Smart Cat Collars: Which Is Best for Health and GPS Tracking?
Smart Cat Collars: Which Is Best for Health and GPS Tracking?
智能猫项圈：哪款最适合健康监测与 GPS 定位？
Wearable health-monitoring devices, like smart rings, smartwatches, and fitness trackers, help people stay on top of key wellness markers. By providing data on steps, heart rate, sleep, and more, these gadgets allow people to better understand their health, along with the opportunity to improve it with lifestyle shifts. 智能戒指、智能手表和健身追踪器等可穿戴健康监测设备，能帮助人们实时掌握关键的健康指标。通过提供步数、心率、睡眠等数据，这些小工具让人们能更好地了解自身健康状况，并有机会通过生活方式的改变来加以改善。
But why should humans have all the fun? Enter: smart collars for your cat. In addition to featuring live and historical GPS location tracking that will help any helicopter cat parent rest easy, the Fi Mini and Tractive Smart Cat Tracker monitor your furry friend’s movement and sleep. The collars also have alerts for health pattern changes, like if your pet is moving less or sleeping more than average, which can function as early warning signs of potential health issues. 但为什么只有人类能享受这些乐趣呢？于是，专为猫咪设计的智能项圈应运而生。除了提供实时和历史 GPS 定位追踪，让每一位“直升机式”猫家长都能安心之外，Fi Mini 和 Tractive 智能猫追踪器还能监测毛孩子的运动和睡眠情况。这些项圈还具备健康模式变化提醒功能，例如当你的宠物运动量减少或睡眠时间超过平均水平时，它会发出警报，这可以作为潜在健康问题的早期预警信号。
For months, I tested these trackers on my cat Basil, analyzing each device’s location accuracy, sleep- and activity-tracking capabilities, and metrics summaries. I also considered practical factors, like ease of use, product size, and battery life. 几个月来，我一直在我的猫 Basil 身上测试这些追踪器，分析每款设备的定位精度、睡眠与活动追踪能力以及指标汇总。我还考虑了易用性、产品尺寸和电池续航等实际因素。
If you have a cat that also goes outdoors, these health and GPS trackers are much more reliable and holistic than something like an AirTag, because they ping off the same towers as your cell, providing a more accurate location. They’ll also notify you if your cat gets out of the premarked “safe zone.” Although Basil is an indoor-only cat, the location features would be super helpful if he did get out: I’d be alerted on my phone right away, and I’d be able to follow his location on the map to find him more easily. (But because he didn’t, in fact, escape during my test run with these trackers, I wasn’t able to check these features firsthand.) 如果你养的是一只会出门的猫，这些健康与 GPS 追踪器比 AirTag 之类的设备更可靠、更全面，因为它们通过与手机相同的基站进行信号传输，能提供更精确的位置。如果猫咪跑出了预设的“安全区”，它们还会向你发送通知。虽然 Basil 是一只室内猫，但如果他真的跑出去，这些定位功能会非常有帮助：我的手机会立即收到警报，我可以在地图上追踪他的位置，从而更容易找到他。（但由于在测试期间他实际上并没有逃跑，我无法亲身体验这些功能。）
Ultimately, each smart tracker had its own strong suits. The best model for you and your cat depends on your priorities. 归根结底，每款智能追踪器都有各自的优势。哪款最适合你和你的猫，取决于你的优先需求。
Best Location Accuracy and App Capability: Tractive Smart Cat Tracker
最佳定位精度与应用功能：Tractive 智能猫追踪器
If tracking location and health metrics for your cat are your top priorities, Tractive (also called the Tractive Cat Mini) is the better option for you. Its historical heat maps display the areas your cat frequents, which is especially helpful for people with indoor-outdoor cats who roam large swaths of land. 如果追踪猫咪的位置和健康指标是你的首要任务，那么 Tractive（也称为 Tractive Cat Mini）是更好的选择。它的历史热力图可以显示猫咪经常出没的区域，这对于那些在广阔土地上游荡的散养猫主人来说特别有用。
However, both Tractive and Fi Mini rely on GPS for location tracking, just as a phone does. This means if the signal is weak—a common issue in rural areas, among others—you may not know the precise location of your cat. According to online reviewers on Reddit and Amazon, Tractive’s location tracking is less accurate in areas with thick vegetation. 然而，Tractive 和 Fi Mini 都像手机一样依赖 GPS 进行定位。这意味着如果信号较弱（这在农村地区等地方很常见），你可能无法获知猫咪的精确位置。根据 Reddit 和亚马逊上的在线评论，Tractive 在植被茂密的地区定位精度会下降。
