I use Google maps on my phone in the car and it does that job for me very nicely, but having just started riding a bit on the roads in an area of the country I don’t know, I realise it uses over 1% of the battery per minute. So it won’t last even a fairly modest evening spin.

Strava on the other hand is also maintaining GPS signal but not too troubling to the battery.

Now part of this is that I have a 3 year old iphone 5S and the battery is not what it once was, but then I don’t think it’s fully knackered either. I expect battery drain but for it to barely last an hour is woeful.

I like having it mounted on my bars telling me where to go because round here there are both ideal empty country roads and others which while still unclassified seem to be drag strips for people wanting to use their 4x4s as murder weapons, so I’ve found I prefer to plan my routes fairly precisely with a lot of junctions. I then just use google maps to navigate from A to be over 2 or 3 separate sections of the ride.

What do others tend to use for this? Are other nav apps significantly less battery-hungry? Do you find the same rate of battery drain?

Memory Map
Alpine Quest
OS
MM Tracker

All the above will be mentioned.

I’ve set an old Android phone up with MM Tracker, I’ve also set up all the battery saving tweaks I can but still only get about 2 hours so picked up a USB power pack from poundland and plug that in when I get to about 50% battery as the phone drains faster than it charges. Gives me about 3.5 hours in total.

Also MotionX GPS is a good App option.

You can put the old iPhone to good use here, run the phone with no sim, pre-cache the map tiles at home on Wifi and you can then run it on Airplane mode for massive battery life saving* (yes GPS works in AP mode) while having full mapping and location fix. You can extend battery life with external packs too.

Using MotionX GPS to track, and with occasional pokes at the screen to check route (ie: screen not permanently on) I can get 6-9 hours on an old iPhone 4s, less the more I use the screen.

Or, get a dedicated GPS unit, Garmin, Wahoo etc. but that’s the more costly option, but event he basic 200 (£45 2nd hand) can do navigation with preloaded GPX tracks if you have a set route you want to follow, no maps, but you can follow a line and it’s normally good enough for road work, well for me anyway and sounds like it would be for your pre-planned style routes, and is good for 6hours+

It’s not the GPS that’s killing your battery, it’s having the screen on. I expect they will all be pretty similar for power consumption. As above, get a 10,000mah Battery pack and mount it a top tube bag.

I experimented with Maymyride for a wee bit, it will do pretty much what you’re asking and also (as I found out accidentally) will even do verbal prompts. I unexpectedly had a ladies voice from my jersey pocket telling me to turn right at the next junction etc. 😀

It’s not the GPS that’s killing your battery, it’s having the screen on.

I thought I had it turned right down but I notice just now that the automatic brightness thing had put it up a fair bit. So there’s something to try there too.

Do any of these apps allow for quick route planning Where the route snaps to roads as you drag a point on it, like google maps on a pc screen? I haven’t tried them all but haven’t seen this yet.

I’m just experimenting with https://www.komoot.com/

I’ve not got the app but on the PC it seems better than google maps for plotting rides.

Google maps also want follow a pre-planned gpx file.

I use Locus maps on Android to navigate a gpx, it shouts directions from my back pocket.

Having tried Komoot now (thanks Podge) I quite like it. It just does the simple job with no fuss. Route planning is just drop a couple of points and it snaps to roads to do the rest and then you’ve got simple turn by turn navigation by voice or on screen.

Opencyclemap based which I don’t find as clear on the screen as say google but that’s a minor point.

However my bloody phone battery still only has an hour’s ride in it, even flicking the screen off fairly regularly. Suppose I could use the voice nav but I don’t want that. Time to either replace or use an external battery.

I’ve actually stopped using that system, it’s clever and I like that it’s editable but I find plotaroute gives me almost the same results in a much easier user interface.

My GPS navigation is based on an old android phone that you could pick up for under 30 quid and a powerbank from poundland. I get about 3 hours out of it if it’s in flight mode and battery saving mode with screen and GPS on all the time. The powerbank doesn’t seem to charge as fast as the phone uses power so there’s probably an optimum time to plug it in to maximise running time but I’ve not worked it out yet.

Better phones and powerbanks would obviously help but I’m happy with this setup. If I was going to be out for significantly longer I’d probably invest in something proper but even dedicated systems all seem to have their weak points.

Good that there are suitable simple free apps to do the job now anyway.

I prefer a phone app to avoid an extra piece of hardware cluttering up the place, needing charging etc. considering this use is prehaps fortnightly in reality.

Looks like this is the catalyst to replacing my phone, under the theory that a decent new one would achive a 2 hour ride on its own and this isn’t the only inconvenience a poor battery causes. My next thread’ll be another “what smartphone” one then…