After roughly five months of appeasing users with new feature after new feature after new feature, the other shoe has finally dropped. Today, Strava sold its segmented soul. At least, if you believe Strava Segments are the soul of what makes Strava, well, Strava.
The company announced three substantial negative changes to the platform effective immediately, which will have huge ramifications for its 55 million users, as well as the 44,000 registered 3rd party apps. They are summarized as follows:
– Non-paying users will no longer see the full leaderboard: They’ll only see the top 10 times (all + Top 10 women), you won’t see your friends anymore
– Strava is removing the leaderboard from all 3rd party apps: If you’re using one of the 44,000 3rd party apps out there to do anything with Segments, this likely just broke it. Only devices like those from Garmin/Wahoo/Hammerhead/etc that have Strava Live Segments can display that for paying members.
– Non-paying users will no longer get the web route builder: If you want to build routes, you’ll need to use another platform.
In addition to those substantial ones, there’s also one lesser removal:
– Non-paying users will no longer get ‘matched runs’ feature: This will automatically compare runs on the same route from a pace/speed standpoint. A new matched rides feature is introduced today, which is only available to paying users.
One might mistakenly believe this change is only impacting non-paying users. But that’s far from true. This change is impacting anyone who uses the platform with 3rd party apps to do any amount of analysis of Segments. And even beyond that, it’s lessening the value of Segments for everyone. Strava is in effect saying: Segments don’t really matter to our business anymore, getting people to pay for them does.
And here’s the worst part: They aren’t necessarily wrong on that specific issue. In a conference call last week, Strava was point-blank clear that if they don’t get more subscribers and become profitable, there’s a pretty good chance there won’t be a Strava in a year. [Update: 26 hours later, Strava disagrees with this summary of that portion of the call, stating only that “We are not yet a profitable company and need to become one in order to serve athletes better”.]
Is some of that posturing? Probably.
But is the undercurrent of it true? Most likely. You can only run an unprofitable business so long when people stop giving you money.
Still, my take is that this is less about Strava’s goals of being profitable, and more about the way they’re going about it. Instead of adding value and new features to the platform and convincing people to convert, they’re pulling the rug out from both free and paid users alike. They’re using the stick, instead of the carrot. And historically speaking – that doesn’t improve customer satisfaction.
Finally, it should be noted that while Strava is slashing and burning today, they did roll out a few new (positive) changes for premium users. First of all, you got a new desktop (web) route builder which better integrates Strava Segments and terrain filters (e.g. gravel vs not, more elevation option, etc…), and you also got some redesigned elements of the mobile app around training load tracking. Some of it is new functionality, a lot of it is mostly cleaned up user interface design. Those will show up in iOS/Android app version v150 starting today, but may take up to 48 hours for everyone to see. The restrictions will appear immediately. On a normal day I might have covered that more in-depth, but today is not a normal day.
Leaderboard Changes:
This first change only impacts non-paying users. By the way, while we’re at it, as of today Strava is ditching the ‘Summit’ moniker it created two summers ago. Now, you’re simply a ‘subscriber’ or not. Meaning, you’re either paying or not. If you’re not paying, Strava wants you to pay – and they’re even giving you a 60-day trial to test things out. Mind you, you’ll have to provide a credit card first, and if you forget to cancel in mid-July you’ll become one of those paying subscribers.
In any case, as of today, non-paying users will no longer see the full leaderboard. The ‘leaderboard’ is basically what is shown when you look up a Strava segment. It manifests itself in a few different ways, including mini-leaderboards and full leaderboards. For example, here’s a mini-leaderboard. You can see not only the top 10, but my self and my stats on it.
However, when I view the full leaderboard, I get additional key information – notably the ‘People I’m following’ and ‘My Clubs’, as well as ‘My results’ and ‘This Year’. Plus age groups and weight classes too. If you’re a non-paying member, you’ll get none of this going forward (you previously didn’t get ages/weights unless a subscriber).
In this context, if I was a non-paying member, I wouldn’t be able to see that I’m faster than GPLAMA here. It simply wouldn’t show up anymore, as if it didn’t exist. And frankly, I can’t have that.
Same goes for my group membership in the Slowtwitch.com ‘Club’, that too would go away, here on a different segment:
Free users can still create segments, as well as use the segment explorer to look at/search for segments. They can also see the KOM/QOM (due to being allowed to see the Top 10/10 Top 10 Female), as well as they can see their own PR’s.
To be very specific, here’s what non-paying users will see going forward:
Free users:
• Top 10 all-time and top 10 women Results in Leaderboard
• New Segment Creation is allowed
• Segment Detail screen is allowed (just not leaderboard details)
• Segment Explore / Search is allowed
• Flagging Segments is allowed
• Activity achievements is shown on a ride (KOM’s, CR’s, PR’s)
Paying Subscribers only:
• All segment leaderboards (including following/clubs/this year/age groups/weight classes)
• Analyze segment efforts
• Compare your results
• Analyze your efforts
So, here’s (on the mobile app), what a non-paying member should see starting today, and what happens if they try and do anything:
![clip_image002[4]](https://media.dcrainmaker.com/images/2020/05/clip_image0024_thumb.png "clip_image002[4]")
Now – obviously, if you don’t care about segments, then you probably won’t care about this.
I think though this lessens the value of Strava Segments for everyone, because it makes it far less interesting/valuable to non-paying users. They won’t care what their friends do, because they can’t see what their friends do. And if a tree falls in the forest…who cares? In other words, your friends that aren’t subscribers won’t bother competing with you on Segments anymore, because they can’t see the results of it.
And of course – this perhaps gets to the core of Strava’s realization: They’re far less a network about segment KOM’s than they are now a social fitness network. As much as Strava has resisted that aura being applied to them in the past, that’s what they are today. And it’s probably not untrue. I personally don’t care much about segments in my day to day riding (and certainly not running). I use Strava for essentially three things:
A) Finding/Building routes
B) Posting my activities and photos for others to see
C) Looking at what my real-life friends have posted recently
And that’s it.
Segments don’t appreciably enter into my day to day usage of Strava (unless I’m beating Lama on a segment when he doesn’t realize it, obviously). Of course, we’re all different. If you’re out there hunting segments with Strava Live Segments or Xert, awesome, more power to you. It’s clear that Strava wants you to have a subscription though, otherwise Segments are mostly useless.
3rd Party App Access:
Out of all the things they’re doing here, this is one of the most irritating ones. Mainly, because of how they’re doing it. Effective today at the exact same time this post publishes, Strava will break some portion of those 44,000 apps. The same app developers that have furthered Strava’s business and reach, Strava has decided to give zero notice to.
Of course, Strava counters they did notify a handful of ”larger developers” ahead of time. But most didn’t get notice. For those, Strava says:
“We realize these API changes could be especially challenging for some developers, so they’ll be non-breaking for 30 days, returning empty data during that time so they can make necessary adjustments. After June 18th, those endpoints will either omit the data or return an error message.”
Which is hilariously crass.
Here, let me translate what they’re saying for you into plain English:
“We realize that this is probably gonna break some (ok, most) apps. So instead of giving you time to fix your apps, we’re just gonna do it anyways and instead give you empty data that confuses your end users and app design, so this way it appears your app is broken – not Strava’s. Good deal?
I’m not aware of any reputable software development platform that gives zero notice to their development customers before breaking their apps. The appropriate course of action here would have been to give their 3rd party developer partners at least a month to update their apps to deal with this significant change. Most companies give many many months for upcoming deprecated features.
Plus – if the tables had been turned, and it was Amazon AWS (Strava’s hosting provider), and they simply sent them a note one morning and said: “Don’t worry, we’re just sending you empty data from your databases effective immediately.” – I’m guessing Strava wouldn’t feel the same way.
Look – I get why Strava needs to deprecate this feature. If they let 3rd party developers access it, then people could just go to 3rd party apps to get the leaderboards which are only available to paying members. But I’m not clear why they had to burn the house down to do it today at 10AM Pacific Time. If they didn’t break apps for 30 days, would that have really been such a big deal?
Strava likely still would have converted those users that cared about in-app access, without breaking their partner ecosystem. An ecosystem that at every turn is wary of Strava’s apparent habit of killing of apps that get too close, or too useful to users.
