Any bicyclist who has used one of big tech’s popular navigation apps knows their limitations. Their wayfinding has improved over the years, but the routes still often suggest major roads with higher speed limits and more cars.

Most Navigation Apps Struggle with Bicycling

This past weekend, my wife and I were bicycling to dinner in a Tucson, Arizona suburb. I repeatedly told a certain Cupertino-based company’s app to bypass major roads, but it persisted. I stopped multiple times to reset the route and tell it to choose quieter neighborhood roads. A few miles later, I realized that it reverted to major roads.

We eventually gave up and rode along a large road with a 45 mile per hour speed limit (which means people were driving at least 50). A wide bicycle lane made the route tolerable, but it still wasn’t great at times.

The intersection at Ina Road, where we eventually turned left, had two thru-lanes, a right turn lane, a bicycle lane, and two left turn lanes in our direction of travel.

Every so often, my phone would abruptly make an announcement on what to do. We would slow down to try and hear the spoken directions, but there was always doubt as to whether we heard it correctly.

With a few extra miles and less time than expected until our dinner reservation, we arrived at the restaurant. We agreed the route was adequate, but it wasn’t the route we expected.

A Better Route

After dinner, we loaded our eBikes and prepared to head home.

“Woops! I forgot I had an app for this now,” I said, as I unlocked my bike lock. This rightfully received a roll of the eyes from my wife.

I had recently subscribed to Ride with GPS after the Adventure Cycling Association announced they would be partnering with the company.

Since it was a new app to me, I completely forgot I had it installed.

I opened the app and asked it to chart our bike ride home. The difference in routing was huge!

Despite the same start and end points, our return route had almost no riding along major roads. It found a seamless path of quiet neighborhood roads that had few cars, lower speed limits, and bicycle lanes.

The route was prettier and, frankly, I never would have found it on my own.

My wife immediately said that she preferred the turn-by-turn navigation of Ride with GPS. I was carrying the phone, but she had no problem hearing the app’s instructions.

The app plays a little bell sound to get your attention before speaking. This greatly helped with the inherent wind noise of cycling.

In my opinion, Ride with GPS is now the dominant bicycling-specific navigation app. Komoot was a favorite alternative of mine until recently, but the future of that app is uncertain. That app was just bought by a tech firm, which then laid off most of the staff.

I should also mention that Strava (which I also subscribe to) offers wayfinding, too. However, the foundation of that app is more geared towards fitness cycling, rather than transportation or exploration. There’s nothing wrong with that, but it affects how the app approaches routing.

Subscriptions

Ride with GPS offers multiple tiers for the app.

There is a free version with limited functionality. It will allow you to chart routes on the website, record rides, and sync with Garmin devices.

Upgrading to the premium subscription ($9.99/month or $79.99/year) unlocks many more features. Premium provides the turn-by-turn navigation that we love, as well as things like offline maps, heatmaps, an estimated time of arrival along the way, and a bicycle maintenance log. There are map layers, such as wind speed, air quality, and cellular service coverage. Additionally, you can create custom spoken cues for along your route.

The company’s website also shows a basic tier at $7.99 per month or $59.99 per year. It cuts some features, like the bike maintenance log, estimated time, and advanced route planning tools. Information about pricing can be found on the company’s website: https://ridewithgps.com/plans

Is Ride with GPS Worth the Subscription?

I’ve been aggressively reviewing my subscriptions this year. The subscribe-to-everything-and-own-nothing model is wearing on just about everyone.

However, I found that Ride With GPS provides good value for the cost. There are many features which I haven’t even used yet.

It’s also nice that the app is built from the ground up for cyclists. This means significantly better routes in my experience.

The only real learning curve I’ve found is creating routes on my phone. At first, it kept trying to add to my earlier route, rather than creating a new route. I eventually figured out that I needed to click Clear Map within the top menu and start over. User error, but I might not be the only one to make that mistake.