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Early on, you could download GPXs, then that function went over to the paid version
I've just downloaded all my history from Strava, to load the Wahoo data into Garmin. Simple really
https://www.strava.com/athlete/delete_your_account
Well, I'll wait and see what the experience is like when these changes happen.
But it sounds like I can get around it by just making sure that I always place in the top 10 on every segment?
Should be easy enough.
I like it - use it a bit - mostly to record overall mileage -- £6.99 is a bit steep when you start to factor in my wife and youngest as well - should have a family plan for it.
I'll pay for a subscription for the Mrs as she will get most out of it and see what I miss .... Youngest doesn't post public rides so she isn't missing much....
I get what I want for free from the app. I'm sure enough people that care about seeing results against other people will pay for it.
The only segment comparison I’m ever interested in is with my friends and people I’m following, not really fussed about anyone else (
As I understand it this will not be available in the free version in the future as you won't be able to view anything not yours or top ten.
I won't be paying personally as I only use it for this. I'd happily pay (a sensible amount) per ride even for the days I'm out with folk and we're having a bit of friendly competition but for the days I'm genuinely interested enough to pay it would be about £20 a ride. The rest of the time I only use it because its there, I very much doubt I'm alone in that.
As I understand it this will not be available in the free version in the future as you won’t be able to view anything not yours or top ten.
I pay already so hopefully won’t notice any difference. That said I’ve not seen any change with the Route Builder (for example) so not sure when these changes will arrive for us.
I do totally see the subscription fatigue though. I culled a bunch mid last year (when nursery fees for the little one kicked in!) and while quite a few things fell by the wayside, I reckon I get enough from Strava to make them worth some money. I’d rather pay them than Amazon Prime for example.
Wish they took the non subscribers off the leaderboard. Might go up a few places then 😉
Not seeing anything different in a mates ride from this morning, i can still see his segments, still see his times in relation to me....
I pay already so hopefully won’t notice any difference. That said I’ve not seen any change with the Route Builder (for example) so not sure when these changes will arrive for us.
I noticed a subtle change to route builder a few weeks ago, I think something to do with the popularity algorithm which frustratingly means it never seems to take the route I want it to! I guess perhaps because I live near the Union Canal which will be disproportionately popular compared to, say, the potholed, gravel strewn farm road I like to hammer along pretending I'm Cancellara in the Paris-Roubaix...
Not seeing anything different in a mates ride from this morning
I'm not seeing anything different either, if this was all a ruse to get people like me to cough up then they have 60 days to start punishing the non-subscribers or I'm calling in the free trial! 😉
it seems to me a much better solution would a pay per ride. For me, especially in the winter when days are short and weather terrible, I will be doing well to get a ride a month in. 6.99 is too much. I'd happy pay a pay per use charge, 50p per ride or something like that.
I like Strava because of the social aspect, and this only works because most people I know are on it. So if it loses loads of my mates, then I'll have to go too as it won't provide the social aspect. I like seeing what they've been up to.
So we'll need a new platform to achieve critical mass. Which one?
I like Strava because of the social aspect
Genuine question - what is the social aspect of strava? Can't say I've ever looked for anything but from what I saw it was limited to giving someone "kudos".
I might be missing a trick and maybe it is worth my money.
amazing folks out with bikes costing thousands cry about a fiver a month on strava
How many people using the free service are riding bikes worth thousands?
Over its 7 years with me my bike has not cost me a thousand even with all the chains/cassettes/tyres/brakes etc that I have changed/upgraded.
beating your riding mates... we have times where it can get a bit competitive locally for sure.
what is the social aspect of strava?
Maybe not something that everyone subscribes to, but I've met people through strava who I'd very definitely consider as friends now, I've also came across people I knew many years ago, school, whatever, who now have a shared interest and end up chatting or even meeting up for rides.
Just googled Strava segment alternatives, first hit was met with this as the first response, someone asking if there was a free alternative to strava segments
No, because the Premium Account costs only around 0,18 euro cents per day.
If i get a well designed platform for this price it is worth to pay. No one likes to work for no money.
Perfectly put.
Maybe not something that everyone subscribes to, but I’ve met people through strava who I’d very definitely consider as friends now
That was certainly a thing when I moved to Aviemore and didn't know anyone.
The other "social" aspects that no one has mentioned are:
The photo sharing bit. Not as sophisticated as Instagram etc but handy for capturing snaps and sharing them.
The chat bit. We'll often use that to discuss trail conditions, gate closures, trees down etc.
FWIW, I've had a couple of regular users tell me they've sacked it off as it's not discriminating between pedal bikes and Ebikes - even when the ride has been uploaded as an Ebike.
Genuine question – what is the social aspect of strava?
I'm connected with a few people off here who I've never met IRL.
It's just nice to see their rides & pics and has led to real life meet ups in the past. Bit like Insta.
Yeah it's definitely a social thing for me. There are a bunch of us who ride together when we can but life gets In the way sometimes so I like to see what everyone has been up to and to check out people's photos. Comparing times to my mates is part of the fun now , that's good and bad I suppose.