But even in the larger apps, there are features that will go away. Take for example VeloViewer, within this Zwift Insider leaderboard section. You’ll still see the segment placings (and times for non-paying users) – so in effect for non-paying users, it becomes more of a check-list of to-do’s, than a leaderboard of standings.
But wait – why is VeloViewer different than other apps? Well, apparently a small number of apps retain leaderboards, but only to show to Strava subscribers. VeloViewer has detailed the nuances here, which still involve less features now for non-paying Strava users. They’re the only app I’ve been made aware of that retains full leaderboard API access (aside from actual devices with Strava Live Segments).
Some aspects of VeloViewer that include leaderboards won’t change though. For example, the ‘Leaderboard’ tab on a given segment won’t change, because it is actually just an embed from Strava’s public site which shows the overall leaderboard + Top 10 women.
That’s still permitted, but isn’t done programmatically anymore. They’re just using the ‘Embed on Blog’ feature to get that to display:
I asked Strava exactly what was changing developer-wise, and they noted the following specific items from the API:
Segment Leaderboard data is not available anymore
- /api/v3/segments/:id/leaderboard
Segment Effort data is available for subscribers (but not non-paying users)
- /api/v3/segments/:id
- /api/v3/segments/:id/streams
- /api/v3/segment_efforts [Updated]
- /api/v3/segment_efforts/:id/streams
- /api/v3/activities/:id
*Note: An earlier version of this post included additional API deprecations. Strava has since changed the listings and corrected errors in their documentation that included those earlier added items. The current/final list is also now shown correctly here.
So basically, that first single line item above simply says “kill off segment result data”. Here’s what that API call did before today. Even if you’re not a developer, you can see (in yellow), what’s being killed off. To be clear, everything below is killed. But the yellow parts make it clear that they’re doing this so you can’t get the other premium leaderboard features via apps.
Meanwhile, the other ones that are allowed for paying members means that apps can still get individual efforts for the given authenticated athlete, but not segment-specific data like people within a leaderboard category such as following or age groups. So basically, as a paying member of Strava, I could still use App XYZ to track my specific pedaling on that segment (with things like cadence/heart rate/etc…), but not my rank (unless I ranked in the Top 10 – which pulls via DetailedSegmentEffort – ”kom_rank”).
Look, API changes and deprecations are a normal part of hosting a web platform. What’s not normal is how Strava is handling this. That’s the part they need to be called out for.
Route Builder Changes:
As part of the May 18th changes, Route Builder got a complete overhaul. They’ve added in new map styles, added sport type filters, show segments directly on the Route Builder, and also have a new surface type and increased elevation features.
But, if you’re not a paying member, you’ll never see it.
As of today, non-paying members lose access to the Route Builder entirely. Up until this point, any member could use the Route Builder for free. Going forward, non-paying members can no longer create routes within Strava, except as to copy an existing route from someone else (or your own ride). Existing routes you have in your account remain.
Here’s the two route builders side by side. At left is the new one. At right is the older one:
The main change here aside from all the user interface elements and map styling, is the addition of surface type preference – similar to what was added to mobile a month or two ago:
And along the bottom you’ll see a breakout of the surface type, just as you do on mobile now:
You can also now toggle segments within the map builder directly:
Previously you could ‘minimize elevation’, but now you can also ‘maximize elevation’, in case you have a soft spot for hills:
And they’ve incorporated the dark map them from the heat maps into the Route Builder, which is toggleable on the side. The other three map types, as well as heatmaps, were already viewable in the Route Builder.
Look, the new changes are nice. Nothing earth-shattering, though a nice clean-up.
The only problem? Likely less than 5% of Strava’s 50 million users will ever see them. Why? They’re not paying members.
Wrap-Up:
I’m sure Strava will think this post is overly negative, not highlighting enough of the new changes introduced today. And perhaps that’s the case – but I honestly don’t think those new feature adds are that big a deal. The Route Builder does have some minor nice new additions, but the training updates seem mostly to be more UI tweaks and filtering options than anything major. There’s some value to be had there, sure, but not as much value as is being lost today (for all users).
And look, I get it, Strava needs to find a way to make money. Every company should – that’s why they’re a company and not a non-profit. As part of a letter going out to all users today from their founders, they outline that part well, saying:
“This means that, starting today, a few of our free features that are especially complex and expensive to maintain, like segment leaderboards, will become subscription features. And from now on, more of our new feature development will be for subscribers – we’ll invest the most in the athletes who have invested in us. We’ve also made subscription more straightforward by removing packs and the brand of Summit. You can now use Strava for free or subscribe, simple.
This focus on subscription ensures that Strava can serve athletes decades from now, and in an up-front way that honors the support of the athletes we serve today. We plan to take what we earn from these changes and reinvest straight back into building more and better features – not devising ways to fill up your feed with ads or sell your personal information. We simply want to make a product so good that you’re happy to pay for it.”
But I think there’s still tons of value being left on the table that they can focus on in terms of new features to bring to people that would drive paying member adoption, rather than pulling features away that have been there a decade or so.
For example – why can’t clubs/teams create shared Strava routes that automatically sync into the team members’ accounts based on upcoming rides on a team calendar? Or, the ability for clubs to have a group routes page that includes a list of all popular routes that you could easily sync to your device. That would be a huge driver towards membership.
Or why can’t Strava Beacon then automatically integrate across teams/clubs so that people know where everyone is on a group ride? Or perhaps leveraging vehicle density/speed data integration already being gathered, into route builder as I floated this weekend. Or…or…or. There are countless ideas that people can come up with that would drive subscription revenue. All of which could be Summit paid-only features.
I’m just not convinced gutting Segments and routes for non-paying members is the right direction there. Nor is poorly communicating to your development community. But maybe I’m wrong.
With that – thanks for reading.
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How will this if at all affect the way or the data that TrainerRoad pulls from Strava to record the data of outside free rides to incorporate into your training calendar?
In case Strava did break that too, TR can also sync outside rides from Garmin Connect. (no such feature for Wahoo)
I tried Strava recording (directly) years ago a few times on MTB rides, along with my Polar v800, and quickly realized how far off Strava GPS distance, and elevation, averaging is. If you are relying on your Strava data as an “input” source, I’d recommend rapidly finding an alternative. I also saw then (many years ago now) that Strava was a fickle partner, so didn’t trust them long-term with my data.
All that to say, record with “something else” that syncs to Strava (many things do) AND to TR, Training Peaks, etc (ditto).
You do have to decide which you want passing through the data, my recommendation is use your source recording device (Garmin, Polar, ride-along-cartographer and monitoring nurse, whatever) and use that to feed them both, independently. (Yes, when I sync my watch post-ride/run, I get about 6 notification alerts from all the services that update as a result, LOL, can’t image what Ray gets!). I even have a Garmin account although I don’t own a Garmin device, LOL, just in case (and to be with the “in” crowd, LOL)
Instead of listening to user problems, Strava changes fonts and maps. Lol.
I keep an xls of my rides aside from recording on strava; but i like to see where I’ve been on the map and getting performance medals for pb’s etc. Non Paying Member.
majority of people use Strava as some sort of Facebook for their activities. These free users don’t care about segments and they also never going to pay for Strava. That would be like paying for a Facebook subscription, not going to happen. A minority use segments etc… , this change is clearly focused on them. Asking this group $60 / year now for what they basically had for free for years will be a tough sell, also don’t see it happen
Just subscribe – what’s the fuss for a few pounds/dollars month?
Remember that not everyone comes from rich countries. 5 $ is quite a lot if I am only interested in the strava live segment. Keidyś was conceived for 3 subscriptions was ok.
sorry 8 $ / month
Because £48 a year is actually a substantial amount of money for many people, and it’s very unclear that it’s value for money.
If you compare what Strava offers with their competition (Polar Flow, TP for training metrics; Mapy.cz, Komoot for routes), then in everything except big user base and Segments is Strava one hundred years behind the monkeys. Segments without comparsion with my friends (if they decided not to pay) are useless.
In the other hand – in this times there are a lot of virtual races using Strava API. They are cut off – practically without time even to tell participants whats going on? That is really unfair and I will not support anyone who did it. For $7.5 per month I can get full city-bike-sharing subscription in Prague.
Will you send me a “few pounds/dollars month?” Why not, what’s the “fuss?”
