Question 1

Which countries does RouteGems cover?

Accepted Answer

Routing and stop discovery currently cover the whole of Europe. You can plan any route with both ends on the European map, from anywhere in the world — planning a European trip from the US or Australia works fine. Routes outside Europe can't be planned yet; more regions are on the roadmap. Accounts are worldwide, and the free Weekender plan is available everywhere.

Question 2

How do I get started?

Accepted Answer

Create an account and start the 7-day free trial — every plan includes one. Then either import a GPX, TCX or FIT you already have, or create a route from scratch: draw it point by point on the map, or type a start and end under By place. Add your stops, export, ride.

Question 3

How do I import a GPX, TCX or FIT file?

Accepted Answer

Open the planner and use the Import control in the top bar (or the GPX tab in the Create panel), then choose your .gpx, .tcx or .fit file. Your track appears on the map ready to add stops to — and any stops already in the file arrive with it.

Question 4

How do I create a route from scratch?

Accepted Answer

In the Create panel pick Draw or By place. Draw drops a point wherever you click and routes between them along the network for your bike type — Create route builds it once you have two or more points, and Clear starts you over. By place plans between typed locations with autocomplete.

Question 5

What does classifying a route as road, gravel or MTB do?

Accepted Answer

It sets the riding profile: how edits and reroutes pick their way across the network, and the speed used for your ETA. You can change it any time under Routing options.

Question 6

Can I use miles instead of kilometres?

Accepted Answer

Yes — Settings → Units. One switch flips every unit in the app together: distance (km ↔ mi), elevation (m ↔ ft), and the weather pane's temperature and wind (°C ↔ °F, km/h ↔ mph).

Question 7

Does RouteGems work on mobile?

Accepted Answer

You can open and view routes on a phone, but route planning is built for a larger screen right now. A properly responsive mobile planner and a companion app are on the roadmap.

Question 8

What file types can I import?

Accepted Answer

GPX, TCX and FIT, up to 25 MB. Files exported from Strava, Komoot, OS Maps, Garmin Connect and most other tools work fine — we autodetect the format from the file contents, and course points in the file arrive as stops on your route.

Question 9

Can I edit a route I imported?

Accepted Answer

Imported tracks are kept exactly as they came in. To reshape one, click “Edit this route” to derive draggable control points — after that you can drag the line, add via-points and reroute. (The first edit snaps to the road network, so it may shift slightly off the original GPS line.)

Question 10

Can routes use ferries — and can I avoid them?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Planned routes take ferry crossings where they make sense, shown as a dashed line with a boat marker. If you'd rather stay on land, turn on the Avoid ferries option under Routing options and the route detours instead.

Question 11

How do I add stops to my route?

Accepted Answer

Nothing is pre-selected, so start in the Add-a-stop panel by tapping the stop types you want — matches appear on the map as you select, and update when you change the search radius. The list follows your map view — zoom into a town to narrow it to what's visible. Selected facilities are inserted into your route as course points and exported with it. If you always want the same types lit, choose them once in Settings → Preferences → Default stop types.

Question 12

Which stop types can I search for — and what exactly does each include?

Accepted Answer

Water: drinking taps and fountains. Cafés & pubs: cafés, pubs, bars — and distillery tasting rooms. Shops & bakeries: supermarkets, convenience and grocery stores, greengrocers, post offices (often the village shop), bakeries and patisseries. Petrol stations: forecourt shops — snacks, water and loos at all hours. Fast food: takeaways and chains. Ice cream: gelaterias, ice-cream shops, and cafés whose main trade is ice cream (very important for cyclists). Hotels & campsites: hotels, guest houses, hostels and campsites. Toilets: public toilets. Bike shops: shops and repair. First aid: pharmacies and medical-supply shops.

Question 13

What do the routing options actually do?

