Map My Walk App Review – Is it really worth it?

It’s expertly advised that adults should do an average of 10,000 steps a day to keep fit and maintain a healthy weight. Along with the physical benefits of walking, spending time outside and getting regular exercise also has a great impact on your mental health.

Map My Walk claims to be the best fitness app to help you reach your walking goals. For this reason, I’m testing out and trying Underarmour’s Map My Walk app to see if it’s all that it claims to be and if it’s worth purchasing the paid version.  

Keep reading this article to find out how I got on and whether I recommend the Map My Walk app. 

Map My Walk App Review

As the name of the app would suggest, the Map My Walk app tracks your walk using your phone’s GPS. It also calculates the number of calories burned and tracks your pace.

For me, the first impression of an app makes a huge impact. Once I was in, the Map My Run app didn’t blow me away with the layout or the overall look. 

Upon comparison to other workout apps, like Nike Training Club, it doesn’t feel as clean and simple. 

Since there isn’t really a home page, the app forces you to look around. While there are clearly a lot of features, even the premium version of the app seems ‘busy’ and it takes a bit of getting used to. 

I tested out the premium version of the Map My Walk app or the MVP version as it is called, which offers an ad-free experience and boasts more features than the free version, such as:

• Interval training
• Live tracking
• Mobile coaching
• Training plans
• Heart rate analysis
• Unlimited printed maps

Pros and Cons of Map My Walk app

Getting Started

I’ll now run through how to get started on the MapMyWalk app. 

The only issue I had was setting up my Apple Watch with the app, as my phone didn’t find Map My Run as a compatible app (even though it definitely is).

However, I believe the issue was on my phone’s side rather than Map My Run, so I won’t hold the blame on them. 

Login or Sign up

First, you’ll be prompted to sign in or create a new account. You have the option here to log in with Apple or with Facebook. I imagine logging in with Facebook will make it easier to find friends using the app you can connect with. 

Set your goals and get walking

Once you’re logged in, you’ll be taken to the explore page. The explore page is a feed where other Map My Walk users record their workouts and share their experiences in an ‘Instagram’ feed style. 

You’ll then need to navigate through the app to find out how to start working out. 

Features of the Map My Walk App

The Map My Walk app has a lot of really good features within it. Don’t be fooled by the name and assume you can only record walking workouts. 

You can pretty much record any workout from walking to cruiser biking, but we’ll go into more detail about that below.

Explore Community and Friends Feature

The first obvious feature of the app is the community. It seems to put more focus on this than on the workouts themselves.

However, it is an advanced community feature. It is more than is offered with other workout apps that I have used before. This is also still the same in the free version of the app.

So if you’re a big fan of sharing and boasting about your workouts, Map My Walk is probably a good app for you. 

Create and Set Challenges

Moving along the control panel at the bottom of the app is the challenges feature. Here, you can create a challenge for yourself for any type of workout that the app offers. 

You can set a challenge to have completed the most workouts among your community, cover the most distance, burn the most calories, or record the most workout time. 

This feature highlights the fact that this app really focuses on the friendly, competitive aspect. If this is what spurs you on, then it’s definitely a good choice. However, if you’re like me and prefer self-motivation, there are probably better apps for you out there. 

Track and Record Workouts

Moving along the control panel again, you come to the workout feature. There isn’t anything too fancy here—just a start and stop button to record your workout. The Map My Walk app records your distance, calories, duration and pace. It will also track your heart rate if you’re on the premium version.

For workouts that don’t require distance, like yoga, it will record the duration and calories.

As mentioned above, there are a lot of workouts offered with the app outside of walking. You can do the following workouts with Map My Walk:

• Walk
• Run
• Power Walk
• Road Cycling
• Treadmill Walk
• Stair Walk
• Gym Workout
• Hike
• Mountain Biking
• Run on Treadmill
• Cruiser Bike
• Running Interval Training
• Elliptical Machine
• Touring Bike
• Other Indoor Sports
• Trail Run
• Stationary Bike
• Yoga Class

This is a pretty comprehensive list of workouts offered in one app. 

Create a plan

Moving along again, you come across the option to view your dashboard, make a plan and record workouts.

The ‘My Plan’ is a strong feature here. You can choose from a range of pre-made plans like running to lose weight, running for a race, or choosing a customisable plan where you can set a distance or time goal.

Common Questions about MapMyWalk

Overall thoughts – Conclusion

Overall, I was happy with the features that Map My Walk offered. It had options to record a range of workouts and the challenges and workout plans were strong features. 

If you like the community aspect of working out, then I think Map My Walk is a good choice. However, for me, my focus is more on user experience and self-motivation for working out. The app wasn’t as simple and clean to use as the Nike Training or Run Club and took a learning curve to get used to. 

Considering the Nike apps are completely free, I think they are a better option if you’re looking for a simple way to find and track your workouts. To conclude, Map My Walk is a good contender in the league of fitness and workout apps.

The features it offers are great, like the ability to track calories, track workouts and even your stride length. Even in the free version are strong and reliable. However, if you’re looking for a completely free (and ad-free) workout app, I recommend using the Nike Apps.