Gaia GPS or OnX offroad

gosborne

gosborne

TJ Enthusiast
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Columbia Falls, Montana
I'm really not a "IT" guy and my research leaves me a bit confused. So here I am. Right now I use a handheld Garmin GPS with OnX hunt montana. Looking to add a tablet in the TJ. But was wandering what would be better for my needs. Gaia or OnX. Looking to have it all. Off road trails & roads, Forest roads, Private land, National Forest, BLM land, State land. Needs to have offline capabilities. No service where I go.Help me me out Please !
 
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I have onx (hunt and offroad) and no experience with Gia. I would do a trial of offroad before purchasing it. I have had offroad for a year here in Colorado and it has gotten significantly better in that time. When I first got it, most trails around me and our cabin were unmarked. As the year went on, more and more trails were added which is why I recommend trying it to see if your area is covered.

Unfortunately for finding private, public, etc land, I find myself hopping between offroad and hunt. They do not talk to each other and each have their strengths (hunt = land, offroad = trails). I just got back from a 3rd season rifle hunt and the trail system in onx hunt was atrocious in our unit.

All of the above is through navigating through the app on my phone. I have played with hunt on the computer to mark waypoints but I have not with offroad. I do like that in the offroad app on a phone, if you click on a marked trail you want, ie Holy Cross trail, I can then click the trailhead and navigate to it through Google maps.
 
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Retarius said:
I have onx (hunt and offroad) and no experience with Gia. I would do a trial of offroad before purchasing it. I have had offroad for a year here in Colorado and it has gotten significantly better in that time. When I first got it, most trails around me and our cabin were unmarked. As the year went on, more and more trails were added which is why I recommend trying it to see if your area is covered.

Unfortunately for finding private, publi, etc land, I find myself hopping between offroad and hunt. They do not talk to each other and each have their strengths (hunt = land, offroad = trails). I just got back from a 3rd season rifle hunt and the trail system in onx hunt was atrocious in our unit.

All of the above is through navigating through the app on my phone. I have played with hunt on the computer to mark waypoints but I have not with offroad. I do like that in the offroad app on a phone, if you click on a marked trail you want, ie Holy Cross trail, I can then click the trailhead and navigate to it through Google maps.
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So you can put both OnX offroad and Hunt on a tablet ? So I could bring up either one as needed?
 
Correct. You have to bring them up individually.

Screenshot_20211121-080859_One UI Home.jpg
 
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Apple tablet or Android? I use Android and OsmAnd, it can work offline, has most trails and is free.

Edit: most people using Apple stuff dislike it so I would look into the other suggestions if that's what you are on
 
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I use Gaia and OnX Hunt and really like both of them. Hunt is so good that I paid for Offroad sight unseen and was disappointed in how it compared to Gaia. But your experience with Gaia and Offroad may be entirely different than mine based on your area and the trails you are interested in. Plus Off-road may be much better developed now than when I was doing comparisons.
 
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I have both and find myself using Gaia more, but only after I took the time to learn it (thanks Youtube).

I recently went on an overlanding trip that I planned in advance using Gaia and so obviously used Gaia throughout the trip. I've also taken other trips where I basically used a paper map to navigate and found myself using OnX Offroad to zoom in on pre-downloaded imagery to see where I was at a given intersection, etc.

If you're going somewhere off the grid I would also recommend downloading offline Google maps to your cell phone before you go as a backup. Primary nav would be Gaia or OnX on the tablet (and/or cell phone).
 
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Retarius said:
I have onx (hunt and offroad) and no experience with Gia. I would do a trial of offroad before purchasing it. I have had offroad for a year here in Colorado and it has gotten significantly better in that time. When I first got it, most trails around me and our cabin were unmarked. As the year went on, more and more trails were added which is why I recommend trying it to see if your area is covered.

Unfortunately for finding private, public, etc land, I find myself hopping between offroad and hunt. They do not talk to each other and each have their strengths (hunt = land, offroad = trails). I just got back from a 3rd season rifle hunt and the trail system in onx hunt was atrocious in our unit.