Your comment demonstrates a strange attitude I have seen in recent years. Don’t question, don’t utilize critical thinking or analysis….just pay. If Strava’s management was smart enough they would have figured out how to be profitable a decade ago. They can’t even offer a free premium trial with a new Garmin or other watch. No one seems to want to touch them (for reasons that are becoming obvious I think).
I would rather donate to an animal rescue or food bank. I spend $9.99 (CAN) a month on Spotify, $16.99 on Netflix, $15 to Adobe. I don’t need any more subscriptions especially when a service is removing previously free features. It’s bad form and doesn’t create trust with the brand.
“Just stop using apps that Strava just broke, what’s the fuss?”
Love how some people have no principles. I’m not paying though I could easily afford it. Their customer service is terrible, they never address bugs or functionality issues, and they sell my data as it is. You can be a sheep if you want, and “just pay” but I have those pesky principle things…
And what calculated timing, lots of people furloughed, out of work etc with lots of spare time who want to use it for good reasons then Strava takes away a chunk of what they have had for free and ask for money if they want it back whilst at this time many people are not as well off as they were before Covid. Come on Strava appreciate you’re a business but how about some human decency.
Ok sure Karen
This is the point. Most people that are complaining about paying aren’t because of the money, but because Strava customer service is terrible.
There are some bugs/issues that they never addressed that could easily be implemented, like, for example, having an algorithm that would instantly flag an activity when the activity type is wrong. For example, I go for a bike ride but I choose “run”, I do a segment at 50km/h beating all the competition in that segment and Strava won’t automatically flag the activity.
It’s so simple to implement some changes not allowing anyone to “run” faster than Usain Bold does, but the truth is that you can even go out for a ride in your car and beat any segment, you will only lose your KOM if anyone flags your activity.
Once I flew from Portugal (Porto) to the Netherlands (Amsterdam), and I recorded all the plane trip (yes, you can catch gps even in an airplane”) and I beat all the segments that were in the plane’s route, even if most of the time it was going at 800+km/h. I was on the leaderboard of all those segments and I only get flagged because people did it manually.
Of course than I deleted the “activity” after that, but I wanted to know if Strava had any algorithm to track that… It hasn’t.
This being said, how can you pay for an app that doesn’t implement simple changes like that?
Caffe Latte Tall $2.95 at Starbucks.$767 per year. Venti $4.15, $1,079 per year. Not counting weekends. And line is out the door day in and day out. In US at least.
$5/month!!! That’s expensive …if you do not need it. And nobody does. It’s a luxury.
Sabina is right. Really, what’s the fuss?
michael – starbucks is terrible coffee..
sabina. you are ignorant. 5$ is much money here. maybe not in your country. privilege blind.
there are many free apps do same. I will not use strava any more and consider closing account
Strava is very popular here in the Philippines among cyclists but most of people cannot afford to pay for the subscribers version, don’t even have credit or debit cards (transactions mainly with cash).
Are any of those who mentioned has “matched runs”? Seriously, it`s the only reason I was on Strava before the Day of Doom. It seems that Runtastic or Endomondo or Suunto Movescount or Sports Tracker hasn`t.
That exactly is the fuss :-)
Sabina,
Totally agree…
I think the main problem is that so many people expect this kind of stuff for free. I personally hate Freemium as a concept. I understand the model and even why it can work for a business: but I dislike this expectation of “I deserve this for free”. I’ve always paid for Strava myself because of that, even when I didn’t ‘need’ to.
I actually think their mistake was providing too much capability for free and for turning themselves into what Freegeek above describes as a “Facebook for activities” – the problem is people put up with FB adverts & FB data revenue in return for what is offered: but, let’s be honest, Strava was never going to get the same kind of traction from in-App or in-site adverts, nor the same kind of data value to marketers. I’ve commented on it being a corporate misstep for years – I think they should have gone subscription-based years back (probably tiered with a really low cost basic package) and only given really limited tracking access for free, if they felt they had to.
However, maybe they would have got less investment in that case, so who knows really? Still in my head, I’d prefer 10M folk paying $36 per year than 54M non-payers and 1M payers… I’d prefer 5M thinking about it… especially if there isn’t a clear way to monetize the non-payers…
And seriously, let’s get over the economic barrier issue on this – if Strava is a global tech company, then it can tailor pricing for the local market. If $5 per month is way too much for the Philippines (as suggested above), then they won’t get anyone signing up and, if they have a brain, then they drop it to the equivalent value locally that $5 per month is in the US or UK. Paying for the service shouldn’t be the issue – paying the right amount for the value given should be the issue (& that likely goes by locality – even if you get a few folk, who subscribe by VPN through the Philippines Strava geo-located sign-up page to save themselves a few dollars in that scenario.)
Admittedly, this is a situation of their own making and they have built a 55M user base and a decent portion of active users… and that is something that too many folks (including the legendary DCR, himself at times) take for granted. It is a bloody phenomenal achievement when you stop and think about it for a moment… and (for all the complaints on here) it is a flipping amazing system to have.
So, even if they have made commercial missteps, kudos to what Strava represents and I appreciate the pleasure it has brought me tracking my own and my friends activities all over the world…
Which brings me back to the original point – Strava is a commercial service, not an athlete’s right.
Let’s have them making money through them delivering value to their customer base. If it isn’t worth that money, then customers won’t subscribe… and then it is their own fault. Trying to live in the flawed economics of Freemium loss-making expansion doesn’t really serve anybody in the long run!
[Also, I am not saying that they are going about this exactly the right way, not that they aren’t making a load of customer service mistakes at the same time. As usual, I agree with DCR on his comments on the situation – I just think it is high time everyone stopped expecting tech platform services like Strava for free and companies like Strava stopped offering them (NB does not include trial subscription periods!]
{{As ever DCR remains the most relevant athlete site on the Interweb!}}
It’s just too much for building routes & comparing segments. – If you use more of the features then maybe you can warrant the cost. If it was half the price for the features I actually use then I would subscribe.
They’re accumulating and selling the user data so the claim about it being free is not entirely accurate, unless your point is to dwell on that and wag a finger at those on fixed budgets that are impacted by cost increases.
My big complaint was about the stupidity of the move (sudden unannounced) and what was done. Instead of adding additional value to the system they expended significant resources to take something away from people.
When the product becomes this much of an issue I tend to go on to other things and just say what ever.
I never wanted nor asked for a social media site for athletes, that’s not what I’m interested in, and based on the survey it sounds like a lot of others aren’t all that interested either TBH. FB is bad enough and just about as worthless as they get. You think you get a skewed view of what people’s lives are like on FB…just wait for the social media version of Strava…eeek!
But what gets me is that the only real feature of Strava that others don’t have is Segments, but with the known GPS system slop the inaccuracies are so great that even +100 watt increase cannot be guaranteed to change your time in a segment…which is a load of crap.
And that’s really why I’m not having much to do with Strava other than just let Garmin Connect transfer my rides and walks over so my few friends can see what’s going on.
Steve A
It’s actually shocking… Instead of creating more accessible options for users, you’re either in, or out. I think the packages idea was the way to go… I’d gladly pay for segments only and drop a lot of the other features of being a subscriber or whatever, but at a discounted rate. Now the joy of strava begins to be diminished…
Most folks that I introduced to cycling and strava was with the idea of “Hey, your training isn’t meaningless…just try beat me!” Now all those perks are down the toilet and the average guy won’t be motivated to shell out cash on something he doesn’t see immediate value to… 60 days isn’t long enough to build up meaningful fitness anyway…
Maybe a rant… But your idea of stick instead of carrot is spot on.
Thanks for the article.
Interesting. I would probably pay $2 per year for segments but now I’ll just disconnect my Garmin account from Strava.
Spot on, my thoughts exactly. I do not want or need all the bells and whistles but a package plan would of kept me on-board.
I have summit but only pay for one of the packages – $2.99 i think. What will happen now? They wont just upgrade me to the higher amount will they?
There is no more split into packages. If you opt out of the old package you will pay for everything.
Ray did an article on that a few weeks back (I think)… ultimately you are currently in a “grace period”, they’ve already begun that transition, after which you’ll have to pay the “full-price” but get “all features”. Or nothing and get, “not-much”. Think that ends this month, maybe next, not sure.
What about if I have a yearly single-pack subscription?
I.e. I paid in advance for 1 year of certain features?
Are these features going to be taken away from me mid-year?
