Outdooractive Reviews 247

Since they went together with the other app it just does not work. Importing a route etc. it just does not work. The app they took over worked much better. It's just about ads and making money, not the love of outdoors. Pitty. And in Dutch:
Sinds ze die andere app overgenomen hebben en alles samengevoegd hebben werkt het gewoon erg slecht. Routes uploaden werkt gewoon niet en de routebegeleiding ook niet. Jammer

Great until today when display suddenly changed without warning whilst cycling. Now has a narrow black bar at the top with a small directional arrow reversed out in white and text which is diffficult to see. Also a new bar at the bottom with small text. Bring back the previous display or I'll cancel my subscription and move to another app!

Like many reviewers, I was a forced migration from View Ranger and, like many, I wish it was still VR. It had a lot of benefits that have not translated over to Outdoor Active. For example, being able to see previous tracks on the map when you are navigating a route. One of the things I miss most is the graph at the end that showed your speed over the walk at the same time as altitude. Overall, it's disappointing that outdoor active didn't build on the strengths of view ranger. Nevertheless, I have persevered.

I might upgrade my review to 5 in the near future, so far with my limited experience I have found this app easy to use , I have plotted routes and followed other routes (not mine) the detail is great.
The only issue I have had is the commentary while following a route,for example it sometimes tells me I'm off the path and it's 20 meters to my right etc so I turn off the sound and just follow the visual. I guess other apps suffer with similar problems but it's not a deal breaker for me .

Very complicated. It reminds me of proprietary software aimed at highly technical users. Practically impossible to jump in as a new users and know what to do. Interface is so unintuitive you have to press everything to see what it does.

Route directions do almost nothing, until you’re a quarter mile off track, at which point it tells you to turn around and go back.

If they want mass adoption they need something much more user friendly. Or at least make the base functions easy to navigate and have the technical options separate.

All I want to do is search an area for walks, pick one, receive directions, do the walk and have it saved to my map. There’s too much clutter and you’re never sure it’s even doing what you think it is

I was a PRO user for a couple of years but just got fed up of the interface crashing when trying to add photos. Took an absolute age to add them and struggled to rearrange them into any order. It got worse over the months to the point where I just got the swirly icon of death when trying to add more than one photo which never loaded so just gave up ( i tried uploading 3 photos before writing this review and have they loaded? ...nope ! ) Enough said.

Viewranger was great. This is useless. Basically impossible to override the paths and roads on the map. Half the time when trying to save a route I just get a loading icon and then the page times out.

Took a brilliant solution and ruined it

I have been a regular & happy user of the App for 2 or 3 years.

However, in the last few days...

1. Every time I login I have to reset my Password (to what it already was).

2. I cannot download new GPX routes. I get a "No internet connection" message - even though I definitely have Internet connection.

3. I can see GPX routes I have previously downloaded. But I cannot access them.

Help, please !!

Ric the Rambler

A waste of time, potentially dangerous lack of usability and reliability. I used to use ViewRanger which was near perfect. With this app, ordinary users would probably need a powerpoint presentation on how to use this app every time they want to go for a walk, and that's just for entering co-ordinates for a specific point and navigate to it. I was a heavy user of ViewRanger and, in comparison, even basic things on this app are impossible to find. Good luck trying to figure this out while out on a trail. Spend a few weeks navigating around your garden or local park before risking your sanity out on the trail. I added what I thought was a point of interest, but no, it doesn't show anywhere on the main navigation page. I managed to eventually find a point I made in the 'My Bookmarks' section, not in the 'Points of Interest' section. Ridiculous. Even after finding it there, it only showed as a recently used item, I couldn't find it for over half an hour, now I can only access it by going into the recently viewed section called 'My Activity'. I could find no way of adding it using co-ords, I had to make a guess on a map first. Absolute joke of an app.

It’s getting better. Like many others I used viewranger and was very happy with it until they sold out to Outdoor active. OA have done a lot to improve functionality, I have been using Memory Map since viewranger shut down, so I am just starting to use Outdoor active again. It is easier to use than MM (which is off the ark in my opinion) but MM has better quality maps and I trust it’s gps and route system more than OA.
My main complaint is the maps will not sit to true north, they are always slightly squint pointing either slightly west or east of north. This seems to indicate the navigation function maybe inaccurate unless there is a simple explanation for this. It is annoying though as I’ve never seen this before in other similar apps. It appear to do this in iOS only, my android device allows for setting the map north to south without turning back to slightly off true north (as iOS does).

