The rule
If the object were visible on a surface, you would already have found it. Every subsequent search should be inside and underneath things, not across them.
The method
- Divide the room into four quadrants and commit to finishing one before starting the next.
- In each quadrant, work top to bottom: shelves, then furniture surfaces, then inside furniture, then the floor, then under the floor-level furniture.
- Empty containers rather than feeling inside them. Hands are unreliable for flat objects.
- Take cushions fully out of seating and reach into the frame.
- Finish at floor level along the skirting boards. Small round objects roll until a wall stops them.
Add a signal to the search
If the object has a radio in it, run a scan while you do this. Signal strength turns a four-quadrant search into a one-quadrant search, and a strong reading with nothing visible tells you to search inside something rather than around it.
Then leave and come back
Genuine advice with no technology in it: search fatigue makes you stop seeing things. Ten minutes away resets it, and the second pass finds what the fourth pass would not have.
Related methods
If this was not the situation you are in, one of these probably is.
- How to find something in the dark, Method
- Why naming your devices makes them findable, Setup
- How to find something lost in a garden, Method
- What to set up before you travel, Prevention
- How to make your phone ring loudly on demand, Ring it
- Bluetooth scanner for iPhone, Scan tab
- How to find something you left in a rental car
- All how-to guides, the complete list
Common questions
Why can I not find something that is definitely in this room?
Because you are searching surfaces, and it is inside or underneath something. Empty containers, take cushions out, and finish at floor level along the walls.
In the app: This is what the app is built for. Read about Proximity Radar.