I was a paid subscriber to Strava for more than a year, then cut back on yearly subscriptions to only monthly options – and only when I am really using them. So I tried Trainerroad, Zwift and now Rouvy (first premium, now standard).
5 EUR/month does not seem a lot but multiplying by 2 or three yearly subscriptions gets adding up. I got a Polar watch, and Polar Flow is sufficient to follow up training levels. I user cycle.travel for planning routes on the go – perfect.
In terms of social, I am spending more time in the GCN app than in Strava I have to admit. For me Strava becomes just a data repository and to collect photos of memorable rides. I’ll pay 2 EUR/month for that or accept somme commercials.
There used to be a subscription to three parts. It was ok. Payment for the whole is unnecessary if I am only interested in the strava live segment.
I understand that if they don’t get more income then Strava might go bust but I don’t know if this is going to help their cause.
It might work but it might also create some competition which could do them more harm than good.
They have such a big customer base they could easily use advertising to drum up some income. As a start just simply having a pro app which had an upfront fee with ads and all the current access and then a free app with no segments.
I’m not paying $120 per month for my wife and I, especially when 99% of my friends also won’t pay it, and half the fun after a group activity is comparing times.
Edit: $120 per year
If the payment was $ 2 a month, everyone would buy. 8 $ too much. The number of those who pay will not change much. Can they think?
Strava was giving away too much for free IMO, so this is a reasonable move from them to increase subscription. I don’t agree that this negatively impacts premium members at all.
And strava premium is cheap. So don’t be cheap. Just buy it.
Agree.
I have been a paid subscriber on and off for a few years, most recently of Analysis pack in Summit which actually met most of my needs. Now with this option gone and full subscription still providing fewer insights vs. Garmin Connect, I see no point is further subscribing.
In my view last 3-4 years of “improvements” as mostly marginal, cosmetic or of no use to me. As primarily a runner I see no need for Segments.
Routes functionality in running is meaningless as the underlying data/heatmaps is so polluted with races on public roads, rides/walks mis-classified as runs or old data including closed roads (which I let them know multiple times in public forums and with direct tickets). Actualy Garmin route creator is much better for runners.
So all in all Strava seems to have lost direction and resulted to some hectic moves.
Hello. What insights do you find Garmin Connect provides that Strava doesn’t do as well?
What is everyone using for the best free route builder? Is it worth the Strava price for those features, or is Garmins built in feature or the free version of ridewithgps better?
Check out Trail Router (web, Android, iOS). No affliation here – I came across it in the comments.
After this news broke I went to ride with GPS (RWGPS) and tried replicating a route that I’d made in Strava to see how RWGPS worked, the route came out all wonky. Makes me anxious about ditching strava when my subscription runs out shortly (which I want to do because this news pisses me off)
Ride with GPS has amazing route builder
I have been on ride with gps for years and I love their route builder it is the only online cycling service I pay for … be interested in hearing what you do not like about it.
Admittedly I haven’t used it much, tried it for about the 3rd time after this post came out, but found it much harder to work with that the strava route builder, which is about the only strava “service” I’d really miss.
Is it easy (seemless) to get RWGPS onto a garmin edge?
I don’t know – never had a garmin – I use lezyne – steps are download route from RWGPS – upload to lezyne interface website – then start navigation (on phone) linked to device- once transferred to device turn by turn works without phone
That’s easy: link to komoot.com is the best route builder.
Luke,
RwGPS is actually a very good route building tool (in fact, I laughed for the last few YEARS at Strava’s tool in comparison). RwGPS did JUST release a some new route building tools the other day and some changes that seem to (currently) negatively affect building new routes. Specifically, I see it it taking some very roundabout ways to get from one point to another point, and it does not typically do that. I’ve seen this more with the RwGPS map layer rather than the standard map layer, so I would first try changing the map layer. Beyond that, adjust your zoom levels in and out when it gives you a bad re-route, utilize the undo tool and give it a few more way points on the path that you want.
RwGPS has always been a tool that you have to know where you want to go and how you want to get there, and not an automatic route builder like the Strava route tool. There are benefits to both and as such I am a paying member for both. I used the free RwGPS for almost as long as they have been around, and I finally became a paid subscriber this last Christmas.
I’ve had struggles with Strava’s route builder, in areas I live (particular challenges, not “common” ones)… at least 2 “trail systems” I ride/run on have entrances/exits onto sidewalks or trailheads. Strava has the “trail” and has the “sidewalk” but adamantly refuses to “connect” the 2, by clicking a point on the sidewalk, it routes all the way back 6 miles to get to the point 50ft away, LOL, so have to use the “manual” mode and that aggravates me as much as anything.
I don’t do it often (never now, LOL, if it’s not free), I actually use Google Earth a lot for mapping, it’s not the friendliest (and obviously not ride/run/athlete oriented, just general-purpose), but very flexible and accurate, and doesn’t fight me when I tell it I want to go from “A” to “B”, LOL.
I have RwGPS, never have built a route on it though (haven’t opened it in years, LOL) may have to take another look based on this discussion.
I think that’s what Strava is risking here… it’s been the “easy” choice, and with a large base, “competition” has been indirect, since it was clear they were the gorilla in the market… I think this weakens them down to “large chimpanzee”, and maybe someone will now step up to say “we can do this too/better”. So many services offer more than Strava in athlete-specific areas, but lack the social portion, this may be the time to test the waters anew…
bikemap.net is pretty decent. I used to switch back and forth between strava and bikemap.net for making routes. They give a bit different results. But I guess I’ll just be using the latter now.
More people are out of work than ever before and we’re in the middle of a pandemic. Companies are stepping up all over the world to help people.
What great timing Strava. Very disappointing to say the least.
To be fair Strava is also struggling. They are not profitable and are taking steps to continue to be in business. If they fail everyone on their team will be out of a job as well. You can’t just keep going while losing money over and over. Strava is not a charity and you’re not entitled to the services they provide. They have employees that are entitled to a paycheck though.
Why don’t they add ads for the free users? It’s simple to do, they’d make a lot of money, and they could leave things as they were?
This is how every app works, they have 50+ million users, most of them are free, can you imagine how much money could they make with ads?
They have been complaining on facebook that they’re a small team, that they don’t profit at all…
What the hell? They are the most popular fitness app, by far, why didn’t they grow as a company?
Is the CEO too dumb or I’m missing something here?
I thought profit is what’s left over after all business costs and everyone’s (including directors) salaries have been paid. Charities often don’t make any profit but keep lots of people in well-paid jobs.
I wonder how much the directors take in salary?
Totally agree with you
What will Zwift and the Zwift Insider/Veloviewer communities do?
I understand that the data is flowing; Zwift or [Garmin/Wahoo/etc product] -> Strava -> Veloviewer.
Strava is acting as the aggregator and the data transaction point between the collection device and VeloViewer and other platforms, but as Zwift data is all recorded in Zwift (and Garmin data is all captured in Connect), can Strava be bypassed anyway; Zwift/Garmin -> Veloviewer?
If anything, I think there’s space for a rival aggregator or development point for VeloViewer. Why have Veloviewer as the focal point for Strava transacted data from hardware providers and Zwift when either VeloViewer or a new kid on the block could open up the input api’s from Strava, Garmin, Zwift, Wahoo, Sufferfest, RunKeeper, MapMyRide and all the others. An aggregator of all these different platforms providing data can then compile and compare. I then can view my Strava time on a road compared to my friend who may use MapMyRide or someone who’s connected direct via Garmin.
These days it’s expected. Reddit has an entire business model based on aggregation of web content and a user community.
Interesting update from VeloViewer — link to blog.veloviewer.com
1) He was prewarned about this, checked and hasn’t had his API restricted ( I can’t tell if this is because he is a valued 3rd party and got special or that the API changes didn’t affect his code )
2) 70% of Veloviewer paid users are Strava subscribers (me included) so for 70% of his users there is no change at all
3) For the remaining 30%, the changes are listed out and 99% works as before
What is the neatest way to export all your data FROM Strava ?
Figured with how the wind is turning there, it couldn’t hurt to have a backup of my activities somewhere else.
I was using SyncMyTracks apps for that, but I’m just getting errors from it right now (even if we have not yet passed the 10 AM PST deadline from Strava).
You can export all your personal data in a zip:
– Settings
– My account
(Now it gets confusing, they make it sound as if you would delete your account)
– Download or Delete Your Account: get started
– Download Request (optional): request your archive
Note: they only allow you to export this data once a week.
