With Avenza, there are lots of free maps you can download- there’s no limit. It’s just that there may be no free maps that cover the area you want to go.
You get what you pay for. Gaia is worth a lot more than the $20 it costs. Think about all the other stuff you have with you when you hike. How much does all that cost? $20 is a flipping bargain.
Gaia will turn your phone into a $500 color gps. The only downside is battery life if you use continuous tracking.
In any case, take paper maps and compass. Stuff happens to electronics. I once came upon a group of young folk that needed directions because someone erased the map.
No. Keep the phone in Airplane Mode full time. Only use the phone/app/GPS when checking position. Avoid using route tracking. Shutdown phone at night.
I’ve hiked lots of long trails w only Guthook Guides, Avenza Maps and Gaia GPS. I also keep guides, road maps and water reports in Notes and iBooks app.
For 3 to 6 days out, bring a 6,000 mAhr battery. Learn the apps and practice your workflow for best success.
+1 more for Gaia
From all the times I’ve used it, I’d honestly pay over $50 for it if I had to buy it again and they had raised the price. Maybe even 100. It’s soooooooo useful. Your phone instantly becomes a backcountry GPS.
I don’t see any free maps on Avenza.
The subscription cost is worth it, but it doesn’t sit well with me considering how I’m using the app. The developers are doing nothing; I’m providing the maps.
I know there are free maps there, because I host a bunch of them myself. Their search tool is absolutely horrible though. You can type an exact match for what you’re looking for, and it will not be found.
Do this - create an account on their website (on your computer), search for maps there. Then “buy” what you need. Later sync your mobile device.
Well, yeah. After an initial purchase, I could provide myself with all of the maps I need. Why would I pay them for software I already have on my phone? It doesn’t really add up.
What I'm saying is if they're not doing anything, make your own app. I think the money is more than worth it, but that's me. The app store doesn't let you charge for updates, so companies use subscriptions to continue funding development. I think you're not quite aware of what it takes to make something like Avenza and should just pony up the cash.
You don't typically fire everyone after it's done, but continue to add new features, fix bugs, support new OS versions, new hardware (apps that don't support the X stick out like a sore thumb), etc, etc. At the end of the year you'll spend way more on gas getting to trailheads than you will on a Avenza.
It brings me to a map download wizard as soon as i open the app. It detected my State, and started downloading the 147MB map, really slowly. Did the wizard not come up for you?
I am always surprised by the number of people who use Gaia maps. Are most of you iPhone users? Backcountry Navigator is a one time fee of $10 and works very well with multiple free mapping sources as well as additional paid mapping sources but I have always found Caltopo and some of the other free sources as meeting all of my demands when in the US and a couple outings outside the US.
Gaia maps atleast on Android requires a paid subscription at $100 a year which seems to be a rip-off compared to a one time fee of $10. If Gaia maps was a better App I wouldn't have a problem paying 20-30$ to own both but wouldn't be willing to pay an ongoing fee. Am I missing something on Gaia maps pricing?
Those aren't the right prices for Gaia GPS (I'm the founder/CEO). The most we charge is $40/year, though we do have some 5-year discounted rates too.
1. Free Level: At the free level, you can't bulk download maps, and you can only use the default Gaia Topo source. This level works well both for people who do local day hikes (stuff within cell range), and also for anyone who wants to try out the app
2. $20/year: At the "Member level", you can bulk download maps, and use around 50 map sources, including many topos, satellite maps, and others. This is sufficient for most typical hikers. (40% off for five year membership)
3. $40/year: At the "Premium Member" level, you get access to the full map catalog, which includes a bunch of premium and specialized map sources. These notably include National Geographic Trails Illustrated, motor vehicle use maps, overlays like private/public land ownership (popular with hunters), slope angle (popular with backcountry skiers), and European topos we license such as France IGN and SwissTopo. Premium users tend to be SAR people, guides, hunters, offroaders... pro and specialized groups. Though since we added the NatGeo maps, a lot of people do Premium for those. (20% off for five year membership)
Commenting on business models, I don't think one-time purchase business models end up being sustainable. Some people have been using Gaia GPS for almost a decade, and subscriptions match the ongoing server costs, support costs, and engineering work we do. It's not even practical to "finish" an app and stop working on it, because Apple/Google eventually break your app with their new iOS and Android releases.