Social side of Strava to me is fairly small, but my friends will do a ride and they will share the link if it’s a good route, we also have a few top 10 KOMs between our cycling group, we will regularly send each other updates, try and beat each other’s position etc. Generally the socialising is done outside of Strava but with Strava being the focus. Most of our KOMs are on longish road segments (approx 8 to 10 miles) and out and back or a big loop to avoid being to affected by weather. Probably once a fortnight one of the guys will have a crack at someone else’s KOM or try and improve their own, just a bit of a fun between a bunch of guys.
And of course the social side includes seeing what your actual pals are up to, locally and more remotely.
It's usual to "follow" most people after you do a ride with them isn't it? Then you get people asking you "what was that trial like?" and you can ask similar, sharing the MTB love.
I get what I want for free from the app. I’m sure enough people that care about seeing results against other people will pay for it.
And route planning, and lots of training/fitness metrics, and automatic route generation (which seems pretty good). I think the free basic ride logging will be plenty for most, but there's enough extras with the sub that makes it worthwhile IMO.
Yeah it’s definitely a social thing for me. There are a bunch of us who ride together when we can but life gets In the way sometimes so I like to see what everyone has been up to and to check out people’s photos. Comparing times to my mates is part of the fun now , that’s good and bad I suppose.
This is something I definitely get out of it as well. More so tbh than the training features and bits and pieces. If they folded I don’t know what could replace that side of things.
Genuine question – what is the social aspect of strava?
Just seeing what my mates have been up to. It's interesting to see where the more distant ones ride, but I also scrutinise the routes of the local ones to see where they've ridden and if they've got any new trails I don't know about.
It's good for a bit of informal willy waving between mates, seeing where they've been riding and the like. But that's not worth what they're asking for. I think they need to split the offering, keep the proposed really basic free option, have a lower price option that matches up with the current free option (say £20/annually) and then have summit with all the fancy stuff.
I have Garmin connect (shudder) for recording activities and pictures and stuff from friends are either on faceache or the gram anyway, both of which are free, that's what they are competing with.
If they could get half, or even a third, of their total user base to pay just £1/month they'd be laughing all the way to the Leeds.
The chat bit.
I didn't even know that was there.
The posting rides and photos thing I was aware of and doesn't suit my old curmudgeonly ways, so I guess I'm not target market.
How many people using the free service are riding bikes worth thousands?
Over its 7 years with me my bike has not cost me a thousand even with all the chains/cassettes/tyres/brakes etc that I have changed/upgraded.
Really! Are you new here? 😂
If they could get half, or even a third, of their total user base to pay just £1/month they’d be laughing all the way to the Leeds.
This was my thought.
I’d be surprised if they get any significant upgrades due to these changes.
Charging a small nominal monthly fee would add a lot of additional income.
it seems to me a much better solution would a pay per ride. For me, especially in the winter when days are short and weather terrible, I will be doing well to get a ride a month in. 6.99 is too much. I’d happy pay a pay per use charge, 50p per ride or something like that.
Based on that much better model I (and quite a few others no doubt) would be paying an average of £5.50 per week or £286 per year. It's amazing how people want stuff for free but will quickly spiv up £3.50 for a coffee which quickly turns to piss.
[i]I’d happy pay a pay per use charge, 50p per ride or something like that.[/i]
Except that isn't really the "use" they are charging for. You can still log rides, for free. And (I think?) compare your efforts on segments against previous efforts, and see the top 10 leaderboard for each segment. And your segment times still count in the overall leader board, you just won't be able to see yourself in the leaderboard unless you're within the top 10, or you subscribe.
I was a free user for years, and only got a summit membership at the beginning of the year. I can't say that I use a lot of the summit benefits, but it seemed like a small charge for something that I use a fair bit, and had done for free for years.
[i]It’s amazing how people want stuff for free but will quickly spiv up £3.50 for a coffee[/i]
Quite. I'm amazed that so much on Strava had been free for so long
t’s amazing how people want stuff for free but will quickly spiv up £3.50 for a coffee which quickly turns to piss.
The thing is I, and a lot of folk like me, don't begrudge paying for things we want.
I use strava because it's there, not because I want it. The loss from not using it is minimal, on the other hand I like my coffee, I get gratification from it and I'd miss two cups of good coffee a month (I'm certainly missing an occasional stop at a good coffee shop at the moment).
Think of it this way, would you pay £7 a month to use Gmail? Or would you swallow the minor* inconvenience and use outlook for free?
*I'd find that switch much less convenient than using the native platform for my GPS watch.
Think of it this way, would you pay £7 a month to use Gmail?
If that meant that I’d get to keep all the functionality but knew that they weren’t monetising my data then I’d consider it for sure. In any case I’m not sure the comparison always holds up because in this example Outlook might be missing the ability to search emails, iCloud mail might not be able to send emails to non-Apple users etc.
Nothing does everything that Strava does (although for sure some services do aspects of it, and probably better), and which elements of it you enjoy (and the elements you don’t use) will define whether or not you think it’s worthwhile paying.
Sounds like you wouldn’t lose anything if they folded tomorrow, but definitely value coffee. No problems continuing to use the free version then?
