Do Smart Watches Hav Gps Antenna, Or Are They Location Based Service

While navigation is one of the nearly important uses travelers have for their smartphones, how often practice you think about exactly how a phone knows where yous are and where you lot're going? You might non know that in addition to connecting to cellular towers, your phone is constantly tracking GPS signals from satellites circling the planet—and that you can apply your phone GPS without data for more purposes than you might look.

If you lot've ever tried to navigate in a place where your telephone has weak or no celluar service, y'all probably wished yous could have advantage of offline phone GPS. Fortunately, you can: GPS signals are raining down around us at all times, and your phone can connect to them without any real reliance on your cellular company, impact on your data plan, or dependence on the phone mode you are in. These signals are free for all of us to use, so long equally nosotros have the right apps and a device with which to connect.

In fact, you tin can even use an older, retired phone as a GPS unit of measurement, and then long equally the apps will notwithstanding run on the operating system. Then, once you get back to civilization, your regular smartphone will still be fully charged and gear up to go.

How Authentic Is My Phone GPS Without Information?

About of the apps I have used measure GPS coordinates to tenths of a 2nd, which is authentic inside four to 11 meters, depending on where on the planet y'all are plotting (accuracy improves as you move toward the poles).

If that isn't close enough, within the next yr applied science is coming that will make some phones accurate to within 1 foot.

You Don't Take to Exist Offline to Use a Phone as GPS

Many of the most popular uses for GPS are for folks who are off the grid without admission to Wi-Fi or cellular connections, merely the technology'due south usefulness is non limited to the backcountry by any means. First, we all know that cell coverage is inappreciably ubiquitous even in developed areas; heck, my kid's central New Jersey soccer practice field shows "no service" so often that some parents drive a mile down the road during exercise to connect.

Another benefit is preserving bombardment life; GPS uses are particularly beneficial when y'all are doing things in areas where cellular service is available but poor, which causes your phone to burn up bombardment life trying to connect. Using offline phone GPS can as well help you conserve information. This is useful when traveling abroad, where information plans are oft plush and express.

Finally, many location-based apps gobble up data voraciously. Your phone's GPS tracking allows you to use them in offline mode, incurring no data penalisation so long equally you preload maps and data while continued to Wi-Fi.

Certainly, your cellphone can do more without a cell connection than you might think; here are v of the best.

Track Your Flight in Real Time

Let's start with my favorite way to utilize phone GPS without data: to runway the flight I'm on in real time. There are a few apps that do this, merely I employ Flyover State, created by University of Minnesota researchers and funded by the National Science Foundation.

The app offers options to view road maps, terrain maps, and satellite maps, including information on geology, underwater core samples, mammal and dinosaur fossils, and landscape features for diverse destinations as you pass over them in flying.

To use the app you need to input and preload all the information along the route while all the same on a Wi-Fi or cell connectedness. Then, once y'all become into airplane fashion, all that information is bachelor as you fly, forth with your ground speed and altitude.

You'll demand a window seat for this to work well; in fact, on some flights I have found that I had to accept the phone virtually against the window to obtain and agree a reliable GPS signal.

Go Backcountry Hiking

Smartphones are becoming go-to tools for many hardcore backcountry travelers, who can spend days or fifty-fifty months out of range of cellular signals. Many find phones more space- and weight-efficient than dedicated GPS units, peculiarly since phones can accept photos, as well.

This excellent how-to guide makes a compelling case for a smartphone as your go-to GPS tool. It includes some very adept bombardment life management tips, noting that some phones can last five to 10 days without a accuse with careful use.

A few of the best backcountry navigation apps include Gaia GPS, AllTrails, iPhiGeNie, and ViewRanger.

Rails Your Fettle

A booming number of fettle applications work with offline GPS, including MapMyRide, Strava, MapMyRun, Runkeeper, and MapMyFitness. For near of these, using your telephone GPS without information will allow you to rails your run, walk, hike, or other outing offline. While you need a connectedness to take advantage of some of the apps' features, using them on GPS-merely mode preserves on bombardment life and data usage, which can be a helpful upside when you are tracking long bicycle rides or runs.

Fitness Armband for Your Phone

Tune Belt Armband for iPhone

The nigh quintessential time to save data and money is during your conditioning- complete with a robust armband of form.

Notation Your Exact Location

There are all kinds of ways this can be useful, such as saving your spot in an airport parking lot or sharing your location with someone else to facilitate a meetup. I know folks who have used GPS coordinates on their phones to mark and/or share things like trailheads, campsites, turn-offs for dirt roads, angling spots, waterfalls, and abandoned ruins.

The free My GPS Coordinates app (available for iOS and Android) has functions to e-mail or text your coordinnates directly from the main screen, and fifty-fifty shows the accuracy of the GPS signal (it tracks my office desk within 16 to 33 feet depending on point access).

To share locations yous obviously need connectivity, but y'all tin log them using GPS and so share or remember them later.

Use Mapping Apps Offline

Finally, there are heaps of full-featured offline mapping applications, including the ubiquitous Google Maps and Apple Maps. Many of these are unfortunately somewhat limited when information technology comes to GPS-only navigation; Google Maps, for example, allows y'all to pre-download a fifty-square-kilometer map for temporary offline use, which will help in some situations just isn't much utilize on a longer road trip. To find alternatives, see 10 All-time GPS App and Navigation App Options for Android and 4 Best Offline Maps Apps for iOS, Android, and Windows Telephone.

Did nosotros miss any other great means to apply your telephone GPS without data? Permit us know in the comments.

Cell Phone Car Mount

Make navigation a niggling safer with a car mount stand- adaptable to almost all smartphone sizes.

More from SmarterTravel:

8 Helpful Travel Apps You Can Use without Wi-Fi
8 Best Wellness Apps for Travelers
The 27 All-time Apps for Solo Travelers

Ed Hewitt is a seasoned globetrotter who brings you a biweekly glimpse into the latest travel news, views, and trends—and how they could impact your travel plans.

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