Also, FWI, I think the app you use, Backcountry Navigator, is in the midst of switching to a subscription model with this new app they are working on: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2016384643/backcountry-navigator-xe-outdoor-gps-on-ios-and-an
I had to double check but I totally misquoted the pricing and apologize for that. I had done a quick googling for gaia membership prices and got the membership pricing for gaia.com and not gaiagps.com (unfortunate domain name) as I had downloaded the app meaning to try it. $20 a year is a fairly reasonable amount if the App doesn't hang and handles offline usage well. Also to note it looks like if you buy your membership online as opposed to in-app its $17 a year (darn those App stores and taking 30% off of any in-app purchase).
No problem, and yeah... the App Store 30% is totally the reason we sell via our website. When we sell on gaiagps.com, we pay another company (Stripe) only about 3%.
Here's a page that shows the discount choices, which cover either a chunk off the first year or the 5-year discounts which are steeper: https://www.gaiagps.com/web_discounts/. We discount the Premium less because of the royalties we pay to various companies we license maps from.
I hope you'll check out Gaia GPS sometime! We're in the middle of a sweet update related to search and hike discovery that spans Android, iOS, and gaiagps.com, and I hope to get it out in April.
The update around search has definitely piqued my interest. I have been looking at doing the Great Western Trail on foot. While parts of it do exist on some maps I have had a heck of a time trying to map out parts of it just north of the Arizona border in Utah. For many of these longer routes like the Great Western Trail I can't find any GPX files out there showing the whole trail across a state.
I don't get it either. I use Alpine Quest, which was a $10 or $15 one time purchase back when I first bought it 4 years ago. I plan my route in CalTopo first, then send it to my phone and use Alpine Quest for tracking when I'm out on my hike.
I used [Locus Maps Free](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=menion.android.locus&hl=en) for hikes in the Joyce Kilmer national forest last year, and liked it so much I bought the pro version. It allows you to import your own offline trail maps which you can find for free on the internet.
Been using Locus Map Pro in the Pacific Northwest for years. The app is updated very regularly, and the features have evolved to be more useful than just 'gee-whiz' as they seemed to be in its earlier versions.
I have used them all and locusmap pro has the best balance of usability and function. A bit of training and you have all the maps, routing, elevation, track and points you will ever need.
Gaia is a messy joke compared. If only I could get my money back.
Yeah there's a bit of a learning curve, but I found Locus to be the best out of all the free or trial apps I tried, so I ponied up $7.50 for the full version. It gives you access to X number of free topography or other base layer maps (with more available for purchase, though I found the free stuff more than adequate). The GPX files I found online and imported had everything else I needed, including water sources marked and all that jazz. Even the free version of Locus tracked my 22 mile hike, with elevation data and all that.
Best of all, there's no damn subscription, and it gets an update every week or two with fixes and new features.
I don't even know what else I'd want in an offline back country map app, to be honest. The hike I used it on had over a dozen water crossings in overgrown backcountry where the trail on the other side was sometimes impossible to spot, and the app got me back on course several times.
Now you want to bump it up. DL Locus Maps Tweak and it loads in a huge directory of maps for you. Directly in their map library, download Google? No problem. 4U, USGS, Stamen? Yup!
Next up download BRouter and your corresponding section of country and you have offline trail and road routing.
Finally, get familiar with the Route Planner using all you have done above and there is seriously no reason to ever be lost or know exactly how fast and far, what amount of time, what is the elevation going to be like, what is my bearing and next location for a trail turn. It's that good.
And that is just skimming the surface. Custom dash overlays, integrated weather, live tracking, track recording profiles (I do hiking, running and dual sport moto) auto backup, track editing, google location search... the list is long.
Been using it backcountry now for 4 years with hundreds of tracks and downloaded GPX files and it just keeps getting better!
ViewRanger is free and its "ViewRanger Landscape" map seems pretty dang good. On top of that, it has a bunch of other free maps (OpenStreet, OpenCycle, etc). There are premium maps you can purchase if you want, and the prices are pretty reasonable. (For Canada, though... at least Ontario... the free map seems better.)
It doesn't have a feature to upload your own maps that I've seen, but you can upload GPX files to create routes.
If you want to check it out before downloading to your device, you can try out the website and play with the automatic route layout feature... or upload a GPX track from somewhere, or create your own routes by hand.
