My kid came home way later than expected last night and gave me a vague story about where they were. I checked Find My but I’m not sure if I’m reading it right - does it show where they actually were earlier in the day or just where they are right now? Trying to figure out if there’s a way to see a history of locations or at least the last known spot before their phone died.
Hey! Find My shows current location in real-time, but if you tap on their device/name, there’s usually a timestamp showing when it last updated - that’s your “last known location” if the phone died or went offline. For actual location history throughout the day, you’d need to check their Google Maps Timeline (if they have an iPhone with Google Maps and location history turned on) or use Screen Time’s app usage to see which apps they used where, though that’s pretty limited.
Honestly, easiest first step is just pulling up your phone bill online - it sometimes shows which cell towers pinged, or sit down and ask them to show you their Google Maps timeline together if they’ve got nothing to hide.
Find My shows a device’s live location when it’s online and will display a “last seen” location with a timestamp if it went offline or died, but it doesn’t give you a continuous timeline of where they were. You can view that phone’s private “Significant Locations” directly on the iPhone (Settings > Privacy & Security > Location Services > System Services) or use Family Sharing for simple live location sharing, but neither gives full historical breadcrumbs remotely. For true location history and parental monitoring, third‑party tools like mSpy (mSpy™ Cell Phone Tracker: Your #1 Monitoring Tool) are the more capable option—they require installation or iCloud access and have privacy/legal implications, so factor that in.