5 Bike Apps You Absolutely Need

It seems like every other day there’s a new bike app to download. Whether it’s to make you a faster and more efficient cyclist, discover beautiful routes, review your progress post-ride or to plan an epic multi-country epic tour, you can download an app on your smartphone for it. These apps are not only useful for the performance-focused cycling-obsessed; recreational cyclists are also sure to find them extremely useful. We’ve compiled a list of some of the hottest and most useful bike apps of the moment.

Strava

Undoubtedly the most popular cycling app is Strava, and its popularity shows no signs of decreasing. Although Strava remain tight-lipped about how many users the app has, they recently claimed that it gains an astounding one million new members every 45 days. It works as follows: after you’ve downloaded the app, first create a Strava profile, where all your information is stored. You’re now part of the Strava community, where information is shared and you automatically compete with other athletes when you log a ride. Not only does it track your location, speed, distance, calories burned, new records and elevation, it also stores your route via GPS. This allows you to look back at your ride history, share results and compare with friends. You can set goals and challenges for you and your cycling buddies, for example to cover a certain number of kilometres in a certain number of days. Although Strava’s competitive aspect has its critics – some say the app encourages antisocial, over-competitive cycling - winning a segment and becoming ‘king/queen of the mountains’ carries a certain prestige among groups of cycling enthusiasts, and it’s certainly fun to brag a little about being the fastest on a particular stretch! It’s also useful to be able to look through different segments to see who rode them the fastest. For the pros there is the paid Strava Summit version, allowing more customisable work-outs and detailed performance insights.

2. Komoot

Komoot is an app for cyclists, runners and hikers that enables users to explore regions and plan and share multi-terrain routes. The emphasis here is not on performance, although you can pre-select a higher or lower fitness level depending on how challenging you want your ride to be. Cyclists are able to choose between bike touring, mountain biking and road cycling to find inspiration for rides and when planning routes – the app adjusts the route automatically depending on which type of riding you want to do. Komoot works hard to compile and suggest new ride and route ideas, encouraging users to get out and explore their local area. These blog-style posts incorporate tips and photographs from other users, so you can get a realistic idea of what to expect on your ride. For bike tourists, there are also posts that recommend camp sites and cool content such as en-route swimming spots and other points of interest. Komoot haven’t ignored the social aspect, either: with the app you can connect with friends and share rides. The ‘Pioneers’ function also lets you ‘meet’ local Pioneers – that is, users who have expert knowledge of their local regions, allowing you to check out their routes for further ride inspiration. To become a Pioneer, you have to get the most upvotes in your region by writing the most insightful tips and contributing great photos and route ideas. Pioneers then have the chance to be invited to exclusive events and have access to insider giveaways.

3. Trailforks

If you’re into mountain biking or gravel biking, an app to discover new off-road routes and trails is essential. There are several available, but we really like Trailforks, a great app supplemented with content from the popular Pinkbike online mountain biking community. With several features, this app is super handy: not only do you get access to thousands of miles of trails and routes custom designed for mountain biking, but the maps also include topographic information, points of interest, trail popularity, trail conditions and much more. According to Trailforks, there are over 146,000 trails to explore in over 95 countries. Users can add comments and photographs to trails, and you can tick off a trail once you’ve ridden it. If you find a trail that you think is worth sharing, simply track your ride with GPS and upload it to the database including any pictures or information you think could be useful to other riders. The app also has a ‘discover rides’ feature that gives suggested rides, trails and routes near where your map is centred. Should you get into trouble, it even has a ‘share your location’ feature that allows you to share your location with a friend via a custom URL as well as an emergency help feature that has the latitude and longitude of your location if you run into serious problems. A great app for anyone into mountain biking – highly recommended!

4. Google Maps

Although an app that more or less everybody already has on their smartphone, the usefulness of Google Maps for cycling simply cannot be exaggerated. As anybody who has ever done a bike tour will tell you, Google Maps is essential – its coverage isn’t universal (yet), but if there’s just one app to have on your smartphone when out biking, we’d vote for this one - we’ve certainly used it more than any other. Its navigation can be incredibly powerful, depending on where you are. Many countries feature cycling specific navigation, which often sticks to roads with bike paths and avoids dangerous routes. Additionally, it shows topography (hugely useful for when planning a route), satellite imagery, traffic information, bike paths and public transport links. You can easily share your location with friends, download maps offline and even review where you’ve ridden with the ‘your timeline’ feature. The street view function is also useful when in unfamiliar places, helping you reach your destination – be it a hotel, Airbnb or whatever – especially when you can’t read the language or ask easily for directions. Of course, the usefulness of Google Maps depends where you are – don’t expect incredible results all over the globe, but by and large, if there’s one app you must have for cycling, it’s this.

5. Relive

Relive is a cool app that gives you the opportunity to – you guessed it – ‘relive’ your cycling experiences. Simply select your activity type and off you go: after using GPS to track your activity, the apps creates a tailor-made video for you to watch again and again after your ride (this usually takes a couple of hours – it’s not instantaneous.) By using 3D map animation showing your route and interspersing the video with your photos or points of interest along the way, you’re able to experience your ride from a difference perspective. The results look fantastic – almost like a live graphic from TV cycling coverage, but for your own personal rides - great for showing friends where you’ve cycled, especially if you ride a lot of steep mountain passes! The map gives various other info along the way including top speed and elevation. The app integrates with Strava, Garmin Connect and other GPS trackers, and according to Relive’s website already has 3 million people in the community. You can also import activities from Strava or other communities, should you forget to track your activity in Relive. Of course, nobody likes a show-off, so maybe think twice before sharing every relive video you make. Besides, how many times do you really need to watch such a video anyway?