Accepted Answer

Each option re-weights the roads the planner may choose; drag to set priority when combining — the first matters most. Avoid major roads keeps you off trunk and primary roads while still using B-roads (the traffic-avoidance option). Prefer quiet roads goes further: it favours the smallest lanes even over B-roads — slower and twistier, but prettier. Minimise turns sticks to through-roads for simpler navigation. Shortest prioritises pure distance, which often means busier roads. Minimise elevation trades extra distance to dodge climbs. Avoid ferries detours around ferry and car-shuttle crossings. Prefer signed cycle routes steers onto EuroVelo, the National Cycle Network and regional signed routes. With nothing selected, the planner already picks the fastest sensible ride for your bike type on cycle-friendly roads.

Question 14

What does the search radius do?

Accepted Answer

It sets how far off your route we look for facilities — from 500 m up to 5 km. A wider radius finds more options but adds detour distance.

Question 15

What do the bell and note on a stop do?

Accepted Answer

The bell sets the approach alert: alerting stops export as course points, so your head unit warns you as you get close. Mute the bell and the stop stays on the route but exports quietly (as a GPX waypoint only). The note travels with the stop — it becomes the waypoint description on GPX exports.

Question 16

What is the suggested stop?

Accepted Answer

RouteGems looks for the longest stretch of your route with nothing planned and suggests facilities there — useful on long routes for spotting the gap you'd otherwise discover at 180 km with an empty bottle.

Question 17

How does the ride-day weather work?

Accepted Answer

On the Rider and Ultra plans, the weather pane forecasts conditions along your route at the time you'll actually reach each point — pick the ride day and a start time (in 15-minute steps), set your speed, and read temperature, rain, wind and gusts across the whole ride, with headwind sections highlighted. Forecast data comes from Open-Meteo; like any forecast it's a guide, not a guarantee.

Question 18

What do the rain and wind map layers show?

Accepted Answer

On the Rider and Ultra plans, forecast rain paints the map where precipitation is expected — stronger blue means heavier, more likely rain. The wind layer animates the forecast flow so you can see direction at a glance. Both stay on the map when you close the weather pane (handy on a phone), until you switch them off.

Question 19

How does the ride playback work?

Accepted Answer

With a rain or wind layer on, press play (or drag the timeline) to watch the forecast evolve through your ride — the steps scale to the ride length, from 15 minutes for an afternoon loop up to a couple of hours for a monster day out. A rider marker moves along the route showing where you're predicted to be at each moment, based on your riding speed.

Question 20

How do I send a route straight to my Wahoo?

Accepted Answer

Connect once, then it's one click. In Settings, open Connected apps and choose Connect next to Wahoo — you'll approve the link on Wahoo's own sign-in (we never see your Wahoo password). After that, any route's Export menu in the planner has a Send to Wahoo option: the route lands in your Wahoo account with your stops included, and the ELEMNT companion app syncs it to your head unit, usually within moments. Available on every plan; on the free plan you'll need a verified email first, same as file exports.

Question 21

I sent a route to Wahoo but it isn't on my ELEMNT

Accepted Answer

First check the route reached your Wahoo account: open the ELEMNT companion app and pull to refresh the routes list — the head unit syncs from the app, so the phone needs to have synced first. If the send itself failed in RouteGems, the Export menu shows why; a connection that has expired or been revoked on Wahoo's side is fixed by disconnecting and reconnecting under Settings → Connected apps.

Question 22

How do I disconnect Wahoo — and what happens to routes I've already sent?

Accepted Answer

Settings → Connected apps → Disconnect. We delete our stored connection immediately. Routes you've already sent stay in your Wahoo account — they're yours, exactly as if you'd imported the files by hand.

Question 23

How do I get my route onto my cycle computer?

Accepted Answer

For Garmin there are two good paths. Via Garmin Connect and Send to Device: export GPX — Garmin Connect re-plans it into a course and every stop arrives as a course point. (Garmin Connect currently has a bug importing FIT courses — imported FIT files, including Garmin's own exports, show 'invalid file' on Edge devices — so use GPX there until Garmin fix it.) Over USB: export FIT — Garmin's native course format, with every stop as a typed course point and icon — and copy it into the Garmin/NewFiles folder on the device. For Wahoo, Hammerhead and other head units, export GPX and load it through their companion app.