All of the above is through navigating through the app on my phone. I have played with hunt on the computer to mark waypoints but I have not with offroad. I do like that in the offroad app on a phone, if you click on a marked trail you want, ie Holy Cross trail, I can then click the trailhead and navigate to it through Google maps.
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have you tried COTREX? its only Colorado but its free and has to be hands down the best app I have ever used for navigation with on and offline maps. I feel spoiled when im out that way using it.
https://trails.colorado.gov/map/@39.595429,-107.438350,9.92z/details
as for mapping in michigan though, I have yet to find anything as good as COTREX, onxoffroad is pretty lame paid/free and Gaia imo is kinda lame too. want something as simple as plug and play.

anyone can download COTREX and play around with it but it only shows trails, roads and such in CO.
 
I've been using Gaia. I recently paid for a year for $20. Since I suck at navigating, I use it to record tracks when I'm following a route I may want to use in the future. A couple weeks ago I used it to follow a track I had previously done.

It worked well, though I keep getting to intersections and not being able to tell which way I need to turn to stay on the track. So I would guess and end up 'off' the track, have to turn around, etc.

I haven't tried downloading other peoples tracks yet.
 
Have had OnX Offroad for a few years and am not thrilled with it. Lots of blank areas where we know there are roads/trails, mostly on BLM or USFS land and they are not on Offroad. Also, some of their trails are inaccurate. I think the developer wants us to save and share our trail runs so they can improve their database - not gonna happen. How-some-ever, it has saved me from a wrong turn or two when on complicated cross-country ski trails in Montana but that was backtracking/getting back to camp.

I asked OnX a couple years ago if they'd offer a regional subscription instead of state by state @ $30 per or nationwide at $100. There are 3 adjacent states I trail ride in and have no need for a U.S. map. Said they'd look into it.. nothing.
I have Polaris and Gaia but don't use either.

I'm still a fan of paper maps.
Hunt might be a better choice.
 
I've been using OnX Hunt for a few years and also use it for trail riding. I've looked into the off road version and honestly don't see much of an advantage to paying for that one in addition to the hunting version. Seems like the only advantage would be if the off road version gave more details on trail conditions, grade, obstacles, etc.

I also use the free version of GAIA and have noticed times when roads aren't shown on GAIA that are on OnX. I realize that since I'm using the free version of GAIA, I may be missing on some functionality, so that could be the reason. We've got a lot of 'roads' in the AZ back country that I'm honestly surprised the Forest Service classifies as roads, and OnX Hunt always seems to pick them up while (free) GAIA often doesn't.
 
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DaveC said:
I've been using OnX Hunt for a few years and also use it for trail riding. I've looked into the off road version and honestly don't see much of an advantage to paying for that one in addition to the hunting version. Seems like the only advantage would be if the off road version gave more details on trail conditions, grade, obstacles, etc.
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I don't think Offroad has as much detail as Hunt, so I agree, if only 1 I'd do Hunt.
 
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Binging this back up since it's been a topic in my group. I'm currently using the free version of GAIA and I'm pretty good at it. Also, I don't have to download and save maps on GAIA when using the topo layer (included with free version).

Questions:

Does that feature on OnX mean I have to preplan the trip and save the area I'm wheeling in before hand? Does the paid version of GAIA and the satellite map layer work the same way? Wondering what benefits OnX Offroad offers over GAIA.

Thanks....
 
I've been using GaiaGPS, both desktop and mobile since around 2010.. maybe earlier. I've gone back and forth between the free and Pro versions (currently Pro for the past few years. Tried OnX free trial and found no benefit to it.

I use the Satellite layer often. What exactly is your question?
 
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Have had both. Onx interface is easier for first time. But giaa is way more powerful. Takes more time to use. It does everything onx offroad and hunt does, and way more. Planning a trip is much easier, as you can trace way larger parts of map easier and quicker. You also can also have multiple layers running at once which is helpful. If you are willing to take the time to learn it, giaa is a no brainer compared to onx
 
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I believe the paid version of Gaia gets you the multiple map layers, which is where Gaia really shines, so if you haven't played around with that yet I would highly recommend. For both Gaia (with multiple layers) and OnX you basically need to download areas ahead of time (before you don't have service; Wifi is best). Gaia is also better imo at routing/navigation. I have paid version of both because in areas that are new to me (or when I'm planning a trip), I like to explore what both have to say about the trails, but when I'm actually on the trail, I basically only use Gaia.
 
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