One bonus for Fi users with an Apple Watch: You can add the Fi app to your watch to monitor your pet’s location, activity, and enter “Lost Mode” without needing a phone, which is especially helpful if your cat’s escaped while you’re not by your phone. 对于拥有 Apple Watch 的 Fi 用户来说，有一个额外的好处：你可以将 Fi 应用添加到手表上，无需手机即可监测宠物的定位、活动并开启“丢失模式”，这在猫咪逃跑而你又不在手机旁时特别有用。
When setting up each app, you can designate specific mapped areas as safe or danger zones, and then it notifies you when the pet enters or exits these zones. Unfortunately, with both trackers, my apartment was too small to create a virtual fence around the perimeter, forcing me to expand it to an area outside my apartment. That means if Basil got out but stayed generally nearby, I wouldn’t get an alert. 在设置每个应用时，你可以将地图上的特定区域指定为安全区或危险区，当宠物进入或离开这些区域时，应用会通知你。遗憾的是，由于我的公寓太小，无法在周边设置虚拟围栏，我不得不将其扩大到公寓外。这意味着如果 Basil 跑出去但只是在附近徘徊，我可能收不到警报。
The Fi’s danger zone alerts were glitchy during my testing. On three occasions, I got notifications that Basil had left the safe zone (aka my home and surrounding area). Each time, after I rushed home or raced to check my pet camera, I found him sleeping soundly on the living room couch. Other users have reported similar false alerts and location inaccuracy with the Fi. 在我的测试中，Fi 的危险区警报存在故障。我有三次收到通知说 Basil 离开了安全区（即我的家及周边区域）。每次我匆忙赶回家或急忙查看宠物摄像头时，都发现他正安稳地睡在客厅的沙发上。其他用户也报告过 Fi 存在类似的误报和定位不准问题。
In the Tractive app, after you create a profile, you’ll get personalized daily activity goals for your cat based on the stats of others of similar age and weight. The app assigned Basil 120 to 230 minutes of daily activity, and then later reported he was consistently more active than 70 percent of similar cats. I felt peace of mind knowing I’m keeping him on the move in my small apartment. 在 Tractive 应用中，创建个人资料后，你会根据同年龄和体重的猫咪数据，获得为你家猫咪定制的每日活动目标。该应用为 Basil 分配了每天 120 到 230 分钟的活动量，后来还显示他的活跃度始终超过了 70% 的同类猫咪。知道我在小公寓里也能让他保持运动，我感到很安心。
Through the Tractive app, you can see daily (by the hour) and historical activity data, compared to pets with similar stats. At the end of every day and week, the app serves you activity averages and average calories burned in a day, estimated using factors like pet type, weight, and size compared to activity output. 通过 Tractive 应用，你可以查看每日（按小时计）和历史活动数据，并与数据相似的宠物进行对比。在每天和每周结束时，该应用会为你提供活动平均值和每日平均消耗卡路里，这些数据是根据宠物类型、体重和体型与活动输出等因素估算出来的。
Tractive’s sleep-tracking feature monitors sleep duration, breaking it down into categories of night sleep, day sleep, and calm. Because it tracks sleep length and cycle phases based on movement patterns and time of day, the data skews more general than precise. As with activity tracking, the app compared Basil’s sleep stats to cats of a similar profile, providing context around the amount of sleep that is typical. Tractive 的睡眠追踪功能可以监测睡眠时长，并将其细分为夜间睡眠、日间睡眠和安静状态。由于它是根据运动模式和时间来追踪睡眠长度和周期阶段的，因此数据偏向概括性而非精确性。与活动追踪一样，该应用将 Basil 的睡眠数据与类似特征的猫咪进行了对比，提供了关于正常睡眠量的参考背景。
The Fi Mini offers similar measures, but only compares statistics with the pet itself (as opposed to with other pets, like the Tractive), noting whether stats are up or down from the day before. The Fi also doesn’t create goals, which I found helpful for a gut-check of whether Basil was in the normal range, comparatively. I did like that the Fi allows you to add vet records, receipts, and insurance information, and you can add vets to share pet-related documents and get appointment reminders. Fi Mini 提供了类似的测量指标，但它只与宠物自身的数据进行对比（而不是像 Tractive 那样与其他宠物对比），记录数据比前一天是上升还是下降。Fi 也没有设定目标功能，而我发现对比目标对于判断 Basil 是否处于正常范围非常有帮助。我确实喜欢 Fi 的一点是，它允许你添加兽医记录、收据和保险信息，你还可以添加兽医来共享宠物相关文件并获取预约提醒。
In general, though, I found the information in Tractive’s app more useful and easier to analyze. 总的来说，我发现 Tractive 应用中的信息更有用，也更容易分析。