Garmin Explore™

Garmin Explore™

By Garmin

  • Category: Navigation
  • Release Date: 2018-10-15
  • Current Version: 4.7
  • Adult Rating: 4+
  • File Size: 440.44 MB
  • Developer: Garmin
  • Compatibility: Requires iOS 17.0 or later.
Score: 3.95448
3.95448
From 703 Ratings
Free On itunes

Description

OFF-GRID NAVIGATION When paired with your compatible Garmin device(1), the Garmin Explore app lets you use your mobile device for outdoor navigation, trip planning, mapping and more — with or without Wi-Fi® connectivity or cellular service. SEARCH TOOL Easily locate geographic points — such as trailheads or mountain summits — associated with your adventure. STREAMING MAPS For pre-trip planning, you can use the Garmin Explore app to stream maps when you’re within cellular or Wi-Fi range — saving valuable time as well as storage space on your mobile device. Download maps for offline use when venturing outside cellular range. PAIR, SYNC AND SHARE With Garmin Explore, you can pair your smartphone or tablet with your compatible Garmin device to sync and share data for off-grid adventures. Use downloadable maps for navigation anywhere. EASY TRIP PLANNING Plan your next trip by downloading maps and creating courses. Specify your start and finish points, and automatically create a course you can sync with your compatible Garmin device. ACTIVITY LIBRARY Under the Saved tab, review and edit your organized data, including your saved waypoints, tracks, courses and activities. See map thumbnails to easily recognize your trips. SAVED COLLECTIONS The collections list allows you to quickly find all data related to any trip — making it easy to sort and locate the course or location you’re looking for. CLOUD STORAGE The waypoints, courses and activities you’ve created will automatically sync to your Garmin Explore web account when you’re within cellular or Wi-Fi range, preserving your activity data with cloud storage. A Garmin account is required for storing your data in the cloud. LIVETRACK™ With the use of the LiveTrack™ feature, loved ones can follow your location in real time(2) and see data such as distance, time and elevation. What You Get with Garmin Explore • Unlimited map downloads; access topographic maps, USGS quad sheets and more • Aerial imagery • Waypoints, tracking and route navigation • High-detail GPS trip logging and location sharing • Unlimited cloud storage of routes, waypoints, tracks, and activities • Online trip planning 1. https://explore.garmin.com/appcompatibility 2. When used with your compatible smartphone, the Garmin Explore® app and your compatible inReach® technology-enabled Garmin device. The Bluetooth word mark and logos are registered trademarks owned by Bluetooth SIG, Inc. and any use of such marks by Garmin is under license.

Screenshots

Reviews

  • Mid August 2025 Update - THANKS!

    4
    By JMLCMark
    I have been struggling with the Explore app for years. The concept of an offline connection between the GPS and other apps seems so important, but for a long time, Explore has been very klunky. As of Mid August, 2025, Garmin has finally managed to fix many of the nuisance issues - with perhaps the greatest one being the streamlining of the GPX import today. THANKS! Now, instead of automatically creating collections that I was constantly cleaning up (and had to go through many steps to delete), Garmin let’s you choose where the new GPX goes, and gives you the option of adding it to a collection. THANK YOU!! Also, they added swipe to delete. Im going to save SO MUCH TIME with just these two changes. I just got back from a 44 day sailing expedition where i cursed Garmin daily having to waste time and precious phone battery with all of these manipulations while off grid. On the sailing trip, I was frequently changing the plan based on weather, so had to add waypoints and courses drawn off grid and on the fly several times per day. Too bad this update wasn’t out on late June. Anyway, a couple problems still exist but this app keeps improving slowly. The sync time will probably be forever slow due to Bluetooth limitations, I am guessing. I can live with that, though, as long as Garmin gives us an option for a more selective sync. What I mean by that is this: Right now, you can do a selective sync… but even if you elect to sync only collections, it still syncs activities as well. If I am on an expedition, what I do now is delete everything from my watch before the expedition so that when I do a sync, it is fast. If, however, I need to send a waypoint on a random day, there could be dozens of activities that haven’t been synced (say I haven’t used Explore in a while). If I am just trying to send a waypoint from my phone to the watch, I will have to wait over 30-45 minutes for all of these manipulations while activities to sync before the waypoint gets there. The workaround is of course to blank out the watch all the time, but it would be neat to have a simple “send waypoint” and “send course” to watch feature that didn’t tie up resources by à prolonged sync of all the other stuff. 4 stars for now. Once the sync procedure gets optimized, this is going to be a 5 star app because being able to wirelessly send stuff to the watch off grid is fantastic!

  • Dependable

    5
    By JGC Colorado
    Worked flawlessly during my backcountry diy float moose hunt. It even saved our lives as we had to unfortunately get rescued from being capsized in our raft from a horrible accident.

  • Have the developers even tried to use this app?

    1
    By Murse Dad
    Go ahead. Give this app a try. Then the developers can respond and tell me what they think. This is the clunkiest app I’ve seen in a good while.

  • My favorite navigation, message, and safety device

    5
    By jenpswims
    Works awesome when our sailing!

  • Easy to use

    5
    By Brian of the Southern Plains
    Super easy

  • 90s product

    1
    By Connorp27
    Garmin products feel incredibly outdated. Absolute mess of a system that should be remade from the ground up if they ever want their products to be taken seriously. Having so many different apps is not a good thing, having so many different types of filters and layers and junk is not a good thing. A map should be straightforward. Here’s your waypoints, here’s your routes, here’s your campgrounds and public lands. Instead they’ve made such a goofy system with all of these features that do not flow together well at all. Using garmin has been anything but straightforward and so I’ll be finding a better alternative.

  • Bug

    3
    By Doydle2
    App crashes whenever I click “offline maps”

  • Still learning

    5
    By Daddylew
    I’m still learning this app and my device. However so far I am really enjoying it. I will add more as I learn more. Just have one question and that is which app is better for the inReach mini. This one or the earth one.

  • Love This Device

    5
    By Cloudbreak02
    Moderate to intermediate outdoor enthusiasts. This device has been amazing once you understand and utilize all the web tools available to plan hikes.

  • Excellent app

    5
    By RossUK
    Excellent app - I’m surprised that Garmin don’t advertise its existence more.

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