If your checked bag doesn’t arrive at the carousel, you can start a delayed baggage report directly in the United app. If you’ve tucked an AirTag or another Find My accessory into your luggage, you can then generate a Share Item Location link from the Find My app on your iPhone, iPad, or Mac and attach it to that report.

Location sharing in this setup isn’t permanent. The Share Item Location link is designed to be temporary and tightly controlled, so you stay in charge of your data.

• •The shared link is automatically disabled once your bag is reunited with you.
• •You can manually stop sharing the location at any time from the Find My app.
• •If nothing else happens, the link expires on its own within seven days.

In other words, United’s team gets enough information to help find your luggage—but not an open-ended invitation to track your AirTag forever.

Airlines have offered baggage tracking for years, but those systems rely on scans at specific points—when a bag is tagged, loaded, or transferred. An AirTag adds a second, traveler-controlled data source that fills in the gaps between those scans.

• •You get extra peace of mind knowing where your bag last appeared on the map.
• •United’s agents can skip some of the guesswork and focus on where your bag actually is, not where it was last scanned.
• •If a bag is sitting in an unexpected corner of the airport or loaded onto the wrong flight, your AirTag can help surface that faster.

It’s a small change that can make a big difference on days when everything else is already stressful—especially if you’re traveling with tight connections, valuable items in checked luggage, or a tight turnaround on the other end.

United’s integration with Apple’s Share Item Location feature is one more example of how smart, thoughtful technology can actually make travel feel easier—not more complicated. You still hope your bag never goes missing, but if it does, you and the airline are now working from the same live map instead of vague guesses.

If you’re planning a trip soon, it’s worth dropping an AirTag into each checked bag. It’s a small accessory, but when something goes wrong in transit, that little piece of tech can give you—and the airline—exactly what you need to get your luggage back quickly.