Strava: Run, Ride, Swimfor iOS

If you’ve always had a competitive edge to your fitness goals, Strava is the app you need to track runs, rides, and swims. One of the most popular fitness apps, Strava comes with a social engagement aspect, letting you compete with other fitness enthusiasts on your route.

The go-to app for the competitive kind!

Real-time monitoring, social aspect, and intuitive interface make it a great choice.

While Strava has a premium subscription option, the free version lets you track distance, elevation, speed, time, and calories. Additionally, you can use third-party components to track cadence and heart rate. The upgraded plan allows you to manage advanced data points. Strava uses your device’s GPS to track your route, whether you’re on the trails or roads.

Though the real-time tracking of metrics isn’t as comprehensive or as easy as high-end devices like Garmin 200 or Garmin Edge 810, Strava proves to be a great choice with similar results. The website adds a social aspect to your fitness training and helps you break up the monotony of workouts.

Ease of use

With an easy-to-use and intuitive interface, Strava is quite popular among fitness enthusiasts. You can either create an account or sign in with your Facebook credentials. The downside to using the latter option is that you’ll have to update privacy settings on Facebook.

After providing your personal information, you’ll notice the large "start" button. Once you’re ready for an activity, it will run the timer. Your phone’s screen will display distance, average speed, and elapsed time.

Everything is clearly displayed, which allows you to shuffle between multiple data points. There’s just one downside. If you’re used to wearing gloves during workouts, it will be tedious to use the touchscreen effectively.

Detailed analysis of routes

Though Strava displays only three modes during workouts, it comes with a wide range of features and data collection options. Once you’ve finished a run, ride, or swim, the data is uploaded to the website. Since Strava is GPS-based, it also shows a detailed map of the route you’ve taken. You can use the data and map details to substantially improve your activity levels.

Comprehensive fitness data

For each activity, Strava tracks elevation, moving time, speed, distance, heart rate, calories, and temperature. The elevation is displayed in chart form, allowing you to focus on detailed descents, ascents, max elevation, and overall gain.

Speed and heart rate are also displayed in chart form, with individual data sets for average speed, max speed, average heart rate, and max heart rate. The intuitive interface lets you overlay these data points to make comparisons for detailed analysis.

Engaging social environment

Social connectivity is one of the most interesting and fun aspects of using Strava. While "following" other fitness enthusiasts, you can see their activities, details of rides/swims/runs, and even make comparisons on data points, such as weekly mileage, average rides per week, all-time stats, and more.

With Strava, you can make certain tracking data "public", which will be visible to other people using the app. The one with the fastest time will top the leaderboard to earn a badge called KOM or King of the Mountain. Additionally, Strava lets you link the app to your Instagram account, allowing you to post images taken during activities.

Where can you run this program?

Strava is available for iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad. For the best mobile experience, it’s recommended to use iOS 11.0 and above.

Is there a better alternative?

While Strava is a great choice, you may want to check out a few alternatives. If you’re looking for one, Endomondo Sports Tracker will be your best bet. While it comes with all the features of a fitness tracking app, the audio coach is a surprising addition. It’s also available with a web interface, which makes tracking easier. However, the app faces frequent synchronization issues that need to be fixed.

Google Fit, a single set of APIs blending your data from multiple apps and devices, is another good choice. It users your activity tracker’s sensors to record activities and measure them against your fitness goals. Unfortunately, it doesn’t track your calories or sleep. Currently, it faces connectivity problems with a lot of apps and devices. But it’s Google, so there’s hope that issues will be fixed soon.

Our take

Strava is an excellent choice for fitness enthusiasts with a competitive edge. It appeals to people who are regularly involved in sport activities. The social aspect makes it fun and appealing, too. With a clean and intuitive interface, Strava makes sure you don’t have to look for any other fitness tracking app.

Should you download it?

Yes, definitely! If you’re already using iPhone, Strava provides you with a wide range of features and data points to track your activities.