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Finally made the plunge and have become an Iclone. Heard a lot of this Strava app and duly uploaded it. Stupid questions, if I set a record up, is it using my monthly data allowance or do I turn off roaming ?
I've also heard loads of scare stories of bikes being nicked from people locating them through the Strava web page ? Please help because I'm scared of this new technology 🙂 Ta
It'll use your data when you click to upload, and if you're viewing maps leaderboards etc, but I don't think it uses any data while it's recording. The amount of data required to upload is minuscule, too. Don't worry about it.
How many Mb/Gb is your allowance? If you're worried, you can always use wifi to upload when you get home.
You can set it to hide the last section of your ride so it doesn't show where you live.
Do make sure you setup a privacy zone around your home (one that's not centered on it).
Also, Strava can use data if you use the 'race my mates' facility.
I've never heard anyone complaining about Strava in this respect though.
If you're worried, just check Data use at beginning and end of ride (assuming you have no other apps that are 'always on'.
For longer rides, I turn data off to preserve battery life and Strava continues to work just fine. Even if data's switched on, it's not up/downloading a huge amount of stuff anyway.
Delete it, do it now, it's not too late!!
I never have data on when recording a ride, and the strava app itself is a pretty poor gps logger and especially inaccurate on an iphone. It's worth downloading a simple gps tracker and exporting the data from that to strava. The data is only needed to give you a mapping image, not record the gps waypoints.
If your worried most phones will do a data per app stat, but Strava never rated that high on mine. Uploaded when at home so no real issue, privacy zones are good but a lot of the stuff on thefts is 2+2=22 really
I turn off my phone's data access during a ride(in fact I enable flight mode, and then turn on GPS) at the end I either turn on Data to upload (when I get to work) or use Wifi (when I get home) to upload the log to Strava...
you can setup "Privacy zones" on Strava in the Settings/Privacy section of the website.
As a bare minimum pop in the postcode for home and work, and maybe any mates whose houses you ride round to regularly? Some people like to setup overlapping zones in case some enterprising Criminal extrapolates your address...
other things to consider:
If you enter your bikes under the "My Gear" section keep the descriptions general and don't list down components, makes or models i.e. "Road bike", "Single Speed", "HT" etc...
Consider using the "Enhanced privacy setting" to prevent people you have not Okayed from viewing your rides etc..
Just think about how someone might use the site to stalk you and rob you and then see if you can prevent that...