Garzini AirTag Passport Holder Review

Frequent travelers know the convenience of using a wallet designed for a passport, and it makes sense. It’s one of your most important travel documents, and you’ll never know when you’ll have to present it while you’re touring another country. Yet, mistakes happen, things get lost, and, before you know it, you’re backtracking the places you’ve been, wondering where you dropped your precious passport wallet.

While the Garzini AirTag Passport Holder isn’t immune from going AWOL, it at least gives you a way to find it much easier. With its dedicated AirTag pocket, numerous card slots, and solid build quality, is this the ideal passport wallet? Let’s find out!

The Rundown

Our first impression of the AirTag Passport Holder is of good construction. The leather feels premium and doesn’t give off that slick, rubbery texture that cheaper leathers do. It also feels relatively thick, though not so much that it makes the whole wallet feel too stiff, especially where it folds and creases. Moreover, we also like the tight stitching, which is not that easy to pull off when working with very minute details—that is to say, we’re not seeing any leftover threads or frayed ends on this wallet.

The looks aren’t too exciting, but they’re minimal and classy. The stitching and the tiny logo at the bottom corner provide accents, but it’s going to be your AirTag that steals the spotlight. Put one in the slot, and it becomes the centerpiece for the entire wallet’s exterior—so, how do you do it?

Unlatch the leather strap and squeeze an AirTag into that windowed slot. While it takes some effort to get it seated in place, you hopefully only have to do it once. The AirTag stays in place if you just leave it alone. However, it shifts easily when something grazes it, and it can get dislodged if the leather strap is unlocked. We like the idea of an AirTag slot aesthetically and functionally integrated like this, but the looseness makes the implementation feel a bit half-baked and unreliable.

Inside the wallet is a fairly simple layout with a healthy amount of variety when it comes to organization. On the left are seven slots for your cards. They feel relatively tight, especially if you’re fitting thick ones like a metal Apple Pay card or other embossed credit cards. However, we could fit two thinner cards, like metro passes or membership cards, in a single slot. With all of that said, seven card slots are already a lot, and it’s more than enough for us, so we didn’t have to double-stack on any of them.

These card slots also have anti-slip strips inside to prevent cards from dropping out. This is important since the sides are still open even though there’s a leather strap locking the wallet. It’s also worth noting that this wallet blocks RFID signals to prevent card skimmers from stealing from you.

Underneath the card slots is a wide inner-facing pocket. It is the closest to a general dump pocket in this wallet, and we use it for cash, although we’re limited by the wallet’s height, so we have to fold bills in half. On the other hand, the pocket is deep enough that even tall Japanese banknotes fit without an issue.

In the middle is a pen slot with a nifty little pen included. We’ve seen a number of passport wallets include one of these, and they’re always handy to have. Trust us when we say there’s a good chance you’re filling out a form or two, whether at departure or your arrival—it’s better to have a pen of your own so you don’t have to share.

On the right side of the wallet is, from back to front, the passport holder, a small document pocket, and a windowed ID slot. That last one, in particular, is pretty unique, as we don’t see it on most passport wallets. Yet, it can be handy on those occasions when you only have to show an ID, whether it’s to verify your age or for other purposes.

The small pocket immediately adjacent to the passport holder is a secondary dump spot for your tickets, slips, and other travel-related documents—the ones that fit, anyway. We like having a pocket like this to keep track of travel expenses. Plus, keeping ticket stubs is a nifty way to save on souvenirs.

As for the passport slot, we like its L-shaped opening, making it easy to take the passport out when needed. Other passport wallets have a full-length slot that’s only open on one side, which makes it trickier to take out a passport. Other than that, there’s not much to say other than it’s fuss-free to use.

Packability

Size-wise, the Garzini is relatively compact for a leather passport wallet, especially compared to similar ones. Yet, it’s still not quite small enough that you can fit it into your back pocket like a regular wallet. A better way to think about its small size is it takes up less space inside a sling or the front pocket of your travel backpack.

We were slightly worried that the leather strap and the integrated AirTag would add considerable bulk to the wallet’s shape. Thankfully, it’s still pretty low-profile overall. Additionally, even though the leather strap isn’t as all-encompassing as a zipper closure that goes all around the wallet, it still manages to tie everything together well enough that none of the wallet’s contents slip out.

Quick Comparison

The Bellroy Travel Wallet and Fjallraven Passport Wallet are interesting comparisons to this wallet. The former is also leather, hence a similar premium vibe. Size-wise, it’s similarly thick, though it’s lengthier than the AirTag Passport Wallet. The layout is also pretty similar, with cards on one side and the passport slot on the other, though its billfold layout means banknotes fit without folding. All of that said, it lacks a secure spot for an AirTag, so you’ll have to use a flat smart tracker, like a Tile, which fits appropriately in one of the slots.

The Fjallraven Passport Wallet, on the other hand, has a full zipper closure, which is arguably more secure. Its trump card is undoubtedly the zippered pocket inside, which you can use to store coins, SIM cards, and an AirTag. However, it doesn’t include a pen, which both the AirTag Passport Holder and Bellroy Travel Wallet have.