New in 7.3: import from Strava. Pick a route you planned or an activity you recorded, and use it for navigation on Apple Watch.
Find your way with a glance at your wrist. Plan a route on your iPhone, then follow it on Apple Watch: spoken turn-by-turn directions over topographic maps. Record the outing while you are at it. The watch runs on its own, so the phone can stay home, and downloaded maps cover you where there is no signal.
FOR EVERY ACTIVITY
WristTopo is built for hiking, running, gravel and mountain biking, skiing, and paddling: 30 activity types across foot, bike, snow, and water. It adapts to however you move.
TURN-BY-TURN NAVIGATION
Stay on course with spoken guidance and turn alerts on your wrist. See the next turn and how far to it, and hear the direction called out. It works with routes you plan in WristTopo and with GPX files you import. Waypoints are called out too: mark a hut or a summit on the route, and as you get close you feel a tap and hear its name.
ROUTE PLANNER
Tap the map to drop points and the route snaps to real trails, with distance and total climb updating as you add them. Close it into a loop, extend it into an out-and-back, or reverse it in a tap. Five routing modes cover running, hiking, biking, mountain biking, and straight lines for when there is no path at all. When the route is ready, one tap starts navigation on the watch without saving it first.
RECORD YOUR WORKOUTS
Start a workout from your wrist and follow distance, pace, elevation, and heart rate. The screens are fully yours: choose which metrics appear, how they are grouped, and in what order, with a separate layout for every activity. Everything saves to Apple Health, and finished workouts can go straight to Strava. If you would rather record in Apple's Workout app, run it alongside WristTopo. Recording and navigation stay independent.
QUICK ROUTE ON YOUR WATCH
Set a point on the watch map and Quick Route builds a path to it from where you stand. Useful when you spot a viewpoint on the far ridge and would rather not dig the iPhone out of your pack.
SAVED PLACES
Mark the trailhead parking, a water source, a shelter, a campsite. Save them on the iPhone while you plan, or drop one from your wrist the moment you stand there. Places sync both ways, carry their own symbols on the map, and one tap routes you to any of them.
BACKTRACK TO YOUR START
One tap while recording turns the track you have already covered into a route home, with turn-by-turn guidance all the way to the start.
OFFLINE MAPS
Download summer, winter, or satellite maps straight to the watch. Take a whole region for general use, or grab just the area along a route in one tap. The maps show contour lines, shaded relief, and marked ski trails, and they pan and zoom smoothly on the watch.
IMPORT YOUR OWN ROUTES
Import a GPX file on the iPhone, waypoints and all, and it reaches the watch in seconds. Show several routes at once and read climbs and descents at a glance.
ICLOUD BACKUP
Routes, places, and downloaded map regions sync across your devices through iCloud, and they survive a reinstall or a new iPhone.
PRIVATE BY DESIGN
No account to create, no ads, and no tracking. Your routes and recordings stay on your device and sync only to your own iCloud.
FREE TO START
The free version covers shorter days out:
• Up to 3 saved routes
• Up to 20 saved places
• 3 small offline map regions
• Plan with up to 5 route points
• Follow routes on your Apple Watch
UNLOCK PRO
Pro adds:
• Unlimited routes and places, larger offline regions
• Voice-guided turn-by-turn navigation
• Workout recording with Apple Health sync
• Quick Route planning on your Apple Watch
• GPX export and Strava sync
• Support independent app development
Terms of Use: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/
Privacy Policy: https://wristtopo.app/privacy
I have been looking for years for outdoor navigation on a watch that best suits my use case. As a hiker and mountain biker, but not a serious athlete in training, I have used Garmin watches and various apps on an Apple Watch. Having used this app for several months now, I think WristTopo is as close to perfect for me as any device or app I have found. And it keeps getting better! It rivals Garmin routing and navigation. Routes can be created in-app but if creating a route using other applications such as QGIS, OSMAnd, or other mobile apps then GPX imports are a breeze. WristTopo base maps are sourced from OpenStreetMap and updated more frequently than Garmin. Edits I make to trails in OSM appear much sooner in WristTopo than they do in Garmin apps. The developer is super responsive to inquires and issue reporting. Support this excellent independent developer and make a purchase now!