I use tapiriik. It syncs to your Dropbox account. I know what you mean about SyncMyTracks, it can be really slow and freezes regularly. With tapiriik, all the heavy lifting happens in the server side, so I can just set up the transfer and let the website do its thing.
Ray I am a paid supporter of DCRainmaker. Why, because I value the service you provide and I want to see you survive.
I don’t get anything more for my money than people who read your posts for free.
I do the same for Strava.
Rick, that makes sense. The crux of the matter will be whether people like it enough to support or just stop using, right?
Excellent point, Rick. I’ve been using Strava free for years, it’s been great to feel connected with my friends and be inspired by my favorite athletes.
Employees should be paid for their work. I’m glad Strava is being upfront about its needs. If people don’t want to pay, continue using the free app with limited features. Most of the features don’t interest me, but I’ve enjoyed the app for free for years and am happy to subscribe.
When I look at my own behavior with regard to Strava, I think this makes sense. It’s probably one of my top-5 websites. I’m on it several times a day, and I get a lot of value out of it. On the other hand, I was an on-and-off subscriber because I didn’t value the premium features at all. To me, it would be a no-brainer to pay for Strava if that were the only way I could get on it. But the big catch is that it would lose a lot of value if my friends weren’t on it, and many of them probably wouldn’t pay a cent for it. That’s the dilemma of a lot of social network and app companies.
Ultimately I started subscribing again last fall out of a feeling of moral obligation: I like Strava a lot more than I like $60/year (which is really a tiny fraction of what most endurance athletes spend on their sport), I want them to succeed, there’s no guarantee that they will, and they’re definitely not gouging anyone.
Anyway, while I get that some people might think this is not a smart move, I don’t get the anger. Why do people think that they’re entitled to have a couple of hundred people work full time to provide them a complicated product for free?
This all sounds like great news. How else will this company make money. They’ve been struggling since they launched and had to resort investors. We want everything to be free because of how it’s become accustomed in the tech world. But at what cost, ads? Free to play but with micro transactions? No thank you! We all got to enjoy Strava free for years, I think it’s time to give back for all the great work they have done—yes with a few bumps.
To me, as one of the few people acually subscribing to premium… I can’t help but like this… Now, I finally feel I’m paying for features I’m actually using. Let’s face it, they were giving away all the good stuff for free and then had some niche features they wanted you to pay for, in the long run (ie. when venture capital runs out) that is not a sustainable business model.
I personally think this is over-aggressive towards Strava. Premium is great value. There is still a lot to be had from the free access. They have turned a corner and are now adding lots of great new features. The route builder is superb. This is classic entitlement culture. Strava need to make premium more attractive to survive – it will always need to be a combination of adding new subscriber only features and making some existing elements subscriber exclusive. The majority of users use Strava to log all of their activities and to keep track of their friends, and give kudos. Segment leaderboards stands out as a premium feature.
A lot of rationale comments here. Good to read.
Strava made many mistakes, and they will continue to do so. Companies make mistakes. Strava being funded as they were never quite figured out how to do it and now they are turning to its users for help. It feels good to help them although I don’t get much (if anything) from the paywall features.
If something better comes along, and people mass migrate, then I will follow the crowd. I guess Strava just needs to be grown up enough to accept that too.
Ray, your post is out of touch with reality, and insular. I cannot speak for Strava management, you are writing as-if Covid-19 were not present.
Why does that matter? Because Covid-19 wracked the venture capital market. Strava’s ability to raise capital during lush times provided the luxury of being able to burn investor cash until it slowly tweaked the product to figure out how to make money.
Overnight, that disappeared. Strava instantly has much less time to twiddle with little product packaging / pricing changes until it finds the magic combo. And *every month* that it continues to lose money puts it one month closer to *completely collapsing*. It now needs to act as fast as possible to see if it can survive on a subscription model. Do one change as fast as possible to get a subscription bump, and focus on people who pay. Remember: Thus is a Freemium model, and a vendor needs to have “just enough” value in “free” to get people to try it, then make it hard to stay on the free level and convert people to paid.
If it cannot get subscribers to pay, the only other business model is the advertising model, introducing ads from third parties into your stream, and make you (the athlete) the product it sells to other “customers” (advertisers). If that is needed, you (the Strava user) should presume a feature freeze for you for quite a while, until the Strava engineering team finishes developing features that serve the advertisers (vs you). And be prepared for your feed to start to look like FaceStagram with an ad every third rider post.
Virtually every startup with whom I work is going thru this same internal reality check about burning cash, and the need to make bold decisions fast. It’s life or death time, baby.
Compared to switching to an ad-based model, changing segment access shows faithfulness to us as users. It doesn’t change who the customer is. And frankly if people aren’t willing to pay for Strava, maybe it deserves to die.
I have long resisted subscribing to Strava. I got what I want for free. But the Segments-for-Pay change was enough to get me to pay (and I did it before I read Ray’s post). Strava’s decision had its desired effect on me. And I’m not bitter; it’s time I pay. It’s time others do, too, and this was the right call my management.
Edit: Left out “but” after the comma in the 2nd sentence; “my” in the last sense should be “by”.
“Ray, your post is out of touch with reality, and insular. I cannot speak for Strava management, you are writing as-if Covid-19 were not present.”
COVID-19 impacts every company.
However, the core of Strava’s issues isn’t this year. The core of Strava’s issues is that for the past 3-4 years (until 2020, when in Nov 2019 they replaced their CEO), Strava acted as if users weren’t the priority. They wholly admit that now. They made virtually no changes to the product that benefited users.
As a result, they saw stalled growth of Premium/paying users. That’s on them. That’s not on users. Nor is on COVID-19.
Strava’s success *IS* because of those free users. They make up 96-97% of their user base. Without them, Strava would be empty. And the appeal would largely be lost for most. There’s nothing insular about what I wrote – that’s reality.
Look, I have zero issue supporting/paying for Strava. I do it myself and have for many years. My issues is how they handled this. That’s all. Re-read what I wrote.
Thanks for replying.
I’m fully aware of your bottom line issue. In fact, I acknowledge – and somewhat agree – that *how* they handled this could have been better. I’d have (a) announced the anticipated change, (b) had a more stepped-plan to migrate the entire set of 3rd-party apps, (c) had a stiff backbone when the inevitable user blowback happened, and (d) rolled out this change in 60 days, not “today”.
So please accept my harsh words as the product of reading your post immediately after waking. Maybe I wasn’t thinking clearly yet.
Nonetheless:
– I’m willing to give them slack for the speed at which they did it. The capital markets just changed; lack of access to cheap cash to burn just got real. Every business coach (like me) is advising companies to Not. Waste. Time. Act fast.
– I remain unconvinced that free users are Strava’s path to long-term success IF they want a non-advertising business model. I’d have planned to get to 80% paid, 20% free if it were me.
I note that a blended business model is out there; ad-based for “free” users, and let users pay for a subscription to nuke the ads. If I were the CEO, I’d “test” that with 5% of the free user base, and see what the economics look like. Data speaks louder than words.
Thanks again for replying.
Jay –
While I think you make some valid points, I think covid and access to venture capital is less relevant than you portray. First, it is hard to call Strava a “startup”. They have been in business for 11 years. Second, they have taken *6* rounds of funding (the last, Series E, in 2017).
link to crunchbase.com
At this point, investors have more than enough info about Strava to decide if they want to throw more money into it. Is their investment going to give them any sort of return? Strava has had a decade to become profitable and hasn’t been able to do it.
Strava also missed out on getting bought when a lot of fitness apps were acquired. As Ray has pointed out, Strava is not a great acquisition target as they are too costly and don’t add much to Garmin, Wahoo, etc. It is also unclear why Facebook, Google, or Apple would want Strava at this point. And even if Strava were acquired, would the price even generate a return for the current investors? Lastly, going public seems totally off the table (even before covid).
Given all that, why would a VC pony up for a Series F round? Those rounds are pretty rare to being with. While covid isn’t helping, it is looks to be way down the list of why Strava would have a hard time getting VC money. Or getting it on terms that were not onerous.
A couple things. This is just speculation on my part. I have no inside info and am interested in other views on this. Second, I am a huge and long time Strava. Paid member since they added it. I really want them to succeed.