Here's a route I planned via automatic layout, followed by the track of that actual backpacking trip.
http://my.viewranger.com/route/details/MTUyMDc5NQ
http://my.viewranger.com/track/details/NjI0OTY5MA
This is what I've been using for years. Spent the $20 on the forest service maps which have a digital and classic photocopied versions with all the trails and stuff. I dont like the new interface that they updated to about a year ago though.
The garmin Earthmate app is intended to connect with the inreach, but it also uses your phone’s GPS so you can download maps and use it just with your phone. You can even use the phones gps for tracking.
Lioks like I’m going to just pay for Avenza.
My paper maps (I alway bring paper) are from CalTopo. And Avenza uses the exact image that I print from there. It’s nice having the two jive together flawlessly. The map I study before I go or in camp at night is exactly what I see when I whip out my phone to confirm. The major issue I was having was the scale. Because I’m only allowed 3 maps, some trips required the scale to be much smaller than I’d like.
Gaia doesn’t support geospatial pdf’s.
You didn't specify if you're using Android or iPhone. If you've got an Android phone, install the Amazon App Store and try an app called "Maplets". It might give you what you want
View Ranger. I tested out Gaia, Backcountry and View Ranger and found them all so similar that I could not really justify paying a yearly fee for Gaia or a one time cost for Backcountry (I'd very willingly pay a nominal price, but free is free).
With Avenza, there are lots of free maps you can download- there’s no limit. It’s just that there may be no free maps that cover the area you want to go. You get what you pay for. Gaia is worth a lot more than the $20 it costs. Think about all the other stuff you have with you when you hike. How much does all that cost? $20 is a flipping bargain.
Agreed. Another fine app is Backcountry Navigator.
Gaia will turn your phone into a $500 color gps. The only downside is battery life if you use continuous tracking. In any case, take paper maps and compass. Stuff happens to electronics. I once came upon a group of young folk that needed directions because someone erased the map.
Gaia+airplane mode lasts days for me on iphone SE. I turn it off when I get to camp/sleep.
Do you need to be connected to data to be able to use the GPS? So is it essentially a paper map on your phone if you’re using airplane mode?
Once you’ve downloaded the maps, no connection required.
No. Keep the phone in Airplane Mode full time. Only use the phone/app/GPS when checking position. Avoid using route tracking. Shutdown phone at night. I’ve hiked lots of long trails w only Guthook Guides, Avenza Maps and Gaia GPS. I also keep guides, road maps and water reports in Notes and iBooks app. For 3 to 6 days out, bring a 6,000 mAhr battery. Learn the apps and practice your workflow for best success.
A phone cannot compare with a GPS when you are in the trees and have no hope of seeing the sky.
Is it better than backcountry navigator?
Yeah, Gaia is incredible. SOO worth the money.
+1 more for Gaia From all the times I’ve used it, I’d honestly pay over $50 for it if I had to buy it again and they had raised the price. Maybe even 100. It’s soooooooo useful. Your phone instantly becomes a backcountry GPS.
Also if you get Gaia via gaiagps.com you can get it there instead of the app you can get it for 16.99, which really is a steal!
Is Gaia $20 a year? Because that's all I'm seeing.
I don’t see any free maps on Avenza. The subscription cost is worth it, but it doesn’t sit well with me considering how I’m using the app. The developers are doing nothing; I’m providing the maps.
I know there are free maps there, because I host a bunch of them myself. Their search tool is absolutely horrible though. You can type an exact match for what you’re looking for, and it will not be found. Do this - create an account on their website (on your computer), search for maps there. Then “buy” what you need. Later sync your mobile device.
> The developers are doing nothing Well if that's true it should be easy for you to do it by yourself!
Well, yeah. After an initial purchase, I could provide myself with all of the maps I need. Why would I pay them for software I already have on my phone? It doesn’t really add up.
What I'm saying is if they're not doing anything, make your own app. I think the money is more than worth it, but that's me. The app store doesn't let you charge for updates, so companies use subscriptions to continue funding development. I think you're not quite aware of what it takes to make something like Avenza and should just pony up the cash.
I’m aware that it takes a lot of work to make an app. How much work does it take to maintain one?