Can’t get maps to download to watch
ptstl
I’ve tried everything. Rebooted phone and watch. Deleted and reinstalled app nothing I have tried will get the app to start downloading. I noticed a recent update after Ed thus issue. Perhaps it still does not work?This is an update to my first review. I accidentally forgot my phone when out for a bike ride. I thought I would give this app another try as I only had my iWatch on my ride. When the watch connected to cellular the offline maps finally started downloading to my watch. Strange that it can not seem to connect and download through my phone. The developer just contacted me in response to my review to offer help, but I think i have accidentally solved my problem already.I discovered another small problem in that when planning a route for my bicycle it often a sends me back and forth a few hundred yards even though I am only intending to travel in a continuous direction. It might be related to gaps in the underlying map data? It seems to be sending me backwards to rejoin the path I am already on. So it routes me backwards to the last intersection and then goes forward again. Also it is advertised as being able to do water routes, but I only see hiking and biking options in the app. I would love it I could do canoe routes as it would be great to glance at my watch instead of putting down the paddle to look at my phone. The overall concept is great! With few updates and tweaks it should be a very useful tool.
Developer Response
Hi again, and thanks for the update! Glad the map download finally worked. :)The iPhone actually only initiates the download, while the Watch downloads the map data itself. It sounds like the message from the iPhone to the Watch was delayed by the system. This is very rare, but I’ve just released v7.2, which includes a few additional improvements to make communication between the iPhone and Watch more reliable. Hopefully you won’t run into this again.Regarding cycling routes, assuming you selected Cycle or MTB mode, what you describe can happen if a short section of a road or trail is marked in the underlying OpenStreetMap data as one-way, private, or otherwise inaccessible. That can occasionally make the router send you back to the previous junction before continuing. If you notice a repeatable pattern or a particular location where this happens, please let me know.And just to clarify the water sports part: WristTopo supports water sports such as canoeing and kayaking for activity recording, but it doesn’t currently provide automatic water-route planning. The route planner offers Walk/Run, Hike, Cycle, MTB, and Straight Line modes. Straight Line can actually work quite well on lakes or open water: you can place a series of points along your intended course and then use the route for orientation directly on the Watch.Thanks again for the detailed feedback, and feel free to contact me at piotr@wristtopo.app if you’d like to send me a specific routing example. :)Best,Piotr
Need maps? Simple wrist maps without the Garmin price point
dwhitend93
Only 6 ratings?? This deserves way more attention. This is quietly living as one of the best hiking tools on the App Store. Anything else has more features than I actually need. I just need an easy reference map on my wrist that can help me check routes and plan new ones without being cumbersome and battery draining… somehow, this didn’t exist until this app! Thank you for making this. This turns my Apple Watch into a gps mapping machine, and kept me from spending excessive cash just to get a Garmin watch for maps. It fits perfectly in that “low battery use, long day hike” space that I needed it for.
Developer Response
Wow, thank you for the awesome review! 🙌 I’m really glad to hear the app’s working well for your hikes - that’s exactly what I built it for: clean, reliable, and battery-friendly mapping right on your wrist. If you think other hikers might enjoy it too, feel free to share it around. Thanks again for the support, and happy trails! ⛰️
Smooth route creation and topo map solution for the Apple Watch!
TrailWalker77
Really impressed by how fluid and straightforward the route creation and map browsing is with this app. I’ve found that the other topo map apps for the Apple Watch can be quite cumbersome (and expensive). Route navigation works very well on the watch once you’ve started your workout. Perfect for those that want to use the Apple Workout app but still want to follow a detailed route at the same time with turn by turn directions. Developer is super friendly and responsive as well! Looking forward to enjoying this app along with seeing where this app goes.
Developer Response
Thanks so much for the kind words! I’m really glad route creation and navigation have been working smoothly for you. Appreciate the support — and excited to keep improving the app!
• Import routes and activities from Strava and use them for navigation on Apple Watch.
• Vertical Speed now reads 0 when you’re standing still, with clearer readings while you’re moving.
• Fixed an issue that could leave route map previews blank. Deleting multiple places at once is now faster.
Version 7.3.1
The developer, Piotr Janik, indicated that the app’s privacy practices may include handling of data as described below. For more information, see the developer’s privacy policy .
Data Not Linked to You
The following data may be collected but it is not linked to your identity:
Purchases
Location
Usage Data
Diagnostics
Privacy practices may vary, for example, based on the features you use or your age. Learn More
The developer indicated that this app supports the following accessibility features. Learn More
Supported Features
Dark Interface
Differentiate Without Color Alone
Reduced Motion
Information
Seller
Piotr Janik
Size
177.8 MB
Category
Health & Fitness
Compatibility
Requires iOS 17.4 or later.
iPhone Requires iOS 17.4 or later.
Mac Requires macOS 14.4 or later and a Mac with Apple M1 chip or later.