PeakFinder ٤+

I rarely write app reviews because so many apps of a geographical nature are very close to being awesome, but tend to be overpriced, lacking in some basic and obvious feature, or have some major glitch. I’m frequently disappointed, but don’t want to discourage developers. In designing a home, this app has succeeded where a dozen other highly technical apps have failed, to give me quick information about features on the landscape, their general appearance and orientation. The camera is intuitive and the function to adjust the position of the features to match the camera view very easy to use. Not only is this useful in a practical sense, it is fun, and I find myself opening it up all the time to better understand my landscape. Please don’t change the essence of this app! It is great as it is.

I’ve been a very satisfied Peak Finder user for many years. I’m usually one to write reviews, but this app is cool that I want to.

So many times over the years I’d sit on a mountaintop, staring out at a vista, and think “wouldn’t it be cool if the mountain names could just pop up above the peaks??”. Peak Finder does just that! It’s really pretty incredible that I can carry this technology in the palm of my hand out in the wilderness. You can also take photos with the labels on them, and even get the names of further off peaks by zooming in on the saved pic later.

If you love the outdoors and maps, do yourself a favor and get this app! Also, the price is low and worth every penny.

There are very few apps out there that do their job so well you barely notice them. Almost every app has some little niggle. This is one of those apps.

One of its best features is actually its secondary feature: sun and moon path representation. If you ever want to know “when is the sun going to hit my tent” or “where do I have to be so the moon rises behind that mountain for my perfect photo”, this is the app for you.

One of the top negative reviews has to do with aligning peaks. Unfortunately, that user probably has used magnetic phone mounts and screwed up their hardware. I’m on my >=10th iPhone and this is the first time I’ve had any issues (MagSafe is pretty good at balancing that effect, but not perfect). True, there’s no image detection with auto alignment, but the line drawing is clear and easy to match up. This is especially useful in areas where the DEM just isn’t accurate. (The other comment about screenshots is many years out of date.)

I bought this app for cheap years ago and it was easily one of my best purchases ever.