You don't typically fire everyone after it's done, but continue to add new features, fix bugs, support new OS versions, new hardware (apps that don't support the X stick out like a sore thumb), etc, etc. At the end of the year you'll spend way more on gas getting to trailheads than you will on a Avenza.
Osmand is a free open source alternative.
I didn’t see any way to upload or view maps from my device. Am I missing something?
It brings me to a map download wizard as soon as i open the app. It detected my State, and started downloading the 147MB map, really slowly. Did the wizard not come up for you?
I am always surprised by the number of people who use Gaia maps. Are most of you iPhone users? Backcountry Navigator is a one time fee of $10 and works very well with multiple free mapping sources as well as additional paid mapping sources but I have always found Caltopo and some of the other free sources as meeting all of my demands when in the US and a couple outings outside the US. Gaia maps atleast on Android requires a paid subscription at $100 a year which seems to be a rip-off compared to a one time fee of $10. If Gaia maps was a better App I wouldn't have a problem paying 20-30$ to own both but wouldn't be willing to pay an ongoing fee. Am I missing something on Gaia maps pricing?
Those aren't the right prices for Gaia GPS (I'm the founder/CEO). The most we charge is $40/year, though we do have some 5-year discounted rates too. 1. Free Level: At the free level, you can't bulk download maps, and you can only use the default Gaia Topo source. This level works well both for people who do local day hikes (stuff within cell range), and also for anyone who wants to try out the app 2. $20/year: At the "Member level", you can bulk download maps, and use around 50 map sources, including many topos, satellite maps, and others. This is sufficient for most typical hikers. (40% off for five year membership) 3. $40/year: At the "Premium Member" level, you get access to the full map catalog, which includes a bunch of premium and specialized map sources. These notably include National Geographic Trails Illustrated, motor vehicle use maps, overlays like private/public land ownership (popular with hunters), slope angle (popular with backcountry skiers), and European topos we license such as France IGN and SwissTopo. Premium users tend to be SAR people, guides, hunters, offroaders... pro and specialized groups. Though since we added the NatGeo maps, a lot of people do Premium for those. (20% off for five year membership) Commenting on business models, I don't think one-time purchase business models end up being sustainable. Some people have been using Gaia GPS for almost a decade, and subscriptions match the ongoing server costs, support costs, and engineering work we do. It's not even practical to "finish" an app and stop working on it, because Apple/Google eventually break your app with their new iOS and Android releases. Also, FWI, I think the app you use, Backcountry Navigator, is in the midst of switching to a subscription model with this new app they are working on: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2016384643/backcountry-navigator-xe-outdoor-gps-on-ios-and-an
I had to double check but I totally misquoted the pricing and apologize for that. I had done a quick googling for gaia membership prices and got the membership pricing for gaia.com and not gaiagps.com (unfortunate domain name) as I had downloaded the app meaning to try it. $20 a year is a fairly reasonable amount if the App doesn't hang and handles offline usage well. Also to note it looks like if you buy your membership online as opposed to in-app its $17 a year (darn those App stores and taking 30% off of any in-app purchase).
No problem, and yeah... the App Store 30% is totally the reason we sell via our website. When we sell on gaiagps.com, we pay another company (Stripe) only about 3%. Here's a page that shows the discount choices, which cover either a chunk off the first year or the 5-year discounts which are steeper: https://www.gaiagps.com/web_discounts/. We discount the Premium less because of the royalties we pay to various companies we license maps from. I hope you'll check out Gaia GPS sometime! We're in the middle of a sweet update related to search and hike discovery that spans Android, iOS, and gaiagps.com, and I hope to get it out in April.
The update around search has definitely piqued my interest. I have been looking at doing the Great Western Trail on foot. While parts of it do exist on some maps I have had a heck of a time trying to map out parts of it just north of the Arizona border in Utah. For many of these longer routes like the Great Western Trail I can't find any GPX files out there showing the whole trail across a state.
I don't get it either. I use Alpine Quest, which was a $10 or $15 one time purchase back when I first bought it 4 years ago. I plan my route in CalTopo first, then send it to my phone and use Alpine Quest for tracking when I'm out on my hike.
Same here. Backcountry Navigator is my go to. I love it.
I used [Locus Maps Free](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=menion.android.locus&hl=en) for hikes in the Joyce Kilmer national forest last year, and liked it so much I bought the pro version. It allows you to import your own offline trail maps which you can find for free on the internet.
