Despite it's name which suggests a viewer, GPX Viewer is a very capable mobile app for navigation, route following and track recording. It is reliable, provides a useful set of features and a nice set of maps that are visually pleasing and useful for hiking. It comes in two versions on Android, the basic free version and the paid Pro version. On iOS it comes only as a paid version.
In this article we will review the Android Pro version, since it comes with a couple of important features that are not available in the free one:
- offline maps
- track recording
The Android Pro version is available for a one-time payment of around 8.50 USD, which in our opinion is well worth the price for a very handy offline navigation app.
Gaia GPS is a mapping and navigation app for Android, iPhone and the web. It is quite popular in the US and Canada due to a large number of specialized map layers for these countries, such as hunting, fishing, historic, public land and others, as well as some premium basic maps such as National Geographic Trails Illustrated. Hikers in the rest of the world can use the maps that are usually available with other navigation apps, which are based on OpenStreetMap.
The web app is a great choice for route planning, while the mobile app excels in navigation, track recording and aims to do so in following routes. Together, the web and mobile apps provide a nice platform for storing and organizing your recorded tracks, planned routes, waypoints and even photos.
The web and mobile apps are synced through the Gaia Cloud linked by your user account. This makes it a great platform for planning routes on your desktop and having them readily available in your app, without having to do any manual file transfers.
Gaia GPS was generally well regarded in the hiking community until it was purchased by Outdoor Magazine in 2021 and became part of the Outside+ suite of products. That's when the costs of using the app started to raise, together with privacy concerns among the community.
This little cool app is designed for classical orienteering and provides various features to help users find the direction and distance to their desired destinations. It is a versatile tool for orienteering enthusiasts and outdoor adventurers who need a digital solution for navigation. It combines traditional map and compass techniques with modern technology to assist users in finding their way to a specific location.
This is the first app I use when I need a quick insight of the direction and aerial distance to a geographical mark. It's also great for figuring out what village, river, lake or mountain you're looking at in the distance, and how far it actually is. I find this to be a very satisfying and nice tool. But there's a caveat - it only works if you have an internet connection as it relies on online Google maps. It would be fantastic if it could work with offline Google maps, but currently it does not.
AGPS-TrackerOm is an interesting and quite a robust Android application. It's main function is to follow preloaded tracks and record your tracks, and tries to do so reliably - ensuring that the GPS data is recorded at all times, even when the phone goes into stand-by mode. This means you shouldn't get surprise straight lines in your GPX tracks. It can also provide enhanced accuracy of your current elevation, by using altitudes from NASA-generated Digital Elevation Models (DEMs) instead of the GPS-provided elevation which can be quite inaccurate.
AGPS-TrackerOm (previously called A-GPS Tracker++), differs from the lighter version, A-GPS Tracker in the following:
- AGPS-TrackerOm uses offline maps maintained by OpenStreetMap, which you need to preload. The "lighter" A-GPS Tracker uses Google maps which are not available offline.
- You can download Digital Elevation Models (DEM) which allow the app to display altitude contour lines and provide DEM altitude along with GPS altitude, the former being more accurate