Maybe they are still struggling with the technical challenges from their aws talk:
link to m.youtube.com
(Tldr: leaderboards are extremely resource intensive and have driven some moderately interesting architectural decisions at strava)
I’m a subscriber and think the removal of leaderboards for free members is a bad idea, It not only removes the incentive for free members to improve their fitness and compete on the segments, it will lessen the competition for paid members on the same segments because the free members aren’t incentivised to better their segment times.
I subscribed to Strava *specifically* to get Strava Live Segments on my Garmin Edge 830. Now the leaderboard’s going to be full of old PRs belonging to athletes who have little visibility how those PRs stack up against their followers.
It’s pretty simple really, Strava uses Snowflake as their datawarehouse solution, a solution well known for ‘price explosion’ with high query counts.
They are probably going insane from their query bills, and see this as the only way out
“Freemiuming” features that are actually expensive to provide, per click, would certainly be a smart strategy when they are forced to act. Perhaps increase subscriptions, definitely decrease costs.
Still sad to see then with their back against the wall like this, I was gladly paying not for the marginal subscriber benefits but for the keeping the platform inviting to those who would never subscribe, either for lack of money or for being on the fence about uploading their rides at all. More “stick” could easily ruin that
Lol what a bizarre place to assail snowflake. I think you might be obsessed.
Ray – do you have any past pieces on platform reviews/platform comparisons e.g. Strava vs Training Peaks vs Garmin Connect Vs Golden Cheetah etc.? Or plans to do such an article? Appreciate a lot will be apples vs oranges but think it would still be very interesting and no doubt you’ve spent enough time on them to know where they excel/suck.
My (unoriginal) two cents, with any software you drive users to premium tiers by adding features to that tier not removing from the lower tier
Nothing that’s focused on training platforms (I did one for trainer apps of course).
The challenge I find with training platforms is they change so quickly (as Strava has showed this year). So a post quickly becomes out of date, and even more so because anything I mention I don’t like I find companies tend to fix…and then immediately ‘demand’ I update my post to reflect it’s been fixed/changed/tweaked. It becomes death by a thousand cuts.
I think there are aspects of this I’d like to focus on – such as data portability, privacy, etc… But I’m not sure about a straight feature bake-off.
Would also be interested in such articles, and I belive privacy, data portability (and the like) orientation would be great writing angles.
I hope Strava does keep changing quickly and doesn’t revert to their old ways. It’s great you have a voice they listen to because the Strava user forums are full of frustrated users with ideas/bugs/requests that have gone ignored for years.
Another good category to include in such an article would be the ecosystem around each platform. Do they even have a public API, are there any interesting 3rd-party extensions out there, etc.
If you do write something about privacy be sure to mention Strava’s 2019 API changes where they crippled a chunk of their API (again, no notice and their online documentation STILL hasn’t been updated to reflect the changes a year later) in the name of privacy. Just try using the half-baked Clubs API. It now only returns a handful of fields and crucially doesn’t include any sort of identifier (neither athlete ID or activity ID) so it’s totally useless!
Ray – would a Product Comparison Table style format be a better alternative? Thanks for your work.
In the simple words, for the past 11 years they didn’t do anything for the users that they where asking for . Those free users build their company and now they showing them middle finger by taking away free stuff that they offer.
With the 55 million users if they would say ok, no more free accounts everyone is paying $1/month ,in my opinion they will make tons of money and no one would say anything.
“Still, my take is that this is less about Strava’s goals of being profitable, and more about the way they’re going about it. Instead of adding value and new features to the platform and convincing people to convert, they’re pulling the rug out from both free and paid users alike. They’re using the stick, instead of the carrot. And historically speaking – that doesn’t improve customer satisfaction.”
Strava has been doing this for years, and is now betting the farm on being the “only game in town” as they have been since 2009. Beating us into paying fees instead of using the tried and true method of using ad dollars, and offering levels of subscriptions to go “ad-free” or unlock other premium features.
I think this will kill Strava as people will start to use garmin connect routes and segments, if you have a high end watch and paid for it why go for strava too, the same if others provide such options.
They are killing themselves. Everyone I know does check his/her segments and like to see how they did today, or this year. Especially comparing with people you know. It is that competition that drives a lot of people, and when that’s taken away, I’m not sure but I think they do themselves way more damage. I think segments are the most poplular feature of Strava, and when you take that away after 10 years, the community will shrink. It becomes less interesting for other to pay, when the community shrinks. That’s why I think they do themselves more damage. It is better to find other things and put that in the paid version.
Note
I’m a paid user, it’s not about me not wanting to pay. It is about that a community gets big when the core functionality is free, and you gater a ring of paid member by having added value in paid packages.
Pretty much agree with your points, but perhaps the damage will not be quite as big of maybe a lot of people hardly ever drill down in leader boards that much.
It’s also not clear for me from the article, do they at least kept some of the non-individualized boards, “this year” and “today”? Technically I think that those exist as mini-boards and they are also not individualized (no filter unique to your user ID) so they are probably much cheaper to provide. This might provide enough reading material to keep users engaged
i agree as well with all of your points, and to tag along with the other reply, i think the whole leaderboard should be visible for free. if you want to search through all the pages go for it. the sorting by age, weight, following, day/month/year should be a pay feature. probably should be able to always view your efforts though. if i’m just browsing through strava i love to look at random peoples profiles and rides. some are real inspiring, and i learn a lot of new routes etc. but if only 10 people and 10 rides are available to look at, that gets boring real quick
I agree with your points and add that I use the matched run feature to see how I am improving (or not). I won’t pay $60 for something I can get from Garmin.
Agreed – part of the fun of using Strava was to go and see which of my friends are exercising and encourage them when they go long, hard, fast etc (they are killing the segment PR feature so some of this being killed). I also used like the matched run (ride) feature – there are 8 common routes I do from my house and i liked being able to see how I am improving (or not) each time. I’m not prepared to pay $60 for this and they are devaluing the social element.
I won’t remove from Strava yet but I don’t see why I should share my data if they don’t provide value.
Is any other company doing something similar to Segments?
Garmin has a segments option
Ride With GPS has a segments feature as well. It’s not quite as polished as Strava but rankings are there and it works pretty much the same way.
– nick
Yeah, but they are pretty bad. If Garmin would step up and make their segments stuff actually work they might be able to seize an opportunity here.
Hello Ray,
Maybe it’s time for a route planning buyers guide. Garmin, Strava, ride with GOS, map my ride, and so on.
So, I have downloaded my archive from Strava via the link they have send me. Just in case Strava is going offline. Received a 500 mb zip file with pdf, zip, pictures, etc files. Can someone explain to me what I can do with this zip? Is there a way to upload it in 1 go to another platform? I have around 900 sessions and 1200 pictures in the zip, would be impossible to upload manually.
One option is to import the activities into your own computer running GoldenCheetah: link to goldencheetah.org
That won’t address the social or segment features of Strava. It will give you much more insight into your riding performance.
Thanks Bob, will give it a try!
Well, to be honest I was a paid member only for Beacon. Segments don’t really interest me as I prefer to do trails and seeing as I can use LiveTrack instead there really isn’t much left to interest me, save for posting the odd FB type post and checking on friends.
With Komoot’s new sync’ing I can use that for route planning (and TBH I’ve found Strava’s route planner terrible) and for analysis Runalyze offers much more useful stuff and I’ll probably subscribe to them instead (and it’s much cheaper too)
You are overly negative, yes! :) The key value proposition within Strava is the leaderboards, and always has been. Everything else has always just been coating. Why should the company provide this free of charge to 95 million freeriders is beyond my comprehension. They don’t even show ads! Losing free shit always ticks people off, but keep calm and look from this at a business angle. The paying users cannot continue subsidizing all these cheapskates. Not to mention letting 3rd parties make money off them.
I also view the transition as being pretty well planned and executed as they have significantly improved the service offering over the past few months and offering more value to paying users.
Boom, there 8t is. High 5 brother from another mother!!
The issue is that their free user base exists because of leaderboards. Taking those away means the majority of their free users will leave, which will eventually leave the leaderboards empty. They’re gutting their biggest feature that pulls in new users.
Additionally, they’re destroying 3rd party apps, which are a HUGE part of strava. The lack of transparency is pretty disgusting, tbh, and shows that developers can’t trust Strava to warn them of upcoming changes.
Also, why not put a few ads in the feed? Nobody will care if they’re targeted correctly.
