Someone explain why GAIA gets so much love

[out.wandering.McL]

I too have not found love for Gaia. I use Caltopo, Locus maps, and oruxmaps as my primary map apps. However, both Locus and orux maps are not available on iPhone, so that leaves caltopo and Gaia.

 

[WeLikeCamping]

I am up for annual renewal on GAIA. I really like the different maps/layers and I use it often when route-finding and creating routes. The problems I have are:

1. Website application: buggy as hell. crashes randomly and when drawing routes on hardtop, the "snap to track" feature wants to exit at every interchange, then get right back on the route. Or, it randomly decides to navigate to some other route nearby. It is a major PITA to draw a route, then have to go back and correct the errors. Often, you have to zoom in/out to create/correct these routes. When zoomed in to street level, the map scrolling is horribly slow and clunky.

2. Memory utilization on tablet. Granted, I have an older Android tablet, but it does have 32MB of memory. When running in my truck, plugged in, there is a negative draw on power that after a day of driving will leave me around 60% from a full charge.

3. Support is non-existent. When you pay for a subscription service, there should be a minimum level of support that provides a response within at least a week.

I am looking hard at OnX right now.

 

[Pacific Northwest yetti]

Adventure medics required staff use GAIA, for our medical routes and courses for events. I never liked it, at least when we had a lot of people on the account. And were working with the developers to design a program for group/company use. So for our pourpose it was pretty buggy, but it did work, usually. And I spent a lot of time using it, across multiple platforms.


I still use BCN all the time. Maybe prefer it as it was what I first learned and used. I have multiple states downloaded. And it works well with my tablet and phone.
At the same time the USFS was requiring Avenza (and still does, for all firefighters/assets in use)
So I had all three on my phone and tablet. They each have their thing, and its more the devil you know. Some work better/worse depending on the OS, and platform.
Also had the Garmin, and Suunto apps on my phone. That I could use in a pinch. Not including google maps, turn by turn. Which I also used for front country route finding.

I spent so much time in the middle of nowhere I would usually have two digital map options for redundancy. And of course paper maps. I will say not often, but a few times having that redundant system saved a life. Either by comparing two topo maps. USGS/USFS. Or due to a specific app failure.

There is a lot of talk about “what you need”. The truth, use what you have/ learn to use what you have. Not everything is one size fits all. It can be easy to get bogged down with all the options and adds.

 

[toy_tek]

I am up for annual renewal on GAIA. I really like the different maps/layers and I use it often when route-finding and creating routes. The problems I have are:

1. Website application: buggy as hell. crashes randomly and when drawing routes on hardtop, the "snap to track" feature wants to exit at every interchange, then get right back on the route. Or, it randomly decides to navigate to some other route nearby. It is a major PITA to draw a route, then have to go back and correct the errors. Often, you have to zoom in/out to create/correct these routes. When zoomed in to street level, the map scrolling is horribly slow and clunky.

2. Memory utilization on tablet. Granted, I have an older Android tablet, but it does have 32MB of memory. When running in my truck, plugged in, there is a negative draw on power that after a day of driving will leave me around 60% from a full charge.

3. Support is non-existent. When you pay for a subscription service, there should be a minimum level of support that provides a response within at least a week.

I am looking hard at OnX right now.

I haven't really experienced the buggy crashing with the web browser version - but I'm using Mac/Safari. I will say it's pretty resource heavy though - my Mac fan always comes on when using it. As far as your tablet - you probably mean 32GB not MB - but even 32 GB is small now. I certainly wouldn't fault the app in this case. I've been using it on an iPhone7 with 128GB for years (phone was probably 5+ years old) with no issues. I recently upgraded to a 256GB iPhone 13 mini and of course it works fine here as well. I don't bother using it with my tablet anymore - I get the info I need from the phone.

I agree the support can use improvement - I had contacted about what I thought was an issue with folders and the response time was ridiculous. I was frustrated enough I figured out the solution for myself which I'll share - when you create waypoints, maps or routes, try to save them in folders asap. Moving them around to organize at a later time is very slow and cumbersome on the web interface... but it is possible. Lots of room for improvement here.

