My Tracks

CNET Editors' review

by: Jaymar Cabebe on July 17, 2012

Perfect for outdoors enthusiasts, Google's My Tracks app records your path, speed, distance, and even elevation while you walk, run, bike, or do anything else that a GPS signal can follow. And for those who are a bit more serious about their training, the app even lets you hook up with a few third-party Bluetooth biometric sensors, including Zephyr HxM, Polar WearLink, and ANT+ monitors.

To get started, just open up My Tracks and hit the record button at the top of the screen. From there, so long as you have a strong GPS signal, My Tracks will plot your path on a Google Map, and keep track of vital statistics including speed, distance, time, average speed, and max speed. You can even drop route markers and enable voice notifications at specific distances or times.

Once you're done, just hit the stop button at the top, and input a name for your trip, activity type, and a short description. All of your records will be saved under My Tracks, so you can access them and share them at any time.

From any of your saved Tracks, you can see your path on a Map or read all of your statistics. Also, there's a chart you can pull up, which displays the elevation changes throughout your recorded trip. One thing I love is the playback feature, which "flies" you along your path on a Google Earth satellite image. And, of course, you can share tracks via Android's share menu. You can use this to send friends all the statistics from your trip, plus a link to the Google Map page with your route plotted out.

While My Tracks isn't exactly one of Google's more popular apps, I do think it's poised for some growth. It's incredibly useful, and since it's open source, I can imagine countless third-party developers incorporating its route-recording technology into their projects.