How to Fake a GPS Location on Your Phone?

To change where your iPhone or Android device thinks you are, you have to trick it into telling apps that you are somewhere else. When you fake your GPS location, most of the time every location-based app on your phone will be tricked.

This might seem like a strange thing to do, since most of us use GPS for tasks that require us to know where we are, like finding directions and checking the weather. But there are good reasons to change the location of your phone to a fake one.

Unfortunately, it’s not very easy to do so. Neither iOS nor Android come with a “fake GPS location” setting, and most apps don’t have a simple way to fake your location.

Android Location Spoofing

If you search Google Play for “fake GPS,” you’ll find a lot of options, some of which are free and some of which cost money or require you to “root” your phone.

FakeGPS Free is an app that makes it easy to fake your Android phone’s location. You don’t have to root your phone to use it, as long as you have Android 6.0 or later.

If you want to try a different Android app that changes your location, we’ve confirmed that Fake GPS, Fly GPS, and Fake GPS Location work similarly to FakeGPS Free.

Install FakeGPS Free.
Open the app and accept the initial prompt to let the app access your device’s location.

In recent versions of Android, select While using the app (older versions might call this something different) on the first prompt, and then ACCEPT if you see the advertising message.
Tap OK to get through the tutorial walkthrough, and then choose Enable on the message at the bottom about mock locations.
Choose Developer Settings to open that screen, and then go to Select mock location app toward the very end of the page, and select FakeGPS Free.
Use the back button to return to the app, and search for the location you want to fake on your phone (you can also drag the map to place the pointer somewhere). If you’re making a route, tap-and-hold on the map to drop place markers.
Use the play button on the bottom corner of the map to enable the fake GPS setting.

Xposed Framework is another way to do it. You can use an app like Fake My GPS to give some apps a fake location while others use your real location. You can search for similar modules in the Xposed Module Repository or the Xposed Installer app on your computer or phone.

iPhone Location Spoofing

If you want to fake your iPhone’s location, you can’t just download an app like you can on an Android phone. But people who make software have made desktop programmes that make it easy to do this.

Fake iPhone or iPad Location With 3uTools

3uTools is the best way to fake the location of your iPhone or iPad because the software is free and we know it works with iOS 16 and iPadOS 16.

Download and install 3uTools. We tested it on Windows 11, but it works in other versions of Windows as well.
With your iPhone or iPad plugged in, select Toolbox at the top of the program, and then VirtualLocation from that screen.
Select somewhere on the map, or use the search bar, to choose where you want to fake your location.
Select Modify virtual location, and then select OK when you see the “succeeded” message.

Fake iPhone or iPad Location With iTools

iTools from ThinkSky is another way to fake your iPhone’s location without jailbreaking it. Unlike 3uTools, it works on macOS and can simulate movement, but it’s only free for a limited time and is only said to work up to iOS 12.

Download and install iTools. You might have to select Free Trial at some point before it fully opens.
Plug your device into your computer and navigate to Toolbox > Virtual Location.
If you see this screen, select the image in the Developer Mode section to agree to download the iOS Developer Disk Image file.
Search for a location from the top of the screen, and then select Go to find it on the map.
Select Move here to instantly fake your location.

You can now quit iTools and the Virtual Location window at the same time. If you’re asked if you want to stop the simulation, you can say “No” to make sure that your fake GPS location stays even after you unplug your phone.

To get back to where you really are, go back to the map and click “Stop Simulation.” You can also restart your device to use its real location again right away.

But remember that you can only fake your phone’s location with iTools during the 24-hour trial. If you want to run the trial again, you’ll need to use a different computer. As long as you don’t restart your device, the fake location will stay.

Why Would You Fake Your Location?

You might set up a fake GPS location for fun or for other reasons.

You might want to change your location so that something like a dating app thinks you’re a hundred miles away. This is great if you’re moving and want to get ahead in the dating game before you move.

When you use a location-based game like Pokémon GO, you might also need to lie about where you are. You don’t have to go miles away to get a different type of Pokémon. Instead, you can trick your phone into telling the game that you’re already there, and the game will think your fake location is correct.

You might also set up a fake GPS location if you want to “travel” to Dubai and check in to a restaurant you’ve never been to, or if you want to visit a famous landmark to make your Facebook friends think you’re on an expensive trip.

You can also use your fake GPS location to fool your family or friends in a location-sharing app, to hide your real location from apps that ask for it, or even to set your real location if GPS satellites aren’t doing a good job of finding it for you.

GPS Spoofing Problems

Before you start, you should know that lying about where you are can be a lot of fun, but it’s not always a good idea. Also, because GPS spoofing isn’t a built-in feature, it takes more than one click to get it going, and location fakers don’t always work for every app that reads your location.

If you install a fake GPS location app on your phone, say for a video game, other apps that you want to use your real location with will also use the fake location.

For example, the game might use your spoofed address to your advantage, but if you open your navigation app to get directions to somewhere, you’ll have to either turn off the location spoofer or change your starting location by hand.

The same goes for other things, like checking in at restaurants, keeping your family-based GPS locator up to date, checking the weather, etc. If you change your location for everything on your phone, it will obviously change the location in all your apps that use your location.