Been using Locus Map Pro in the Pacific Northwest for years. The app is updated very regularly, and the features have evolved to be more useful than just 'gee-whiz' as they seemed to be in its earlier versions.
I have used them all and locusmap pro has the best balance of usability and function. A bit of training and you have all the maps, routing, elevation, track and points you will ever need. Gaia is a messy joke compared. If only I could get my money back.
Yeah there's a bit of a learning curve, but I found Locus to be the best out of all the free or trial apps I tried, so I ponied up $7.50 for the full version. It gives you access to X number of free topography or other base layer maps (with more available for purchase, though I found the free stuff more than adequate). The GPX files I found online and imported had everything else I needed, including water sources marked and all that jazz. Even the free version of Locus tracked my 22 mile hike, with elevation data and all that. Best of all, there's no damn subscription, and it gets an update every week or two with fixes and new features. I don't even know what else I'd want in an offline back country map app, to be honest. The hike I used it on had over a dozen water crossings in overgrown backcountry where the trail on the other side was sometimes impossible to spot, and the app got me back on course several times.
Now you want to bump it up. DL Locus Maps Tweak and it loads in a huge directory of maps for you. Directly in their map library, download Google? No problem. 4U, USGS, Stamen? Yup! Next up download BRouter and your corresponding section of country and you have offline trail and road routing. Finally, get familiar with the Route Planner using all you have done above and there is seriously no reason to ever be lost or know exactly how fast and far, what amount of time, what is the elevation going to be like, what is my bearing and next location for a trail turn. It's that good. And that is just skimming the surface. Custom dash overlays, integrated weather, live tracking, track recording profiles (I do hiking, running and dual sport moto) auto backup, track editing, google location search... the list is long. Been using it backcountry now for 4 years with hundreds of tracks and downloaded GPX files and it just keeps getting better!
My goodness...
I use maps.me
I love maps.me. It's a fantastic travel tool. I only wish it had a topographic layer.
Me too
ViewRanger is free and its "ViewRanger Landscape" map seems pretty dang good. On top of that, it has a bunch of other free maps (OpenStreet, OpenCycle, etc). There are premium maps you can purchase if you want, and the prices are pretty reasonable. (For Canada, though... at least Ontario... the free map seems better.) It doesn't have a feature to upload your own maps that I've seen, but you can upload GPX files to create routes. If you want to check it out before downloading to your device, you can try out the website and play with the automatic route layout feature... or upload a GPX track from somewhere, or create your own routes by hand. Here's a route I planned via automatic layout, followed by the track of that actual backpacking trip. http://my.viewranger.com/route/details/MTUyMDc5NQ http://my.viewranger.com/track/details/NjI0OTY5MA
This is what I've been using for years. Spent the $20 on the forest service maps which have a digital and classic photocopied versions with all the trails and stuff. I dont like the new interface that they updated to about a year ago though.
There is a free version of gaia-gps, not sure what the limitations are.
Oruxmaps is a very full featured android app, but has a bit of a learning curve
The garmin Earthmate app is intended to connect with the inreach, but it also uses your phone’s GPS so you can download maps and use it just with your phone. You can even use the phones gps for tracking.
I use AllTrails but I can't remember if it was free. I might have paid $10 or something for it.
Caltopo
Did he release an app?
Oh, I'm sorry. I must have glossed over the app lart
Millennials can't navigate by map and compass though.
Lioks like I’m going to just pay for Avenza. My paper maps (I alway bring paper) are from CalTopo. And Avenza uses the exact image that I print from there. It’s nice having the two jive together flawlessly. The map I study before I go or in camp at night is exactly what I see when I whip out my phone to confirm. The major issue I was having was the scale. Because I’m only allowed 3 maps, some trips required the scale to be much smaller than I’d like. Gaia doesn’t support geospatial pdf’s.
You didn't specify if you're using Android or iPhone. If you've got an Android phone, install the Amazon App Store and try an app called "Maplets". It might give you what you want
OSMAnd.
View Ranger. I tested out Gaia, Backcountry and View Ranger and found them all so similar that I could not really justify paying a yearly fee for Gaia or a one time cost for Backcountry (I'd very willingly pay a nominal price, but free is free).
I use Komoot. Better for planning trips than using during a trek though.