A viral X post from January in which traveler Amy Bruni described catching an airline in a lie about her misplaced luggage — using an AirTag to prove where the bag actually was — has resurfaced on Reddit and prompted dozens of similar stories from other travelers
According to Bruni and several commenters in the thread, airlines have on multiple occasions provided inaccurate information about the location of misplaced luggage — information that AirTag tracking contradicted, and if one has an AirTag attached to their luggage, they can simply call out such lies. “I can just be like, ‘nope, that’s not true at all,’” the poster, Amy Bruni, wrote.
Airlines must *hate* air tags.
— Amy Bruni (@amybruni) January 4, 2026
My bags were lost yesterday and this is my third call with the airline where they try to blatantly lie about where my bag is - and I can just be like, “nope, that’s not true at all.”
This little flying tip led several people across X and Reddit to share their personal experiences, which only backed up Bruni’s post. For example, one Reddit user wrote that they once were told their missing racing bike case was “5,000 miles in the opposite direction.” Except they realized, thanks to their AirTag, that it was in an airport storage room overseas.
The commenter added that they were able to direct airline staff to the exact room where the luggage was being held, and that it was later couriered to their hotel in Madrid.
Another person also shared a similar experience and said that their luggage and toiletry kit showed up in different airport locations after a trip. The staff eventually recovered the traveler's belongings when they provided tracking information from multiple tracker cards that they had kept inside their luggage. Otherwise, all of the belongings would have been lost.
On the other hand, some travellers said that luggage tracking by airlines has improved by leaps and bounds compared to the previous decade. One Reddit user said that they had it for three weeks for a lost bag to turn up, only to see that it was damaged and stained.
Others described airlines dispatching drivers or taxis to deliver delayed luggage as soon as its location was confirmed.
One commenter on X noted that Delta Air Lines now allows customers to integrate AirTag tracking with its own baggage tracking system. Previously, they supported Apple's “share item location” feature, which allowed travelers to temporarily share the location of an AirTag with their customer service representative during baggage recovery.
The Fly Delta App has long made it easy to track your bags. And now, by integrating Apple’s new Share Item Location feature, you can share your AirTag’s location with us to more quickly locate lost or delayed bags—giving you more peace of mind, even when the unexpected happens. pic.twitter.com/99a9NCb9If
— Delta (@Delta) December 16, 2024
Bruni noted this was not her first experience with lost luggage — she had previously posted about a bag that carried an AirTag going missing, also on Delta Air Lines, but mentioned that such cases had been very rare when she travelled with the airline, and that it had nothing to do specifically with Delta. “AirTags turn what used to be guesswork into instant accountability,” an X user said.
Travelers should be aware that some airlines require batteries to be removed from certain electronic devices before boarding — though many major carriers have publicly acknowledged the growing popularity of luggage trackers like AirTags and have adapted their policies accordingly.
