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Location services on your phone can make your life much more convenient, allowing you to meet up with others, find your lost phone, check in to your favorite spots and get directions for your travel. When you enable Location Services on your iPhone you’re also enabling a feature that keeps a record of places you visit the most.
The iPhone has a built-in feature called Frequent Locations that tracks your location and displays your frequent locations, both by address and map. The feature is buried beneath several layers of settings, but you, and anyone who knows about this and has access to your phone, can see where you’ve been going most often.
Maybe you have nothing to hide and are eager to see how often you’ve visited your favorite places. Or maybe you don’t want anyone knowing how often you head to the pub, go to the casino or shop till you drop. Either way you should know how to find this feature and how to turn it off.
How Does the Frequent Locations Feature Work?
Frequent Locations is a feature on iPhones running iOS 7 that keeps track of where you go most often. When you enable Location Services on your iPhone, Frequent Locations is automatically activated. You can see where you have been most often, by specific address and by location on a map.
Frequent Locations will also display the exact date and time when you arrive and leave at your favorite spots.
According to Apple:
Your iPhone will keep track of places you have recently been, as well as how often and when you visited them, in order to learn places that are significant to you. This data is kept solely on your device and won’t be sent to Apple without your consent. It will be used to provide you with personalized services, such as predictive traffic routing.
Note that Apple says that this information resides on your phone and you can opt out if you don’t want your phone keeping track of where you have been.
How to Find Your Frequent Locations on Your iPhone
Frequent Locations is not easy to find, you’ve probably never seen it unless you enjoy digging deep into your settings. To see your Frequent Locations:
Go to Settings => Privacy => Location Services
Scroll down to the bottom of the screen and tap System Services. Again, scroll down to the bottom of the screen and tap Frequent Locations.
You will then see a general history of the places you have visited most frequently, as well as how often you have been there. Tap on any of the places to see the details of where you’ve been.
You can see specific addresses, locations on a map, and the date and time when you were at that place.
Opting Out
If you don’t want your iPhone to keep track of where you’ve been, you can opt out while keeping Location settings in tact for your other apps. To opt out go to Frequent Locations, as explained above:
Settings => Privacy => Location Services
Scroll to the bottom and tap System Services. Scroll to the bottom and tap Frequent Locations.
Move the slider to the right so that Frequent Locations is off.
If you want to keep track of your Frequent Locations, but need to start with a clean slate, you can tap Clear History at the bottom of the Frequent Locations screen.
Cool vs. Creepy
Seeing where you’ve been recently can be very interesting. Most people to whom I showed this feature immediately became fascinated in seeing where they had been. You also may find it helpful to know how often you’ve been somewhere, to the gym, for example.
You may also see the potential for trouble with this feature. Employers, spouses and parents may all be interested in seeing an iPhone record of frequent locations. You also may have a favorite secret spot where you like to hide from the world.
Because this information resides only on your iPhone, someone must have access to your phone to see your Frequent Locations. If you lose your iPhone and you don’t have your phone protected with a passcode, this information may be available to anyone who finds your phone.
If you get a new iPhone the information on your old phone isn’t backed up and won’t transfer to your new one.
Poll
Whether you find this feature cool or creepy, you can decide whether you want to opt out or in by following the steps above.
Do you think Frequent Locations is Cool or Creepy? Vote in today’s Wonder of Tech poll and let us know:
Your Thoughts
Are you interested in finding out your Frequent Locations? Have you checked out your Frequent Locations? Did you find any surprises? Would you be interested in checking out the Frequent Locations of anyone else? Will you be opting out of this feature? Let us know your thoughts in the Comments section below!
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* Sports car image by Damian Morys
* Alaskan Glacier image by Dhilung Kirat
HI Carolyn,
That was interesting indeed 🙂
I think most people have this feature on because whenever any crime takes place also as one sees in the news, the police is able to track the criminal through their phone, so perhaps those people had this feature on? Just a rough guess perhaps.
Ah – no, I would certainly disable this feature, who would like to be tracked all over and once you know that you are being traced, you will never be at ease doing or going where you want. Certainly not safe for my girls too – I better warn them about it as well.
Thanks for sharing. Have a nice week ahead, and I hope you had a lovely Mother’s Day as well 🙂
Hi Harleena, Actually, police use Find My iPhone to track stolen iPhones. Frequent Location information stays on the phone so only the person who has possession of the phone can see the list of places and maps. You can log into iCloud on the Internet to see where your phone is with Find My iPhone.
You’re right, there is potential for misusing this feature, but parents may also want to utilize it to keep an eye on the whereabouts of their kids. This feature can be both useful and invasive, which may be why the poll results are mixed so far.
Not that I have anything to hide, but some of the places might not be considered ‘work’ related to some…:). But I’m in sales, I’m always working, right?
The funny thing is, mine was on but it only had 4 locations in there; hmmmm……
Hi Bill, Yes, you have work opportunities wherever you go!