This just reeks of a disconnect between management and users. It basically removes the MAIN reason folks use strava.
I paid for Strava for over 8 years. I did it to support them. I couldn’t ever have cared less about their leader boards. I used routing and it built community. I tracked long rides.
I hoped they would leverage the large user base to do great things with cycling. They did not. That’s cool. That’s their prerogative.
But Leaderboards were not something most of my very active cycling friends cared about. Everything else just coating? Please. That’s a very shortsighted take of the user base.
I stopped paying because it brought no value to me after trying to help fund their operation for years. Feature requests unanswered, noise on feeds amplified, routing a mess.
I read bunch of comments here and can’t help but think people don’t understand business in the new era. I think Strava doesn’t understand where their value is. Their value is getting millions of people to upload data for free and give it to them.
They should be looking for away that will get every cyclist in the world to upload to their platform for free. Then they should find every way to monetize that data. That is the value of this company going forward, not some route builder or segment leaderboard.
I can think of a million ways they can make revenue of that data. Figure out where cyclists are riding mostly and sell that data to companies looking to by billboard space on the road with adds that target cyclists is just one dumb idea. I am sure if they hired some real big data analysts they could figure out interesting ways to make money off that data.
I think they are going the wrong way, they should be looking for a way to make their platform completely free and monetize the data.
I think companies like this are underestimating the amount of people out their that are sick of monthly fees. I know myself I don’t want anymore monthly fees. NONE.
In the US, just look to all those people that are “cutting the cable”. Their is a move away from monthly payments and a return to just the basics.
Depends on how much you want your data used for various purposes. Maybe anonymized data, but look at all the things Facebook or Google does.
Strava already do monetize their data – e.g. transport departments all over the world buy it to look at the number of cyclists on their routes. It’s very expensive, and clearly it’s not making them enough money to support the other features, so they are looking for alternatives.
It also turns out that Strava have decreased their rate-limiting for new API users. They used to allow 30,000 requests per day and they now only allow 1,000 requests per day. This will be a real problem for some API users and the “Developer forum” already has reports of people hitting it. Fortunately existing developers seem to be keeping their original 30,000 limit so that’s something.
Note, there has been no notification about this and it isn’t listed at link to developers.strava.com, the number was silently changed at link to developers.strava.com
My advice as someone that pays premium for 3 months of the year (peak summertime, solely for Segments):
Just put ads in the damn feed, Strava.
It’s 2020. Everybody and their mother understand the quid pro quo of the internet. We get free stuff, you display ads.
Facebook’s 3 billion users don’t mind.
Come on. Get it over with.
This!
Monetize the data, make the platform free. Fee based services like this don’t really have a future or at the bare minimum limit their growth. The amount of people wiling to pay a monthly fee is limited. Strava is not training peaks or HBO like people try to compare it to. Quite frankly its a gimmick, but a really cool gimmick.
But gimmicks are not necessary. I think its cool to look at a leaderboard, or segment, but I am not paying for it. Quite frankly, every cyclist I know wont pay for strava. My elite friends use training peaks and coaches, my non elite friends either strava free stuff or nothing at all.
Precisely. Those willing to pay would get an ad free experience. An ad banner at the top or bottom would pose no issue for me if I didn’t have to pay.
“They’re using the stick, instead of the carrot”
I agree 200%, I used to pay for a summit account, mostly to support them despite the lack of new features, and despite I use garmin connect for analysis. Then they banned relive, removed more and more things for free accounts instead of introducing killing features for summit ones (just my opinion). This was a so stupid move the relive thing, I never renew my subscription since then.
I would clearly like to renew my account and support them, but I don’t see any carrot so far, and their attitude with third parts developers is so poor :(.
I’m afraid that If one day Garmin decides to open their connect platform, and introduce more “social” features they will kill Strava
I think this is absolutely the right move, no questions. I’ve come from a corporate background and the amount of “free/included” features for the freeloaders was unheard of.
I’m sorry, but if your interested in the benefits of tech, then you have to pay for the tech, full stop no quarms.
It’s not a lot and to almost every nation that will be the target audience, more than affordable. Disney, £60, Netflix, £120, etc etc.
If you have the energy to moan and groan and list all the competitors you already use then that’s cool, bye bye.
Sick it up, get back on the saddle and if you can do better, do better, create your own infrastructure, create your own api’s. I honestly don’t know a Dev op that would whom at this even remotely.
The biggest issue is ppl have got used to a good service with a great interface and a good customer base and don’t want to pay for it. Fair enough, now move along and moan somewhere else!
Peace out, stay safe or dont get caught. P.S. noticed the included “subscribe for £20x to dcrainmaker, that’s expensive for secondhand knowledge and a fairly single minded attitude.
You have been given something for free for almost a decade but not you have to pay for it. The result is a huge rant?! I really was expecting more from you DC Rainmaker.
See, this thinking is fundamentally wrong and a misunderstanding of how mass-user platforms, including Strava work.
Free users were not ‘given’ something. They were part of the financial and corporate equation that made Strava what it is today. Without the 97% of users that don’t pay, there would be no Strava. There would be nobody on the platform and it’d be one of the countless has-been other apps out there. But it’s not. It’s not because of volume. Strava needs those people, else the foundation of almost any social platform fall apart.
Strava used those free users (and paid users too) for the past decade to market to you from various industry companies (where they got paid for all assortment of things), to market your data to municipalities (where they got paid), and to market the platform as a thing worth beingon to paying users. If only 3% of attempts ever existed on Strava, Segments would become a lot less interesting. If only 3% of your friends existed on Strava, your feed would be a lot less interesting. And if only 3% of Segments existed on Strava…well, actually, that part would probably be fine.
Fun fact: I just went through my Strava feed (people I follow) for activities uploaded today. Only about 30% of those are from paying members. My feed is a blend of real-life friends and some industry people – I don’t follow a ton of people (57 in total).
As for my post, my point is simple: Strava made changes that significantly impacted the developer community with zero notice. They took away features that for a decade have been branded as free and core to the Strava experience.
I have zero issues with Strava finding ways to shift features to paid subscribers, or to have all new features being paid-only. The problem is they effectively just pulled a bait and switch. Whether that ends up making business sense for them we’ll have to see.
A guy in the neighborhood is giving away apples for free every day from his garden. Not the fancy apples from the tree (you have to pay for those) but the ones that are on the ground. The guy also lets business have free apples and soon there are juice bars all over the city using his apples.
After 10 years the guy (out of the blue) decides to charge people for all apples – even the ones on the ground. Business can only pick up apples that are damaged.
Now what? Should you just start paying for the apples? Should you be happy for getting free apples for 10 years? Should you write sarcastic blog posts about it? Should you plant some apple trees to get a better feeling for the work your neighbor has put in over the last ten 10 years?
The phrase you’re looking for is “critical mass”. Without it, leaderboards are useless. In this space, only a free low-friction app can have any chance at critical mass.
The “bait and switch” is a perfect summary.
Great post DC. Thanks for the info. I don’t disagree with STRAVA. It’s like investing in stocks. Whatever business you support on a daily basis, MCard, Telus, etc. That is what you invest in also.
So why am I still seeing the leaderboards and using the route planner (on the website)? These changes are to take effect when?
Strava’s saying it could take up to 48-hours for changes to take effect (till Wednesday sometime).
$5, dude. You don’t think that the things that you get from Strava are worth five dollars a month?? I can appreciate what you said about their not giving app developers enough notice, but to suggest–as you did throughout this piece–that a company around which a significant portion of the endurance sporting world revolves should continue to be unprofitable is ridiculous. TrainingPeaks, Spotify, Sufferfest, Fulgaz, Zwift, DownDog, and TrainerRoad all cost at least twice this much, and I pay for all of those without hesitation because I value the product that they create. I don’t understand why we are willing to pay thousands of dollars for bikes, gear, and entry fees, but we think that we should get Strava for free.
“You don’t think that the things that you get from Strava are worth five dollars a month??”
Where did I say that?
“that a company around which a significant portion of the endurance sporting world revolves should continue to be unprofitable is ridiculous”
Or where did I say that?
“I don’t understand why we are willing to pay thousands of dollars for bikes, gear, and entry fees, but we think that we should get Strava for free.”
Or that?
C’mon folks – at least read the darn article before commenting and making up things.