I really like GAIA, and its cool that most of my buddies use it as well. It's very easy to share a waypoint for a meetup, track, or even a folder with all your planned adventures with others.

Besides some of the map layers mentioned above - I found the following really nice to have: NatGeo trails, USFS roads and trails, NPS visitor, NatGeo Baja, and even some of the historic maps (for finding mines, etc).

 

[Kevin108]

Can someone explain why Gaia gets so much love? I have tried using it and do not understand why people talk it up so and why they pay for essentially a lesser version of google maps or maps.me.

My use case is plan on the go, I don’t sit down and plan out “routes” in advance. I want to be able to find my way from the driver’s seat, not from a computer on WiFi. We are full time in the road and cannot always guarantee connectivity. On top of that, recording “trips” or “routes” is of no use to me. That is what the map is for, so I don’t have to keep track of all the roads I drive.

Gaia is difficult to find a useful map, I have to download blocks and hope I get it right. The maps are all about the same, and no routing. What am I missing that everyone thinks is so great?

This is a slightly confusing post. First you mention Google Maps, then say you cannot guarantee connectivity. Everything you can do on the Gaia web site can also be done from the app.

Your complaints are largely correct though. It is definitely not the most user-friendly mapping system out there. Good documentation of what it can do is easy to find. Good documentation of how to do it is not. I don't understand why there are routes and tracks. One would be sufficient. The folder system that is supposed to be for organizing things is really just a junk drawer. The method of downloading maps is cumbersome and limited. Importing, exporting, and sharing is annoying at best. The only update I've noticed in the 8 years or so I've been using it are new icons, which I welcome, but that is not an inspiring display of the app's development.

On the other hand, I really enjoy looking at the maps in my down time to try to spot interesting places and plot out a route more scenic or fun than turn by turn directions down the interstate. I like how your account syncs across all your devices. On the trail, I have Gaia running on an iPad, but may have another app running on my phone. My favorite feature is, when on the trail and coming across a camp site I like I'm not ready to stop, I can easily hop out with my phone, snap a picture, add a few notes, and save its location for later.

For me though, the multitude of maps layers on the premium version is its real strength. Having access to the entire National Geographic Trails Illustrated maps alone is worth the price of the annual subscription.

 

[Sparse Gray Hackle]

I don’t like Gaia either, it just doesn’t seem intuitive. I’m using OnX Hunt, and starting to become familiar with Back Country Navigator now that it’s on IOS.

BCN is not well developed on IOS, but it’s coming along.

 

[WeLikeCamping]

I haven't really experienced the buggy crashing with the web browser version - but I'm using Mac/Safari. I will say it's pretty resource heavy though - my Mac fan always comes on when using it. As far as your tablet - you probably mean 32GB not MB - but even 32 GB is small now. I certainly wouldn't fault the app in this case. I've been using it on an iPhone7 with 128GB for years (phone was probably 5+ years old) with no issues. I recently upgraded to a 256GB iPhone 13 mini and of course it works fine here as well. I don't bother using it with my tablet anymore - I get the info I need from the phone.

I agree the support can use improvement - I had contacted about what I thought was an issue with folders and the response time was ridiculous. I was frustrated enough I figured out the solution for myself which I'll share - when you create waypoints, maps or routes, try to save them in folders asap. Moving them around to organize at a later time is very slow and cumbersome on the web interface... but it is possible. Lots of room for improvement here.

I really like GAIA, and its cool that most of my buddies use it as well. It's very easy to share a waypoint for a meetup, track, or even a folder with all your planned adventures with others.

Besides some of the map layers mentioned above - I found the following really nice to have: NatGeo trails, USFS roads and trails, NPS visitor, NatGeo Baja, and even some of the historic maps (for finding mines, etc).

