you to reunite with your furry runaway.
But while these devices continue to improve, none of them are perfect—their technology depends on satellites, cell signals, smartphones, app algorithms, and even the clouds in the sky. It’s a wonder they work as well as they do. And as long as you’re okay with ceding a little privacy, they’re a useful tool that can turbocharge your search.
After a month of testing and comparisons, we think the Tractive GPS Tracker for Dogs and the Fi GPS Collar is the most accurate and reliable devices for when your dog stages a breakout.
Everything We Recommend:
Tractive GPS Collar
Tractive GPS Trackerr provides excellent accuracy, connectivity, and battery life, as well as flexible subscription options.
on Tractive
The Tractive GPS Tracker for Dogs reliably connects to the GPS signal faster than any other model we tested, so you won’t be left standing on the corner wondering which way to turn when every second counts. The tracker uses signals from three different major cell networks (and more small ones), so you’ll end up in fewer dead zones than with the models that use just one cell network. The location during live tracking is among the most accurate, but the tracker is bulky, and the built-in light is too small to be useful.
Fi GPS Collar
Fi Series 3 Dog Collar offers great location accuracy in a small package, but there are a few sacrifices.
on TryFi
If you prefer a tracker with a smaller physical profile than the Tractive but with similarly sharp location accuracy, the Fi Series 3 Smart Dog Collar is a good runner-up model. Due to its streamlined construction, it’s less bulky around your dog’s neck, and the accompanying plug-in base helps preserve battery life. But it doesn’t connect to the GPS signal as fast as the Tractive for live tracking. It’s also more expensive, and you can’t use it on just any collar.
Detailed Review and Comparison:
Runner-up: Fi Series 3 Smart Dog Collar
If you prefer a tracker with a smaller physical profile and great location accuracy, or if the Tractive isn’t available, the Fi Series 3 Smart Dog Collar is a good runner-up model. This device shares many features with the Tractive, but in a slimmer, sleeker package. However, its size comes with a few trade-offs, and it’s more expensive than our top pick. It’s easy to set up, and it comes with a base that helps preserve battery life.
For such a small device, it does a lot. The stainless steel–encased Fi device weighs 0.95 ounces without the collar, nearly half an ounce less than the Tractive. Compared with the Tractive, this device measures almost an inch less in length and nearly a quarter-inch less in depth. The sizer on Fi’s website goes as low as 5 pounds (and 9.5 inches for the collar diameter), compared with Tractive’s 9-pound minimum for dogs. Also, the Fi can’t be attached to just any collar—you either have to use the one it comes with or buy one of the many available third-party options (one of which might better suit your style).
Fi takes a creative approach to preserving battery life. Unlike any other tracker we tested, the Fi comes with a separate base that helps maximize battery life. When the collar moves too far from the base (roughly a radius of up to 200 feet, depending on the environment), it will jump onto your home’s Wi-Fi instead, which is slightly less power-efficient. Similarly, if the Fi app is running, the collar can connect to your phone via Bluetooth. But once the dog disconnects from all of those “safe” signals, the algorithm considers it an escape and starts looking for the more-battery-intensive GPS signal. In our testing, we found the battery life of the Fi to be nearly as good as that of the Tractive: After a dozen outings of roughly 30 minutes each over six days, the Fi still had 45% of juice left, only 5% lower than the Tractive’s result. The base also serves as a wireless charger, using magnetic induction.
It delivers mostly accurate location updates. The Fi’s location accuracy was close to the Tractive’s most of the time during live tracking, which Fi calls Lost Dog Mode. But the pathway it displayed wasn’t always as precise. The Fi’s path trace often appeared as a series of zig-zags that occasionally cut through buildings or showed part of a trail that never happened. The Fi relies on only one cellular network, AT&T, versus Tractive’s minimum of three, so the signal might be weaker or absent in more places. But in general, when I was looking for the dog in Lost Dog Mode, the Fi stayed up-to-date and pointed me in the right direction. And while the Fi map’s location pointer is a transparent fan, which we found harder to use than the Tractive’s arrow, the Fi’s satellite view was much brighter and easier to see.
It’s waterproof. With an IP68 waterproof rating, the Fi can be submerged in up to 1.5 meters of water for up to 30 minutes; this is better than the Tractive’s IPX7 rating. So if your dog loves to swim and dive in the deep end, the Fi might be the better option.
