Review Insights · App Store
OS Maps: Walk, Hike, Run, Bike
Ordnance Survey · 409 ratings · ★ 4.7
4.7
★★★★★
409 ratings
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Top complaints - extracted from 10 negative reviews
Recurring phrases mined from 1-2★ reviews. The bigger the percentage, the more users have the same problem. Fix the top 2-3 in your version and you have product-market fit on day one.
1
"maps"
4 negative reviews mention this · 40% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Offline maps are buggy. Downloaded a couple of maps from purchase of paper versions. Zooming causes the map to be truncated. Can’t be relied upon. Test before you leave." - RichyRichBda
2
"paper"
4 negative reviews mention this · 40% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Offline maps are buggy. Downloaded a couple of maps from purchase of paper versions. Zooming causes the map to be truncated. Can’t be relied upon. Test before you leave." - RichyRichBda
3
"offline"
3 negative reviews mention this · 30% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Offline maps are buggy. Downloaded a couple of maps from purchase of paper versions. Zooming causes the map to be truncated. Can’t be relied upon. Test before you leave." - RichyRichBda
4
"downloaded"
3 negative reviews mention this · 30% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Offline maps are buggy. Downloaded a couple of maps from purchase of paper versions. Zooming causes the map to be truncated. Can’t be relied upon. Test before you leave." - RichyRichBda
5
"offline maps"
3 negative reviews mention this · 30% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Offline maps are buggy. Downloaded a couple of maps from purchase of paper versions. Zooming causes the map to be truncated. Can’t be relied upon. Test before you leave." - RichyRichBda
📋 All 10 negative reviews
Every 1-2★ review we fetched. Use the copy button to grab them all for your own analysis (paste into ChatGPT/Claude with a prompt like "summarize core user problems, group by theme, ignore bugs, focus on missing features").
Can’t cancel
Beware! I’ve tried to cancel multiple times and it won’t take. I’m going through Apple now. Don’t sign up for the free trial.
Beware!
Cancelled long before the 1 month “free trial” was up (given to me by a tour company I toured with) but they charged me anyway. Super disappointed.
Unable to cancel automatic renewal
There appears to be no way within the app to cancel automatic annual renewal once you’ve subscribed. Very frustrating. Either it doesn’t exist, or they deliberately Mae it hard to find.
Offline maps are buggy
Downloaded a couple of maps from purchase of paper versions. Zooming causes the map to be truncated. Can’t be relied upon. Test before you leave.
Just terrible
I downloaded a paper map, then zoomed in on it, but it failed to show up. I close & reopen map; still not showing. Then I kill the app, reopen, and finally the map shows on zoom in. Really this app is poorly map. I think I will move to AllTrails instead. OSM is so much better now.
Previous complaint: drove to remote location with no mobile phone to do a hill walk. Opened the app and nothing worked: it had logged me out and refused to show my downloaded map. There I was, in the wilderness, and no electronic map! Thankfully, I brought paper map. This app is useless to me if it requires mobile data to operate on hill walks!
Previous complaint: drove to remote location with no mobile phone to do a hill walk. Opened the app and nothing worked: it had logged me out and refused to show my downloaded map. There I was, in the wilderness, and no electronic map! Thankfully, I brought paper map. This app is useless to me if it requires mobile data to operate on hill walks!
Fails to retrieve country settings
As of 2022-02-08, my copy can’t allow setting up account-with which to add more detailed maps-because “failed to retrieve country settings.” Blah.
As of 2022-02-13, now won’t even log me in because “failed to retrieve email server,” or soemthing. My email server is working fine. I am suspecting that this thing only works for people in the UK.
As of 2022-02-13, now won’t even log me in because “failed to retrieve email server,” or soemthing. My email server is working fine. I am suspecting that this thing only works for people in the UK.
Major technical issues syncing to iPhone and I Pad
When I originally installed the apps and upgraded to Premium, everything worked fine. I logged out, but could never log back in with my premium subscription, both on the website and on the smart devices. I was finally able to log back on to their website but only by changing my password, which is ridiculous. And when I used the new password on my iPhone and iPad, in both cases I received the message that an unexpected error had occurred. Technical support did their best to help but the issue remains unresolved.
There’s another feature of the app that is very annoying (this was before all my technical issues). The screen has a window with the option to start navigation. I only wanted to look at the route, not navigate. Unfortunately this window takes up a significant part of the screen, blocking a large part of the map. For some unknown reason, you can not close this window, and tech help said that the app developers aren’t currently going to change it.
All in all, it’s a great app when it worked for me, and most people don’t appear to have had the problems I’ve experienced. I hope that tech people read this and do some more development work.
There’s another feature of the app that is very annoying (this was before all my technical issues). The screen has a window with the option to start navigation. I only wanted to look at the route, not navigate. Unfortunately this window takes up a significant part of the screen, blocking a large part of the map. For some unknown reason, you can not close this window, and tech help said that the app developers aren’t currently going to change it.
All in all, it’s a great app when it worked for me, and most people don’t appear to have had the problems I’ve experienced. I hope that tech people read this and do some more development work.
Don’t see how to integrate with OS hiking guides
I’m a big user of Ordnance Survey hiking guides, particularly the Pathfinder series, but don’t see a way to integrate these routes into the App.
Am I missing something?
Am I missing something?
Quits repeatedly with large custom offline maps
Created a custom map of most of Pembrokeshire (250K) for an upcoming hike. Once it finished downloading, I zoomed in and out, scrolled, etc. It only took a few seconds for OS Maps to quit. I tried again with similar results. A separate custom online map of SE Wales had the same trouble.
I had fewer problems with paper map downloads (OS maps that have a digital activation code). This makes me think that OS Maps was not thoroughly tested with large offline maps (>250K).
I will make sure that I carry paper maps for now.
I had fewer problems with paper map downloads (OS maps that have a digital activation code). This makes me think that OS Maps was not thoroughly tested with large offline maps (>250K).
I will make sure that I carry paper maps for now.
Released with fatal bugs
In July of 2016 I used this app for walks in the Yorkshire Dales. I had planned the trip carefully, researching walk routes on the Internet, and downloaded about a dozen offline maps, a key feature of the app, designed so you can view a map in a wilderness area without data connectivity. The maps saved ok, but I discovered when I tried to use them, that if I loaded a saved route on top of an offline map, it would crash immediately.. On my first walk I had to abandon the app altogether and use a paper map. Later I discovered I could use the app if I loaded the map I needed for the upcoming walk using wifi in my hotel. As long as I didn't save it, it would persist in cache and I could load saved routes on top of it. So I finished the trip using the App that way. That's why a 2* rating. When I contacted customer support after my trip to report the problem, they admitted this was a known bug if you save more than "3 or 4" offline maps.
Sentiment summary
95%
Positive (4-5★)
2%
Neutral (3★)
3%
Negative (1-2★)