Yeah, sorry, it is 32GB. I totally get that having more is better, however, having more than the minimum requirements should be adequate, as in the GAIA stated minimum is 4GB. I don't think the memory is really the issue, it is the power consumption when using the app, which is why I limit the usage on my mobile phone, because the places I go, it's better to save your phone power, just in case. I use the app for planning on the website, then utilize the sync feature to get it to my other devices. I also use a Galaxy S22. For offroading, however, I like to draw my routes on the web, then export the files to my Garmin Montana. I only use the tablet in the truck, and most often it's on the blacktop, with some offroad/trails action. I never have problems with my Garmin. So far as the website crashes, it's more likely because FireFox is my default browser, and I've suffered a lifetime of crashes with that browser - it just seems to happen more frequently when using GAIA on my Windows desktop which is a beast.

PS - the "routes vs tracks" discussion came up on a recent ride. The upshot is that a route is a pre-planned navigation, while the track is the live recording of where you've been.

 

[WeLikeCamping]

Also, I finally got a response from support regarding the random route selecting. Their answer is that the mapping must be missing "bits" going through Pocatello, ID. Unfortunately for them, it is an easily reproducible bug and not just in Pocatello. Support response did say they would be "watching" this issue. I think that for now, I'm just gonna suck it up and deal with it as OnX doesn't seem to be much better, at least on the platforms I use.

 

[unsung]

Wow, I have spent countless hours mapping for the WYBDR for the last few months and all of a sudden my GAIA won't sync, won't do a download, and everything is gone. I'm trying to get everything on OnX but this is not intuitive on an iPad in Landscape mode. How the heck do you add layers on OnX? Maybe if they spent more time on ease of use instead of getting goofy looking people to do their ads this would work better.

 

[grizzlypath]

Wow, I have spent countless hours mapping for the WYBDR for the last few months and all of a sudden my GAIA won't sync, won't do a download, and everything is gone. I'm trying to get everything on OnX but this is not intuitive on an iPad in Landscape mode. How the heck do you add layers on OnX? Maybe if they spent more time on ease of use instead of getting goofy looking people to do their ads this would work better.

There are no layers really on OnX, just topo, satellite, and private property, and then toggling on/off some of the highlighting and stuff.

I tried OnX Offroad recently when having basically the same issue as you with Gaia, but ultimately I cancelled my OnX membership and went back to Gaia, it's just so much more powerful.

My tip to fixing the sync issue is to completely delete the app and redownload it. Once you've downloaded it, log in, and then just leave the app open for like 20+ minutes (depending on how much stuff you have in Gaia). It might say it's synced, but it's still syncing, you gotta give it a ton of time with the app open to sync everything with the web.

Once you can see everything that you can when you log in via a web browser, then start downloading map layers and stuff for offline use. Again, leave the app open while downloading to ensure no interruptions.

I also noticed that the download feature lagged MAJORLY during 4th of July week, I suspect their servers were bogged. Returning from a camp trip everything downloaded super fast.

 

[unsung]

Ok, I will give it a shot. I'm about to puke because of the time I have into this. I'm going to cancel OnX, not impressed at all. GAIA was prompting me to re-download my offline maps and every time I open the app it is set in the middle of the country instead of where I last viewed like it used to be. This is frustrating.

 

[unsung]

My .gpx files are showing as viewable in the saved tab, nothing is showing though.

 

[grizzlypath]

Yeah honestly the best way I've found is to follow the above directions- delete app, re-open, log in, and leave the app open on your phone for quite a while until everything starts showing up again. Once it's synced it'll be more normal, but that initial sync takes a while (note: the settings > sync might say it's done, but it's not)

I'd love to see Gaia get more updates or bug fixes, it's definitely the best I've used over the years and I'm a huge map dork.

 

[Pacific Northwest yetti]

When I was using Gaia I would have to do that every few events. ( delete app, re-open, log in, and leave the app open on your phone for quite a while until everything starts showing up again. ) I always figured that is due to the way it was being used for a group. There were times when it was needed, I would have to run a backup program as it was doing this. Noteworthy, it seemed to be worse at this if it had been a month or so since I had used it.

 

[unsung]

Thanks for the help, I have deleted the app and also re-downloaded the .gpx files to my computer. I'll try the sync route first and if that doesn't work I will try to download the files directly to my iPad.

I am of the mindset that if I do something as simple as change a route color on my computer it should also change the route color on my iPad when I sync it and it does not do that.