The Device Therapy Bike Mount & Reflector gives you a place to hide an Apple AirTag tracker. With this combination, you can (hopefully) track the location of your bike if it gets stolen because millions of iPhones around the world can report the location of your lost item.
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Device Therapy Bike Mount & Reflector review
Conceal an AirTag on your bike and you might have a better shot at getting it back if its stolen. Apple’s item tracker hasn’t been around long, but there’s already at least one report of it being used to return a stolen bicycle to its owner. A bike taken July 4 in Boston was allegedly recovered by police.
In that case, the AirTag had been removed and thrown away. Fortunately, the bike was found nearby. With the Device Therapy Bike Mount & Reflector, the AirTag is actually attached to the bike.
Hardware and design
Photo: Ed Hardy/Cult of Mac
This accessory is primarily a cylindrical holder for the AirTag made of plant-sourced bioplastic. It opens with a screw cap, and the tracker fits snugly inside. The case seals tightly to keep out the weather, but this doesn’t much matter because the AirTag itself is splash, water and dust resistant (IP67).
Device Therapy puts 3M Diamond-Grade reflective material — the same stuff used for road signs — on one side. It doesn’t just look like a reflector. It is a reflector.
You have your choice of red or white reflective material on a black or white case to match your bike.
The Device Therapy Bike Mount & Reflector attaches with a standard zip tie that can’t be easily removed once it’s closed. In my testing, I found it a strong connection. The only way to remove the item is to cut the zip tie. But the idea here is that a thief isn’t going to do that because they’ll think it’s a simple reflector. It sure looks like a reflector.
Just so there’s no confusion, this accessory doesn’t come with an AirTag. That’s sold separately ($29).
Photo: Ed Hardy/Cult of Mac
Device Therapy Bike Mount & Reflector performance
The reason you would use an AirTag bike mount is to conceal a tracker on your two-wheeler so it can be found by almost any iPhone via a Bluetooth connection. And that iPhone will then automatically (and anonymously) notify you where your lost/stolen item is. So if your bike gets boosted, you can find it later.
But there are a couple of caveats here. Apple’s tracking system depends on iPhones getting fairly close to the AirTag. And the Bike Mount & Reflector itself slightly reduces the distance because the wireless connection has to go through the bioplastic casing. In my testing, I could make contact between AirTag and iPhone at about 75 feet in Device Therapy’s bike reflector. That’s down from the usual 100 feet or more. Walls reduce the connection distance even more.
Also, if the thief has an iPhone themself, they’ll eventually be notified that there’s an AirTag following them. Apple created the system to find lost items, not stolen ones.
Most importantly, if you get notified of the location of your stolen bike, don’t go try to collect it yourself. Talk to the police. Take the experience of the guy in Boston mentioned earlier as a guide.
Device Therapy Bike Mount & Reflector final thoughts
This is a simple product, but it does exactly what it’s intended to do. You can easily attach an AirTag to your bicycle and have a firm hope that a thief won‘t notice the tracker is there.
Pricing
The price of this AirTag bike mount is about as low as one could hope. You can order a Device Therapy Bike Mount & Reflector from the Cult of Mac Store for just $15.99.
Device Therapy provided Cult of Mac with a review unit for this article. See our reviews policy, and check out other in-depth reviews of Apple-related items. We originally published this review on July 28, 2021.