Question 24

GPX or FIT — which should I use?

Accepted Answer

FIT for Garmin devices over USB: the richest stop icons in Garmin's native course format. GPX for everything else — uploading to Garmin Connect (it becomes a proper course with your stops as course points), Wahoo and Hammerhead companion apps, and every other platform; stops travel as waypoints. We no longer offer TCX export: no platform or current head unit imports TCX course points, so it couldn't carry your stops anywhere. (We still import TCX files, stops included.)

Question 25

How is the ride time estimated?

Accepted Answer

From your riding speed for the route's profile — set it under Routing options and the ETA, and the weather timeline on the paid plans, update everywhere together.

Question 26

What's the difference between Rider and Ultra?

Accepted Answer

Rider is the complete planner: create, import and modify routes, every stop type, the advanced finder, projects, sharing, every export format, and the ride-day weather timed to when you'll actually be there. Ultra adds Ask RouteGems: describe a ride and it builds the route — a loop, an A-to-B, or a named trail like a EuroVelo route followed properly end to end. It can split a tour into a day-by-day project, and it picks stops around your climbs, your arrival times and whether places will actually be open when you get there.

Question 27

How does the free trial work?

Accepted Answer

Every plan starts with a 7-day free trial. Use everything, and cancel any time before it ends — you won't be charged. If you keep it, the subscription starts automatically, and we email you a reminder a few days before that happens.

Question 28

How do I cancel my subscription?

Accepted Answer

Account → Manage subscription opens the billing portal, where you can cancel, switch plans, or update your card. Cancel during the trial and you pay nothing; cancel later and your plan runs to the end of the period you've paid for.

Question 29

How does route sharing work?

Accepted Answer

Use Share to copy a public link to your route. Anyone with the link can view it — no account needed — and they get the full stop finder and weather panel: they can light up stop types, browse what's along the route and open Street View. What they can't do is change your route: Add to route is greyed out until they take a copy, and the weather forecast is the route owner's (a copy gives them their own). You control whether new routes are public by default in Settings → Privacy.

Question 30

How do I plan a multi-day trip?

Accepted Answer

Group routes into a project, one route per day. Projects keep the days in order with each day's distance and climbing, so a week-long tour reads as one plan instead of seven scattered routes.

Question 31

How do I change my password?

Accepted Answer

Settings → Profile → Change password. You'll need your current password. Once it's changed, every other device is signed out — the one you changed it on stays signed in — and we email you to say it happened. If that email arrives and it wasn't you, use Forgot password on the sign-in page straight away.

Question 32

How do I change my email address?

Accepted Answer

Settings → Profile → Change email, with your password. Your current address has to be verified first. We send a confirmation link to the new address and a heads-up to the old one, and nothing changes until you open that link (it's valid for 24 hours) — you keep signing in with the old address until then. Once you've clicked, the new address is your sign-in, and it counts as verified.

Question 33

How do I delete my account?

Accepted Answer

Settings → Privacy & sharing → Delete my account, and type your email address to confirm. Everything linked to you — routes, stops, projects, saved settings — is erased at once, and we email a confirmation to the address that was deleted. Before you confirm we ask why you're leaving; that's optional, and the answer is kept with nothing that identifies you. On a paid plan, cancel it first under Account → Manage subscription — the delete button will tell you if it's still live. Want a copy first? Download my data is on the same page.

Question 34

Who can see my routes?

Accepted Answer

Only people you give the link to. Routes aren't listed publicly or indexed. You can also choose whether your name appears on shared routes in Settings → Privacy & sharing.

Question 35

My GPX file won't upload — what's wrong?

Accepted Answer

Check the file is a .gpx, .tcx or .fit and under 25 MB. Very large activity files (lots of trackpoints) can take a moment. If it still fails, re-export it from the source app and try again.

Question 36

The stop finder found nothing — why?

Accepted Answer

Usually the radius is too tight for a remote area — widen it (up to 5 km) and search again. Facility data comes from OpenStreetMap, so genuinely unmapped places can come back empty; if a stop you know exists is missing, it likely isn't mapped yet.

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