Flaws but not dealbreakers
It’s slower to activate live tracking. The biggest problem we had with the Fi was how long it sometimes took to activate live tracking. As we were writing this guide, the company pushed out a firmware update that drastically improved this timing, but it was still slower than the Tractive and not as consistent. It took the Fi between roughly 14 seconds, at its fastest, and 80 seconds, at its slowest, to activate Lost Dog Mode. In a situation where every second matters, that higher end can feel like a very long time, especially compared with the steady six-second average it took the Tractive to start live tracking.
It’s intended to work with the app always running in the background. I regularly quit out of all the apps on my phone, partly to preserve my battery and partly to preserve some semblance of privacy. But whenever I closed the Fi app, it pushed a message saying I should leave the app open in the background “for better tracking.” According to my test, if you’re walking your dog with the app closed, the collar won’t know that you’re actually with your dog, and it will think they’re escaping. It will then power up the GPS connection and start sending you alerts, all of which will drain the battery faster. Ultimately, the choice is yours, you don’t have to leave the app open in order for the tracker to function, but it works better if you do.
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Top Pick for dogs: Tractive GPS Tracker for Dogs
The Tractive GPS Tracker for Dogs had the most reliable location accuracy and escape alerts of all the models we tested. It also had the longest battery life. It easily attaches to a dog’s collar, and the app has an intuitive map interface that makes it simple to follow your dog’s path, even when you’re panicking. It offers multiple subscription options, costing as little as $5 a month.
It’s great at tracking your animal’s location. Of all the devices we tested, the Tractive provided the most consistently accurate location updates during live tracking. Tractive is the only company we’re aware of that uses multiple cell-service providers, including AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile, among others, connecting to whichever one has the strongest available signal. During live tracking, the device updates every 2-3 seconds under good conditions, but it can sometimes take longer than that, depending on the environment. In our testing, the dog’s location wasn’t always pinpointed perfectly, but it was usually off by only a few yards.
The Tractive connects to the device quickly for live tracking. When switching to live tracking, the Tractive consistently connected to the collar and updated the dog’s location after roughly 6 seconds, on average. No other tracker we tested came close. The Fi, after a recent firmware update, took an average of 38 seconds to activate live tracking, and the times were inconsistent. The Whistle usually took close to a minute, if not longer.
The Tractive has the fastest escape alerts. Every tracker we tested had a lag between the animal leaving the safe zone and the escape alert, but the Tractive had the shortest delay. On average, it pushed an alert to my phone roughly 90 seconds after the dog crossed out of the safe-zone boundary. I contacted Tractive customer service and they told me: “This slower speed is a trade-off to preserve battery life. The more frequently it’s checking to see if it’s outside of the safe zone, the faster the drag on the battery. And so we can dial that up and the battery depletes faster or we can dial it down, the battery lasts longer but that alert is more delayed.”
The map interface helps you find your way to your pet. When you’re looking for a pet, the Tractive’s map indicates your own location with a familiar blue dot. The dot has an arrow extending from it, showing which direction your phone is facing; this was helpful in orienting us to our own position on the map, so we could point ourselves toward the dog’s location.
The battery lasted longer than the rest. After the first dozen outings of at least 30 minutes each—about 6 hours total, over six days—the Tractive still had 50% left on its battery, the best performance among all of the batteries in trackers we tested. The Fi’s battery came in a close second place, with 45% battery life. The Tractive comes with a separate clip-on charger and cable that you can plug into a USB power block (not included). This is an extra piece to keep track of, but we found that it charged the device relatively quickly, within a couple of hours. Tractive also offers an XL version of its dog tracker, which is larger than the main dog tracker, it’s very similar to this version, yet it has a bigger battery and a more-robust casing, to withstand the stronger jaws of larger dogs.
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Flaws but not dealbreakers
The app can be glitchy at times. Occasionally we noticed the dog’s blue path line advancing ahead of his icon on the map, which seemed to be stuck. We figured out that the path line was the thing to follow. So we just consulted that when looking for the dog, and it worked out fine. The lag never lasted longer than 10 seconds, but it was still a less-than-perfect experience.
The light is small, and the sound is fairly quiet. The light on this tracker is extremely small, so it’s not useful when you’re trying to find an animal in the dark. Likewise, the jingle it plays is very quiet, with no adjustment for volume, so if there’s a lot of road noise or wind, you may never hear it. It has an IPX7 waterproof rating, which means it can be submerged in up to 1 meter for up to 30 minutes, but this is lower than that of the Fi.
