Can You Track Sheep Without a SIM Card? LoRaWAN Livestock Tracking, Explained

If you've looked at tracking livestock, you've probably found two frustrations: the trackers that use a mobile SIM go flat in weeks and cost a monthly data fee per animal, and the cheap ones don't reach across a hill farm. There's a third way that fixes both — LoRaWAN — and most people have never heard of it. What LoRaWAN actually is LoRaWAN is a long-range, low-power radio network built for exactly this: small devices that need to send a little bit of data a long way, on a tiny amount of power, with no SIM card. A LoRaWAN ear tag or collar sends its position to a gateway you put up on the farm (a shed, a pole, the house), which passes it to an app on your phone. Because it sips power instead of gulping it, a LoRaWAN tracker lasts months to years on a battery — often with a small solar cell to go effectively forever — and there's no per-animal data bill. SIM vs LoRaWAN — the honest comparison Battery: SIM trackers — weeks to a couple of months. LoRaWAN — many months to years. LoRaWAN wins for livestock. Running cost: SIM — a data fee per animal, every month. LoRaWAN — none once the gateway's up. LoRaWAN wins at scale. Range: LoRaWAN reaches several kilometres from a gateway across open ground — ideal for hill and moor. When a SIM is better: animals that roam far beyond your own land with no gateway in range — then a 4G/GPS tracker's nationwide coverage wins. Rule of thumb: your own land, a flock or herd, want it cheap to run → LoRaWAN. Animals wandering off-farm across open country → cellular GPS. What you need A LoRaWAN gateway on the farm — one covers a lot of ground. LoRaWAN trackers — ear tags or collars — on the animals. The app to see them, with geofence alerts if they stray. We supply the lot and help design it — including Lansitec trackers and a range of LoRaWAN gateways and LoRaWAN GPS trackers. See how it fits your farm in the livestock GPS guide, or tell us your setup — number of animals, acreage and terrain — and we'll spec it. Trade and farm pricing, UK stock, and we answer the phone ourselves.