How to Pause Location on Find my iPhone in 6 Easy Ways

In today’s digital age, your live location is very likely to be shared with third parties via your Apple devices, your car, and other belongings. Preserving your privacy – or at least knowing your options – has never been so important.

If you want to learn how to pause location on Find My iPhone (Find My) or how to freeze location sharing, I’ll show you various methods for just that as well as the best iPhone settings and tips for increased privacy and peace of mind.

Let’s get started with simple steps.

How to Pause Location on Find My iPhone

• The OG way: Turn off your iPhone
• The clever way: Turn on Airplane Mode
• The easiest way: Untoggle Share My Location in Find My
• The precise way: Disable Share My Location
• The aggressive way: Disable Location Services
• The geeky way: Use automation to stop location tracking

Before we dive into the nuts and bolts of privacy controls, look at the table below where I summarized the difference between the major terms I used in this article.

Method 1: Turn off your iPhone completely

The easiest way to freeze your location is guess what: turning off your phone. Period.

You probably don’t need a guide for this one. If your iPhone is off, it won’t track your location. The downside of this method is that you cannot use your iPhone this way.

The next obvious method for pausing location on find is turning on Airplane Mode.

Method 2: Turn on Airplane Mode.

This method allows a healthy iPhone use while preserving your personal information.

1. Open the Control Center.
2. Tap the Airplane Icon.

Alternatively, you can toggle Airplane Mode in the Settings:

1. Navigate to Settings.
2. Toggle Airplane Mode.

Method 3: Disable location sharing in the Find My app

The easiest way to pause location is in the Find My app.

1. Open the Find My app.
2. Navigate to the Me section.
3. Untoggle Share My Location.

Method 4: Disable Share My Location in privacy settings

Probably the best way to pause Location on Find my iPhone is disabling Share My Location.

Here is how you can toggle Share My Location:

1. Go to Settings.
2. Scroll down to Privacy & Security.
3. Tap Location Services.
4. Tap Share My Location.
5. Toggle Share My Location to specify who can see your location in Messages and Find My app.
6. Here, you can disable the Find My iPhone feature as well.

Method 5: Disable Location Services

Once you disable Location Services, it also stops Location on Find My iPhone.

Here is how you can pause location on Find My iPhone:

1. Navigate to Settings.
2. Go to Privacy & Security.
3. Tap Location Services.
4. Untoggle Location Services.

It’s important to know that Location Services differ from Find My (formerly Find My iPhone AND Find My Friends). It won’t share your location data with selected individuals. The purpose of Location Services is to share your location with Apple and third-party apps to offer location-based services such as location-based notifications, maps, etc.

Location Services uses GPS data, Bluetooth, and Wi-Fi to determine your current location. Your data will be used by Apple and can be transferred to third-party apps to offer location-based services.

Location Services serve as a layer of protection where you can specify what you share. You can specify location access on a per-app level. You will have three options for that:

1. Never: Your iPhone will never share your location with the app.
2. Ask Next Time Or When I Share: Each time you are using the app, it will ask you whether you want to enable location sharing.
3. While Using the App: Your location will be shared only while using the given app.

Method 6: Use automation to stop location tracking

If you know in advance which time of the day or at which location you want to pause Location on Find my iPhone, you can create a simple automation to enter Do Not Disturb and then Airplane Mode.

This way, location sharing will be off.

We’ll create the first automation with Focus settings on your iPhone.

1. Navigate to Settings.
2. Find Focus.
3. Tap Do Not Disturb.
4. Scroll down to the Set a Schedule section.
5. Tap Add Schedule and specify your location, time, or app when you want to auto-turn Do Not Disturb.

The next step is to create a conditional rule: if Do Not Disturb is on, your phone switches to Airplane Mode automatically.

1. Open Shortcuts.
2. Tap Automations.
3. Create a new automation by tapping on the + icon.
4. Find the trigger that will initiate your automation. In my case, this is Do Not Disturb, but it can be a time of the day, location, etc.
5. On the next screen, click When Turning On.
6. Click Next and add an action. Search for Set Airplane Mode, hit Next, and then Done.

You may not need such a complex automation if you don’t want to use Do Not Disturb. Simply create an automation for turning on Airplane Mode at a certain location or time.

Let’s see some tips to take your personal privacy into your own hands and to the next level.

Best iPhone settings and tips for increased privacy

Besides location services, there are many options on your iOS devices to protect your privacy and take at least partial control of your personal data. By applying some of the proposed methods, you are likely to save battery life, too, which is always a good thing.

1. Prevent Apple advertising: This may well be off by design, but you can double-check it in your settings: Settings > Privacy & Security > Apple Advertising > untoggle Personalised Ads.
2. Stop sharing your Analytics: This, again, may help Apple to improve its service. Data collected may include location information. You can opt-out any time: Settings > Privacy & Security > Analytics & Improvements > untoggle Share iPhone & Watch Analytics.
3. Turn on App Privacy Report: If you want to geek out, you can turn on App Privacy Report to get a comprehensive picture of how and when your apps use your data. Here is how you can turn it on: Settings > Privacy & Security > App Privacy Report > Turn On App Privacy Report.
4. Do a Safety Check: You can check which of your contacts and apps have access to what. Settings > Privacy & Security > Safety Check > Manage Sharing & Access.
5. Control the access of individual apps: You’ll find this option under Settings > Privacy & Security. Here, you can specify which app has access to what.
6. Always check the settings: Each time when you download a new app to your iOS device, take your time and play a little bit with the settings to minimize data usage by the developer.
7. Avoid public Wi-Fi: Public Wi-Fi may be more vulnerable to attacks and might not be encrypted.
8. Use a VPN: VPNs or Virtual Private Networks can anonymize your internet data and thus prevent your internet service provider from using your data.
9. Use fake locations: There are now third-party apps that can anonymize or fake your real location thus offering greater privacy. Note, however, that using a third-party tool almost always comes with certain costs and may inherently increase your privacy concerns.

How to Pause Location on Find My iPhone: FAQ

1. What happens if I turn off location services?

Location Services are tied to the Find My iPhone feature. If you disable Location Services, you can’t use Apple’s Find My iPhone feature and the location-based functionalities of third-party apps.

2. Can I fake my location on my iPhone?

Apple currently doesn’t offer fake location. You can use third-party tools to modify location or fake it.

3. How can I use Find My iPhone while preserving my privacy?

You can disable Share My Location in the Find My app or in your iPhone’s settings while leaving Find My iPhone on: Settings > Privacy & Security > Location Services > Share My Location.

Cover photo by Franck on Unsplash