I must admit when I first used Strava I thought the timing/leaderboard thing was great, until I scored a KOM on an UPHILL segment that I'd actually pushed up (15 seconds when it really took about 3 minutes) and realised it was about as accurate as Donald Trump's medical advice. I have, however, found hundreds of trails and ridden in places I would never have found or even looked for without Strava so I have no problem in paying £7 a month even tho most of the features I use were on the free version. I hear it's now £4 a month so even better and although Trailforks is pretty useful I have found places using Strava which aren't on there so I'll continue paying without a second thought
No problems continuing to use the free version then?
As of this morning in honesty I'm no longer a user. Its got a few bits and bats I do make use of, certainly nothing I'll miss, but quite a few things that irritate me.
The things I use are going premium, I'm fine with that, most of the things that annoy me I get to keep.
I'm not everyone of course but for me, there's very little I'd pay for and the monthly cost is significantly higher than the value I put on that.
As a one off I'd probably have paid. Not as a subscription.
FWIW I used to use runtastic before addidas bought it. I paid the one off for the premium app and it did everything I wanted and very little I didn't. It went to a subscription model under addidas and I didn't feel I used it sufficiently to justify that either despite making much more use of it than I ever have of strava.
I do subscribe to prime and use that plenty to justify the cost, I personally just don't see strava doing that for me or a lot of others who are casuals there's a reason micro transactions are so popular for funding games these days.
As a one off I’d probably have paid. Not as a subscription.
I totally see that. On a somewhat more expensive level it was when Adobe switched to the subscription model that I gave up on Lightroom.
I can't see this move generating much more income, the people who don't mind appear to be those who have bought summit/premium/whatever rebrand because they can't monetise it. And that's cool, they see benefit in the added value behind those features, but quite why everyone else should pay the same as them for a load of features they didn't want is beyond me. Fine make it a payment model but I struggle to see the one size fits all is sensible.
Stravas problem is that Strava is just fluff, it's a nice to have but not something I'll lose any sleep about not being there or only having basic access to. It has tried to add things on but the route planning isn't as good as other tools (and Global mapping on Komoot is £30 one off) and the training stuff isn't that clever either. Ultimately it's asking people to pay a decent amount to willy wave with your mates and I suspect they're about to find out the number of people prepared to pay as much as they are asking is likely to be not that big.
I'm not surprised that they're chosen to use the leader boards/KOM aspect to try and bait users into paying. I have a suspicion that GDPR has probably changed their business model in terms of what they can actually do to generate revenue by flogging on individuals data vs the rules in place when they first kicked off. Hence the need for Subs revenue to make them profitable.
Can't say I care about leader boards TBH, I use it for two simple things as a place to "Log" my activity and partly as a bit of "Social media" to record the rides I do with friends and family (maybe 20% of my actual riding?).
The one thing worries me slightly is the reduction of 3rd Party app access, I do use 'Elevate' (formerly "Stravistix").
I wouldn't be shocked if that was one of the 3rd parties that got cut off, as it's pretty much a free version (optional donation) of what Strava want to flog you as analysis features, obviously making use of Strava's convenient free data logging service...
The problem is that between other companies apps and Garmin's own upload/data management tools paid for Strava does nothing you can't get elsewhere essentially for free other than the "Social media" bit (not too fussed) and the nice layout/usability (worth having) but I'd not pay extra for just that...
I suppose I would pay for Strava but only if there were a cheaper tier (say £2 a month?) and it just gave me back the route planner and matched runs features...
Part of me hopes they get bought up by Google or Garmin, part of me worries they might get bought by Google or Garmin...
Quite. I’m amazed that so much on Strava had been free for so long
But the vast majority of that stuff was supplied to Strava by users, most of whom would be free users. If it wasn't free then there would be lot less content.
but quite why everyone else should pay the same as them for a load of features they didn’t want is beyond me
See also free classes in gyms that are mostly run between office hours
See also free classes in gyms that are mostly run between office hours
And the barrow loads of utter shite that pads out Netflix and Prime.
And the barrow loads of utter shite that pads out Netflix and Prime
In honesty I see prime video as a remarkably good free gift with my deliveries but, thar aside...
I think the thing with all the crap on prime and netflix is no-one watches most of it, everyone pays for it but its not as if sharknado 53 is all the best stuff, not like it's costing lots of money (grumble bbc4 indeed) and that its really the content you're stumping up for.
Go to a gym - on more on topic - premium strava, all the best stuff is stuff most people can't/won't use, paid for by the masses to keep it affordable for the few. It's like public funding of the national opera.
Erm...havent read all this its a bit long, went for a ride today, it all looked the same on my phone, has it changed yet.
Ride was shit, I crashed into a another rider coming t'other way round a blind bend on singletrack.
It’s a £1 a month service at most for the 20 minutes a week I spend on it.
I paid for premium for a while. Can't remember how much it was but Sub £20 a year feels about right. Didn't find I was using any of the premium features and didn't renew
As someone else has said, I can deal with it not being free but £1 a week/£50 a year feels too high. Can't help thinking they'd get more revenue overall with a lower price.