Fi Series 3 vs Tractive XL GPS Dog Tracker

[@robertodell1903]

I've had the latest FI for a year and half. It's a last resort. As far as real time, it sucks. There is way too much lag in the live tracking. If there are roads near your house and your dog is a runner, then you might find your dog dead before the device works. FI and the Whistle should have HUGE disclaimers on the top of their website pages warning owners.

[@Deagle367]

Was about to buy the Fi 3. Glad I found your review. Not buying now.

[@TheIcyGoose]

It sucks.

[@hellothere9218]

I've had experience with both the FI and Tractive pet tracking collars, using the FI for three years now. Tractive offers alerts by the means of its virtual fences, also known as safe zones or no-go zones, which you can set up to receive alerts on the app if your dog leaves the safe zone or enters a no-go zone. The FI collar connects to your cell phone, which significantly helps extend its battery life during walks or when you're outside your base coverage area. However, the Tractive XL battery outlasts the FI when it's not near a phone by a considerable margin. My FI collar eventually stopped connecting to my new phone, and its battery performance declined, which led me to switch to Tractive. Another advantage of Tractive is that I can buy a second XL collar and charger as a backup for only $50 during sales. In contrast, purchasing a backup FI collar and charger is much more expensive due to their pricing structure, which includes the monthly fee in the purchase price. Overall, my experience has shown that Tractive offers better battery life and more affordable backup options compared to FI. I wish they would bring back FI 2 series where the collar was separate from the subscription and you were able to attach the hardware on a third party collar.

[@WorldAnimalFdn]

Thanks for sharing your experience!

[@laurelgalasso2475]

I have the FI and it’s not accurate. I have a small dog. I just want accuracy. Out of FI 3 and tractor I need accuracy. Near woods. What would you get? She’s 20 pounds

[@Naamturd101]

Appreciate all your videos going so in depth on these collars. Some of these company's seem to intentionally hide certain "features" of their products and it was a pain to figure it all out.

[@Altt]

Well, I guess I'm not getting the Fi, as I live in Canada. XD Thanks for the video!

[@Yep783]

We have livestock guardian dogs in a rural area guarding our goats. Cell service is fair to poor at this location. What unit would you recommend?

[@WorldAnimalFdn]

I would recommend the SpotOn because it has a new “off-grid” mode. Even if the collar can’t detect any signal, you can still create one invisible fence and it will function normally. As far as cell service, you can choose between AT&T or Verizon, the latter of which often does pretty well in rural areas. Make sure you check a coverage map of your area for both carriers.

[@kayroy_4151]

Im here because my husky got out while i was at work 2 nights ago, foggy, rainy and night conditions. So its about that time.

[@WorldAnimalFdn]

Well, I certainly hope you found your dog! The Halo or the SpotOn will definitely help. The SpotOn is a little better, imho. Just remember to go over the training sections for either collar thoroughly. It took me a few days to get my dobies acclimated.

[@media6969]

I live in the city but sometimes we like to go out into the desert or the forest with our dog off-leash, and some areas have poor cell phone reception, which smart dog collar would you recommend?

[@WorldAnimalFdn]

SpotOn because of the “off-grid” mode. You can still setup a virtual fence without signal if you turn on off-grid mode from the app. When it has cell signal it uses either Verizon or AT&T. Also, the SpotOn Collar is now $100 off: spotonvirtualfence.sjv.io/5gvgJ9

[@miscstuff7824]

​@@WorldAnimalFdn SpotOn provides the convenience of a connected / off-grid mode in a single device, but the off-grid mode leaves a bit to be desired. Setting up a fence + ticking the dog when it tries to leave the zone is largely the extent. There isn't a single solution that works well right now unfortunately. We've found a combination of Tractive and a smartphone enabled hunting collar to be the best combo at the moment. Tractive for good reception areas. Hunting collar for remote areas. Garmin Pro 550 and Dogtra Pathfinder 2 can track multiple dogs offline with up to 9mi range. The downside is you need to take the handheld receiver with you and battery life is 24-55hrs (unlike Tractive that is 30 days). But as long as you're on top of charging, this combination works really really well. If we're out hiking in a remote area and find that we're out of mobile reception and our off leash dogs got accidentally separated from us, pop open the hunting collar app and in a minute or 2, all 3 of our dogs are popping up on a map (that we've previously downloaded). It's not full-proof - geography and physics get in the way :) But we've never failed to get in voice range of our dogs to recall them back to us so far.