Endomondo & Android Phone

[Deleted member 26715]

Went for a ride today with the full intention of doing 30 miles, the longest distance I have done so far. The cycle trail I was on has markers away from the start point each 1/2 mile. By the time I had got to about 6 miles I noticed that the audio telling me my interval times & the distance I had travelled didn't agree with the track marking. I turned around at 16 miles to head back, but just before I got back to the start theoretically just short of 32 miles the app announced I had done only 29 miles. So I continued past the start & went a further 3/4 mile & turned around again where upon the app was happy to say I had done 30.88 miles once I was back at the starting/finishing point, although I believe I did over 33.5.

I know this is quite trivial & I think I have worked out what was happening, as the trail winds through some residential areas & around some golf courses there are quite a lot of sharp changes in direction. I make a presumption that the GPS signal is only taken every 30 seconds or so, as I go around a sharp corner the app actually plots a straight line between the 2 points effectively cutting the corner. On a road course this isn't as noticeable.

Do all GPS products work this way or is there a better alternaive?

Alan...

 

[Stonechat]

Well I am no expert, but off course strength of the GPS signal is variable for one thing. If I am at home outside with GPS switched on, sometimes my position appears to be moving slightly. There are slight inaccuracies. I use Strava myself but they all use the same GPS data.
I also have a Cateye Velo wireless on the bike. I have set this to the correct wheel size. I did a 40 mile run last week, at the end the Cateye said 40.9, and Strava said 40.3.
Also Strava does not detectwhen you stop very well, so average speed on the Cateye is better.
However I love using strava, know some people use Endomondo though.
I know when I do an out and back course the two tracks do no overlap exactly.
Of course it might be better on and expensive Garmin, where the GPS receiver is more sensitive

 

[paul04]

Not had that problem using Endomondo, or any app I've used with my android phone. and I used cheap crappy android phones and top of the range ones.
you do not say what phone you have, but try and update the phone as that might fix the problem

 

[Hacienda71]

Android phones don't record your position as often as a dedicated device like a Garmin so won't be quite as accurate. The only time I had serious distance issues with Endomondo on my HTC before I got my Garmins was when I used the Endo energy saving feature on the paid app, it reduced the number of times it recorded the track and was pretty much a waste of time. Even when recorded on a Garmin though different apps interpret the data slightly differently.

 

[Andrew_Culture]

I used android phones for tracking Strava and Endomondo for all my riding until a couple of weeks ago when I bought a Garmin. There is no comparison. I'm astonished.

Problem is that I set up some segment using various android devices and they're so erratic that Strava doesn't see that I've ridden them now I have better GPS!