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The competition
The Whistle Go Explore 2.0 is the updated version of our former pick. This tracker had excellent location accuracy, and it had one of the most user-friendly app interfaces of all the trackers we tested. But its battery life didn’t stack up to that of our picks. It also consistently pushed escape alerts later than the Tractive and the Fi devices did.
The Petcube Dog GPS Tracker & Activity Monitor delivered spotty locations, with the pet’s icon bouncing around to different random (and incorrect) spots, especially when we got into a park where the signal wasn’t as strong. It also had a collar attachment that was difficult to put on a one-inch dog collar with buckles, and the battery life wasn’t as good as that of our picks.
The Apple AirTag updated the dog’s location far less frequently than any of the GPS trackers we tested. It showed us a new location only when the dog was within Bluetooth range of our phone or someone else’s iPhone. But even then, sometimes it just didn’t update at all.
Conclusion
Among the dog collars I tested, Fi and Tractive stood out as the best options. Both can meet the needs of most dog owners, but I personally lean toward Tractive. It offers a more affordable subscription plan—nearly a third of Fi’s cost—while outperforming Fi in connection reliability, tracking accuracy, and battery life.
On the other hand, Fi is more stylish, lighter in weight, and has better waterproofing, making it a great choice for smaller dogs or those that love swimming.
If you are really still on the fence, keep in mind that both Tractive and Fi Collar offer a 30-day money-back guarantee. This means you can try both collars, test them for a few weeks, and simply return the one you’re not satisfied with for a refund.
Whichever collar you decide to go for, be sure to get the best price via the discounts below:
Visit Tractive's Promo Page>> (Get 30% Off)
Visit Fi's Promo Page >> (Get Up to 70$ Off with the code “HOLIDAY“)
We’ve been using Fi for about a year and a half. We haven’t been entirely satisfied with it — just too many errors and we feel location is not checked nearly often enough. So we bought a Tractive to compare.
These photos show the same walk (on different days) on our road to our home. The Fi mapping is very much generalized, and the Tractive shows all the places the dog went while walking on the road. Very interesting.
Thanks for this review. All the horror stories I’ve found about Fi and their sketchy policies, shutting off collars, refusing refunds, etc. are just too much for me to ignore.
You’re welcome. I’m still using both. What I like about Fi is the way it differentiates between travel (by car) and paws on the ground. But if I had to choose one right now, it would be the Tractive.
Fi did not work for us (plus awful customer service). We are in a semi-rural location on 25 acres and our walks were recorded incompletely, while car rides were recorded like walks. Most importantly, the two times when my dog did get lost, their live tracking ‘lost dog’ mode took forever to load, and when it did, it showed my dog in an old location, no live updates. I understand that in semi-rural locations it’s harder to get a good signal but my AT&T phone works just fine. Wondering if Tractive is better. I like that the Tractive map you posted is a lot more detailed, that seems promising…
It’s really not that surprising. Fi collars last ~2 months per charge and Tractive says it lasts about 10 days in power saving mode. How do you think Fi gets that much extra battery? It’s just a trade off situation: better tracking or better battery life?
I don’t mind charging the collar once a week—it’s not a hassle. What matters most to me is better tracking performance.
I was pretty disappointed with fi. I got a Tractive at the same time to compare, and although less “social” than the fi, it’s been much better overall. I recently got the larger XL version, and although it’s bulky it’s been a game changer for us. The battery life isnt even a factor anymore, it’ll last a month easy without issue. This has given us so much more confidence and freedom.
I have two Anatolian shepards. I live in a rural area with lots of water and tree cover. I put the Fi 3 on one dog and the Tractive XL on the other and let them run. The dogs always stay together so it is a good comparison. The Fi3 will not update in the wooded areas while the Tractive pretty much does a step by step live update. Yesterday, the Fi3 did not update for over an hour. I was able to locate the dogs 2 miles from house with the Tractive. The battery life on both is about 4 days. They are within the base range about16h/day otherwise on GPS so they use alot of battery. They both get alot of water time with no problem. It will be interesting to see how long the trackers last as the Tractive is held to the collar with rubber attachment which seems like it could be pulled off in thick brush. My last Fi collar broke where the tracker attached to the collar (which is unfixable). For $2/month (Tractive Care: https://tractive.com/en/c/plans) the Tractive is replaced if lost or broken. Fi collar has to be replaced at full cost. To get the cheaper subscription rate you have to buy a minimum of 1 year which is not refundable if you break or lose your tracker.
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