During riding a bike, running or other activities you probably register them – to get know your own records, to know route, or just to count kilometers, because people like numbers :) The easiest way is to use phone (because each of us have one) and one of many possible applications. The most common choice is probably Endomondo, but this is not the only possible choice. Strava is also noteworthy and I would like to compare both applications in this post, show their advantages and disadvantages, which I have observed over few years. In the beggining we can say, Strava is an application that was created primarily for fans of two wheels.
Generally speaking, both Endo and Strava do the same – both apps can record our activity, distance and time, and on the basis of this they calculate, for example, our average speed, burned calories, etc. Both applications support external sensors (ex. heart rate monitors, speed, cadence) by bluetooth and ANT + (if our phone supports this connection type). Both also have an automatic pause function when we stop activity. The devil is in the details – Endo does not have so-called height corrections, Strava has. Riding 10 km on a flat is completly different than riding 10 km in the mountains or on special tracks – everyone who tried, know it well. In both applications, the measurement of elevation (the sum of all our climbs) takes place with the use of GPS, but Strava additionally has data from specialist maps and corrects data from sensors – because GPS height is not very accurate. It gives a more accurate information of route we have traveled.
Strava does not have an interface in Polish language (I must mention about it), Endo does not have a problem with that. In both of them we will also find an audio trainer who tells us a certain distance or pace at a particular distance – in Endo, however, it is much more extensive than in Strava. Endomondo also supports more disciplines – we will find here everything we come up with. At Strava, it is not good anymore, although for some time it offers much more than just cycling. The other thing is that in the latter it works really well through the so-called segments. Here we go to the main difference between applications.
Segments are sections that are created by Strava users. When we ride on segment, we will be added to results list. If we pass section with Strava turned on, our result will be registered and added to the list of people who have already passed the same segment. It is obviously an array of segregated results, which automatically motivates us to improve our performance on the segments – the person who sets a new record, gets the KOM (King Of the Mountain). Even if the record is beyond our reach, Strava will let us know that in a given place we have set our personal record, silver or brown record. Although the segments are not particularly reliable – a lot depends on the day, weather, wind, etc. – but I must admit that they can motivate a lot. I added some of them myself in my area.
When it comes to social functions, both are similar – we can invite friends, we can put photos in our activities or write custom posts. In both cases we can also share our training, for example, on Facebook. In the case of races, Strava is able to show us people who also participated (if they use it, of course), even if they are not our friends. Endomondo offers challgenges, where in specific areas we “race” with other participants. There are also clubs, although this is a rather unused function. In Strava we also have clubs and they are more important here because always display statistics for certain periods regarding members activity. There are also competitions, but a bit different – for example, to make 1000 m elevation in a month.
Both applications have premium plans that provide additional features – in Endomondo: an assistant and training plans, no advertisements and information about heart rate zones. In Strava: extensive statistics relevant to solid training. The difference is quite big, because Endo costs $30, and Strava costs $60 annualy. In my opinion, paying for Strava does not make sense – a lot of advanced statistics can be obtained by installing the StravistiX extension in browser. It changes Strava website appearance on our computer and provide a lot of information.
I will not answer the question what is better, what’s worse – there is no such answer and it all depends on what we expect. About one, two years ago Endomondo was crashing sometimes on a lot of phones (Huawei, Honors, Xiaomi – because of very aggresive policies about applications running in background). I have not noticed such problems for a long time, it’s just ok now – and it was ok on iOS, it’s ok now on Android. In my opinion, both applications complement each other. Strava is best when we use it typically for a bike riding. If you have sport activity devices like Polar, TomTom, Mio or Garmin, you can set up 99% of them to automatic transfer all your activities to both services which is also a huge advantage.