Best GPS Apps To Find, Track & Share Your Next Ride
Technology is making trail riding better than ever.
REVER
There are literally hundreds of outdoor, hiking, camping and navigation GPS Apps out there but few are built with off roading in mind. However, there are a few low cost or free Smartphone GPS Apps made just for us. That means, not only can you view terrain, trails and roads, you can track your ride, mark waypoints and even share what rides you have been doing with others. We have put together a list of great off road ready Apps that we have been using over the last couple years and can recommend. Some do certain things better than others, so you can review the features and spec charts we have made up and decide what is more important for you and which you should take with your on the next adventure. Enjoy.
Relive: Free-$10.99
Relive is unique in that it will track your ride then replay your route on a satellite image of the trip. While you are watching the trip unfold, photos from each stop will pop on the display. It’s a cool recap of your day, you can share on social media or in person with your friends.
Track Friends: No
Track Rides: Yes
Import/Export Rides: No
Format: Apple & Android
Works in Airplane mode: Yes
Contact: https://www.relive.cc/
1 REVER: Free or $5.99 Per month option.
Track Friends: Yes
Share Rides: Yes (GPX)
Track Rides: Yes
Format: Apple & Android
Works in Airplane mode: Yes
Contact: https://rever.co/
Polaris Ride Command: Free
The Polaris Ride Command App is the one we are most familiar with. In fact, our account says we have tracked over 1600 miles this year alone. Ride Command is available as a complete display console on some RZR and General models, but by using it on a smartphone means it can be used in any brand machine you ride. Within the App, Polaris has pre loaded thousands of Forest Service, BLM, State and private ride areas all over the country. You can also import GPX files to Ride Command and ride trails Polaris doesn’t know about yet. You can track your ride and save it for later or send it to a friend to enjoy. If that’s not enough, Ride Command allows you to create groups and track them upto 5 miles away as long as you have cell service. The rest of the features work while off line or even in airplane mode so it’s not a battery eater.
Track Friends: Yes
Track Rides: Yes
Import/Export Rides: Yes (GPX)
Format: Apple/ Android
Works in Airplane mode: Yes
Contact: https://ridecommand.polaris.com/en-us/home
UTV Trails: Free-$14.99
The UTV Trails Smartphone App uses crowd sourced trail GPS data and other trail information from a huge community of riders via the app, and make it available to the rest of the community via the same app! When riders use Smartphone, GPS Apps to record their rides, the ride is sent to the UTV Trails servers upon completion (or the next time you have internet service.) That recording is compared against all trails in the database, and any new sections create new trails in the database. This database is what shows trails on the map for everybody using the UTV Trails app. This means as more and more riders record their rides, more and more trails appear on the map for you to see. If there aren’t many trails shown in your area, this simply means nobody has recorded them, YET.
Track Friends: Yes
Track Rides: Yes
Import/Export Rides: Yes
Format: Apple/Android
Works in Airplane mode: Yes
Contact: https://www.utvtrails.com
OWLSHEAD GPS: $2.99
Owlshead is the most complete collection of off road trails in the state of California. Within Owlshead you can see trails you won’t find on other Apps. So the downside is, this App is only for California, but the upside, is there are a lot of places to ride in the Golden State. It won’t track your previous course of travel, you can see what trail you’re on and which trails are coming up, This is one of those features that will be added in an upcoming update. However, we have used the Owlsheadgps.com site to export certain trails they list on their map and import them to other GPS systems.
Track Friends: No
Track Rides: No
Import/Export Rides: Yes, Export
Format: Apple/Android
Works in Airplane mode: Yes
Contact: http://www.owlsheadgps.com/owlshead
LeadNav: $20
Along with track recording, marker dropping and a great route builder tool, routes used in the LeadNav App can include audio waypoints, which provide street-style audio guidance while you are off-the-grid (“In 450 meters rock on right, then turn left”, “In 100 feet sharp right”, etc.). This is what makes LeadNav such a popular choice amongst ATV Riders and single-seat off road racers because LeadNav serves as their navigator while they keep their eyes on the road ahead. The base $20 App also provides several background map imagery options: Bing Satellite and Hybrid (street names), USGS Satellite and Topographic, and Open Street Map.
LeadNav location tracking works across three different channels: Cell Connect which allows any LeadNav user within cellular reception (using a device with a cellular plan) to broadcast their location as well as receive the current locations of their LeadNav contacts.
For the ultimate in tracking LeadNav can create a custom channel on their website, where viewers from anywhere can track the progress of multiple vehicles at once using any home computer or mobile device.
Track Friends: Yes
Track Rides: Yes
Import/Export Rides: Yes
Format: Apple
Works in Airplane mode: Yes
Contact: https://leadnavsystems.com
Mob Armor: $9.99
Mob Amor got its start by manufacturing and selling mounts for GPS units. They quickly realized how many systems that were being used in the world and created their own GPS Apps. Within the Mob Armor Smartphone App, you can do the basics like track your ride, lay down waypoints and add notes to each of them, and save trails. The app also tracks data n each ride that include top speed, elevation etc.. In Performance mode you can install range rings that will alert you if a specific marker is coming up
Track Friends: No
Track Rides: Yes
Import/Export Rides: Yes
Format: Apple
Works in Airplane mode: Yes
Contact: http://mobarmor.com/
Gaia GPS: $9.99
Gaia GPS Smartphone App was built for back country adventurers and professionals worldwide to plan, navigate, and stay safer. You can plot trails and routes, and download all the info you need for an offline trip in the wild using a decent library of maps for around the world travel. Since this is more of a hikers App, it does not come with any preloaded off road trails. You can’t track friends or let friends track you but you can share with them the places you have been. What we like about Gaia is the ability to see speeds traveled including max and average. The same goes for elevation gains. You can also Geotag all of the photos you take within the App.
Track Friends: No
Track Rides: Yes
Import/Export Rides: Yes
Format: Apple/Android
Works in Airplane mode: Yes
Contact: https://www.gaiagps.com/
We know some riders would rather use a large I-Pad for ease of use, keep in mind these GPS apps will work on tablets as well. However, using them on your smart phone is more cost effective for many.
If you would rather use a conventional GPS unit, the latest Voyager Pro from Trail Tech has a lot to offer.
Comments are closed.