Interesting that you only have four places. I’m not sure what the criteria is for “frequent”. My Frequent Locations listed some places in Philly I had been to just once.
Are there any places you go to frequently that weren’t included? You may want to wait a few weeks and look at Frequent Locations again to see if your places change.
Hey Carolyn,
I have my Frequent Locations turned on but only to get the weather. I don’t have any of the other settings enabled so I’m not being tracked anywhere. It said that a purple arrow would be next to anything that was being tracked but I never had any of my other settings on. There also isn’t a place to clear the history so I’m assuming that I haven’t been tracked? You know I don’t know how this works but if I am then I think I’ll do without knowing what the weather will do today! LOL!!!
Thanks for the update and letting us know about this. I say creepy girl.
~Adrienne
Hi Adrienne, It sounds as if you have limited Location Services enabled. You can limit Location Services to just the apps you want and turn off Frequent Locations to make sure you have the privacy you want. You’re very wise to customize this the way you want it to preserve both your privacy and your phone’s battery life, Adrienne. :-bd
You were right, this is really great info. I only wish my wife wasn’t standing behind me when I was checking it out. Just kidding!
Lol, Carlo. You’re right, this could be a marriage ender, though there are some who would blame the spouse, not the iPhone, for the wandering. 😉
Hi Carolyn,
Really very helpful and useful for us!!!
I am sure use this feature.
Thanks for sharing great job 🙂
keep posting
Hi SmithLopez, I’m glad you like this feature and will find it useful.
Enjoy!
Hello Carolyn,
Of course its really hidden feature which I’ve just came to know. But I think this feature can be used for bad purposes so disabling it for some time would be recommended.
Hi Samir, Yes, this is a tech feature that could be used for good or bad. Like any tool, how you use it will determine whether it’s helpful or harmful. The good news is that you can turn it off if you don’t like it, you just have to know how to do that.
Turning it off takes just a few taps and swipes, you can always change your mind later if you want to keep track of this information.
Not an iphone user but Android has similar feature where you can get detailed statistics on your most frequent locations you have visited and much more.
I think this is interesting to look at and I am not very worried about others getting hold of this information (already share location to some good friends and family).
Hi Johan, Yes, Android has had this feature for years but the iPhone just got Frequent Locations with iOS 7. The comments and poll results have been very mixed, some people don’t mind this feature while others can’t wait to turn it off!
Thanks Carolyn for bringing this “feature” to our attention. To me it’s not creepy or cool – it’s more annoying because 1) it’s not publicized, 2) it’s as deeply buried in Settings as anything I’ve ever encountered and 3) it’s ON by default. I really like Apple products but they can make the same mistake as any other gadget maker – adding features that go beyond what users want – often for the sake of advertisers or other interests. That’s not a problem unless it is as hidden as this feature is.
Thanks again for keeping us all informed.
Gary Braley
Hi Gary, You’re right, this feature is more deeply hidden than any other feature I’ve seen on the iPhone. That may actually be beneficial though as most people won’t know to look for it and snoop on you.
Yet since Frequent Locations is on by default, those who do know and have access to your phone, could see this information before you knew to turn it off. This is truly a case where information is power, Gary.
Thanks for stopping by and sharing your thoughts with us, Gary.
I like to think of myself as in the know when it comes to technology but i had absolutely no idea that the iphone has this feature on it! I know facebook allows you to see where you are currently logged in but this is a new and interesting piece of information to me. I’m kind of in the thought that I’m not doing anything wrong so does it matter if someone can see where I’ve been? Are those that don’t want anyone to know doing something wrong or paranoid? We are living in a big brother world with cctv being the most well known of this. Guess thats just the way life goes
Hi David, The reactions to this feature are very mixed. I don’t think you have to feel guilty about where you’ve been to be uncomfortable about having your Frequent Locations tracked. But some people think it’s very cool to have a record of places you’ve visited the most.
Yes, the UK has a lot of CCTV cameras, the US doesn’t have as many of those. With cell phone tracking, most of us are leaving a record of where we’ve been though. Very interesting issue and I appreciate your sharing your thought with us, David.
It is an effective feature of iPhone. It will be awesome to find your frequent locations. But is it also available in India. I have iPhone 5 of US, but I am using it in India, can i Use this feature in India?
Hi Attinder, Welcome to The Wonder of Tech! Is your iPhone 5 running iOS 7? If so, Frequent Locations should be available to you. The best way for you to know is to follow the steps in the article and look to see if your Frequent Locations have been tracked.
Yup My iPhone running iOS 7 and thanks for the help. actually location tracking was not enabled. So, i done it now.
Excellent. Thanks for letting us know, Atinder.
Nice post with great tips, thanks for sharing it with us! The frequent location is really cool, I didn’t know about that.
Hi Ashley, Welcome to The Wonder of Tech! I’m very glad you enjoyed this post and think that Frequent Locations is a cool feature. Thanks for sharing your thoughts here.