The transtition from ViewRanger to OutdoorActive has not been easy but I have to say the guys at OutdoorActive Customer Service have been great at sorting it out. Quick to respond, patient and with clear instructions. And ultimately we may have a better priduct than ViewRanger.

When I was forced to migrate from ViewRanger to Outdooractive I lost all my purchased expensive detailed maps.After complaint I recovered 3 of them and anything else.I lost very detailed(1:50,1:25)maps of Spain,UK,Baleares and other countries.I am very disappointed this app.

I think a lot of the negativity in most of the reviews stems from the fact that users were used to ViewRanger and like me they quite suddenly found themselves unable to use an app they had become used to and comfortable with. I too had concerns but really since the change have found that with a combination of Google and the Outdooractive support I haven’t lost anything, nothing has changed and I am happy, comfortable and confident enough too rely on this app to guide or get me anywhere in the UK.

I am 74 and I had been with ViewRanger quite few years where I bought lots of maps, now it’s changed over to Outdooractive I can’t have one, how unfair is it that you can buy something and you can take it away if they change their name.

Was a happy viewranger user. I purchased several maps to use offline which promptly disappeared when the view ranger app updated to outdooractive.
The so called options to get these back aren't available just a legacy map agreement which doesn't lead you anywhere.
I do have the old maps backed up but no way I can see in getting these into outsdoornotsoactive.
I do have an old phone with old version of viewranger I may just use that and make sure it doesn't update.

I was a happy VR customer for many years. I purchased OS map tiles which were stored to my phone which I could use OFFLINE when I was in remote areas with no signal. This has all stopped since the move to Outdooractive. The cut & paste response from Outdooractive will tell you that people who switched from VR ‘get the same maps permanently’, but this does NOT include the functionality of using the maps offline, to do this the user needs to subscribe to Pro (and not something I am prepared to gamble on given the terrible reviews). I no longer have the maps that I paid for via VR, and what Outdooractive have provided in their place is useless. Unfortunately, this experience has made me sceptical of digital purchases. I still can’t fathom why, having purchased 1:25 and 1:50 map tiles for areas I travel to frequently, that I am no longer entitled to access them (offline) on my device.

Another previously Viewranger user here - was given some kind of Pro status when the switch to Outdooractive happened. Now seem to have lost all previously purchased maps, routes and tracks. Seems impossible to get any kind of response from Outdooractive.
Update: I did eventually find that support email address and got prompt support - but it was not easy to find that support contact.

As a former and happy Viewranger customer I committed to paying circa £90 for the OS Landranger 1:50 UK mapping. Along comes Ourdooractive and assured me this purchase was safe and had me as a Pro user.

Outdooractive have now cancelled my Pro user status and so I've had my purchase cancelled. They no choose not to answer my questions via emai.

A beyond shoddy way to deal with people who I can only assume they want to retain.

Add to this that their app is just the worst and borderline dangerous as listed on the many 1 star ratings. Just look a the % of star ratings and you instantly get to know what this company is about. Not a single reply to anything on here too!

Outdooractive should be avoided at all costs, a shoddy company with a poor product

I'v used VR for many years paying for the premium maps and features and found it to be an excellent app when I was forced to move over to OA I found it difficult to use safety, the main problem I have is that on a route the tracking keeps stopping every time I put my phone in my pocket and on restarting gives me out of position, upto 5 mies or so, I have learned from others that this is because this app use's phone signal or WiFi, not a lot of good in the areas we walk.... Will be moving apps

Very Dangerous. Do not use. Here are some basic facts:

- This app requires you to login.
- To login you need an internet connection.
- This app randomly logs you out.
- Mountains have little internet coverage.

How these facts bypassed the folks at OutdoorActive is beyond me. I suspect they are fully aware and simply don’t care.

Twice it has logged me out whilst out in the mountains. Luckily, both times I was in a familiar area and had landmarks to navigate by. But this will happen to someone who will then get lost as a direct result of the insanely stupid design decisions behind this app.

How this can be marketed to people going on trail hikes is beyond comprehension. I look forward to the day when they are sued for their irresponsibility.

If you are an ex ViewRanger user then just get AllTrails. Much simpler, and much cleaner. And it’s not trying to kill you.