I did read the article. From the outset and then throughout the piece, your irritation with Strava is clear. The obvious suggestion is that you think that they’re moving to a model that opens certain features to subscribers only is the wrong thing for them to do. Am I reading between the lines? Yes, of course I am, but my deductions based on the tone of the piece are not off-base.
Nope, you’re incorrectly reading between the lines.
Literally the last few lines of the piece explicitly says that.
I went back and re-read the last section based on your suggestion here. I don’t see anything that counteracts the tone you set in the opening paragraph and then substantiated throughout the piece.
Your irritation is clear, and that’s fine. And like I said, I agree with you that they should have given app developers more grace. But don’t pretend that you don’t understand your clear implication here.
Well George, your reading comprehension is lacking to say the least then. You should probably stick to tricycles rather than comment here.
“$5, dude. You don’t think that the things that you get from Strava are worth five dollars a month??”
Remember, that Strava’s users are not based in US only. $5 a month is a significant amount in Eastern Europe for example, not to mention other areas of the world.
I’m not saying I wouldn’t be prepared to pay for the service, but I think there should at least be a few different options at different price points.
Btw. Endomondo is cheaper ;)
e-bikes have made the segment portion of Strava worthless anyway, at least for MTB. Yes I am a MTB’er that reads this blog :)
I think this move was to aggressive and shows their style. What if they want to change something for the premium users in the future? No announcement or warning just do it, to Machiavellian for me :)
I always think it’s amazing how much people think they should get for free. If everyone was prepared to pay, the subscription could be very low. Tech companies put huge resources into getting this tools to us, they deserve to get paid. Or put ads in! There, I said it!
you are not getting it for free. You are giving them your data and rights to use it. DATA has value. I don’t understand how people can’t see this. Look at how much money facebook makes of your browsing history.
So glad that I left Strava years ago. I think it will eventually be sold along with the user’s data.
I never understood the value of it and it was kinda confirmed that it hasn’t been profitable.
All the comments on here touting Garmin Connect as an alternative or successor to Strava – are people forgetting the fact that GC only works with Garmin devices? So:
a) You’ll only get people using Garmin devices on there
b) It makes shifting away from Garmin to a competitor’s device in the future a bigger issue
c) Even if Garmin did open its doors, would it really be a good situation where a manufacturer owned and controlled the go-to fitness app?
I’m happy piping my data through GC as a secondary repository, but I still want it hosted on a quality independent platform.
You can manually upload a gpx/fit file from any device to the Connect website.
Yeah, but that’s way more effort than most people would want to bother with, plus then does everyone agree on using Garmin?
While I think it’s a pretty unfriendly what Strava has done here to its partner ecosystem, I feel like most of that “partnership” is a one-way street. Strava provides a lot of value to its partners for little in return as far as I can tell. Personally, I think it’s crazy to build a product around another company’s proprietary API and data services. But there’s still a nicer way to cut people off and at least a month but probably more like 3 months would have been a better way to sunset that API.
Personally as a Garmin and Training Peaks user, I just don’t see any value from paying for Strava. I wouldn’t be particularly sad if it went away. It’s fun to see my friends’ workouts but its not exactly a critical part of my life. Garmin Connect already has all of the safety features for when I’m out riding for my wife to follow me and Training Peaks integrates so well with so many platforms that it is where I run my training plans from. I’ll never be competitive on a segment and have never purposefully tried to beat anyone on them.
The only way I could see ever paying for Strava is if they had all of the training features of Training Peaks. Then it would be worth it to have that platform instead since it has all of the other stuff. I don’t begrudge them for trying to turn a profit but nothing about their offering is very exciting.
I think your comment hits the nail on the head for any serious cyclist.
“Personally as a Garmin and Training Peaks user, I just don’t see any value from paying for Strava. I wouldn’t be particularly sad if it went away. It’s fun to see my friends’ workouts but its not exactly a critical part of my life.”
I feel the same way and I don’t have 1 cyclist friend that pays for strava but plenty pay for training peaks.
It’s May 19th and I was still able to use Route Builder (Beta) on my desktop – I’m a non-subscriber at the moment. Is it just a case of a rolling phase-out, you think?
Strava Feature Suggestion/Request
Would anyone else that uses TrainerRoad and Strava find the following useful?
In the last ~8 months TR released a new feature that gives you the option to perform your indoor workout outside. (To make it easier to find a route that fits the workout, they simplify the intervals somewhat.)
So, I’m now often looking for a road segment that is say 0.5 miles in length with an average gradient of 2% with a standard deviation of no greater than X. Or, a segment of 1.2 miles with an average gradient of 1% with a standard deviation of no greater than Y. I currently use Google Maps for this but of course there is no indication there of the segment’s gradient variance. When I get to that segment of road, I start my intervals, going up for the effort then soft pedaling back down during the rest period then back up. Rinse and repeat per the TR instructions shown on my Garmin Edge head unit.
The feature I want is to have Strava search my local area for segments that meet specifications related to length, average gradient and consistency.
The Article Writer hit some things on the head.
1. Elitism: You can’t be an elite athlete app and make money. 99% of users are not elite. Elitism kills apps. You have to focus on the social to make revenue.
2. Group Ride Beacon: Put a feature like Live Beacon in a ride group and instantly your App becomes a friends and Family favorite. People on rides get lost. Then what do they do, open Trailforks and go solo, and feel left out.
3: Tiered Membership:
– Free. Self Record and post pics friends can follow.
Athlete: Tons of Metrics and Leader boards.
– Individual: Leader boards
– Family and Friends: Leaderboards and Live Group Beacon
4: Integrate Trailforks (or like function) somehow so you can see not only where you went, but where you can go. Figure out pay tiers to add this too.
Frankly I think this is a load of crap from Strava. I just went and looked, I uploaded by first Strava activity on February 27, 2012. Pretty much every activity that I have done since that time has been uploaded to Strava. Really the only reason I use Strava is for segments, and that is what I have been using it for for more than 8 years now.
I have paid for membership from time to time, but never found any value in what it was giving me. There was a time when I used Strava to analyze my rides, but TrainerRoad has since added that ability and done it with significantly more success than Strava ever did (without an increase in cost to my membership I might add). I have used it to map routes, but found it more trouble than it was really worth. And as someone who is more on the “clydesdale” side of the bike racing world I have always liked the weight class leader board, but again I couldn’t see paying a monthly membership fee just for that. One feature I have used forever is the matched runs feature…so thanks for that Strava.
As Ray discusses in his wrap up, if they had added value I likely would have paid for a membership (I love the idea of using beacon to track group rides). I was a poor grad student with a new baby when I uploaded that first run, so paying for Strava was out of the question. Now, all these years later, I have a successful enough career that I am lucky enough to have a little disposable income to spend on “toys” like Strava. But since all they have done is strip away the features that I have used for 8.5 years, while still not really adding any value that I can’t get elsewhere, they are dead to me. I’m an engineer, not a business person, but I am going to go out on a limb here and say that if your on the brink of bankruptcy in the next 12 months the best move is not to alienate long time users. Maybe instead of withholding features that have been a core of your business for a decade, try thinking outside the box a bit about how you can leverage the power you have with such an immense existing user base.
Startups take note: If you want to start an app that leverages GPS data to create virtual races now is the time. Advertise it well and you could poach about 55 million users without breaking a sweat.
In the meantime, if people are looking for an excellent platform to analyze rides (and a whole lot more) get a TrainerRoad membership. You can’t imagine the value for money that you get. Also, their business plan ADDS features for users, which is nice…
Thanks for that. I am looking for ideas to move away from Strava. Totally agree that if another app can add the segments feature and manage the business side of things properly, there are a lot of pissed off people who would switch. SOMEBODY PLEASE DO THIS! Personally, I’d PAY another app for this and NOT use Strava for free totally based on principle and the fact that I would now be ashamed to be associated with an app that works in this underhanded way. My issue is 100% on HOW Strava handled this. There are actually a lot of bugs within Strava that I put up with (and shitty customer service when it comes to feedback or feature requests) because I enjoy the segments and leaderboard competition with my friends. When they take that and everything else I valued hostage and call it ‘asking’ for support, I already have such low trust in them that it becomes not worth it.
I get a great deal out of Strava. Be it seeing my friends rides & runs (which I find really motivating), or just keeping track of what I am up to. I have been a paying member for years, on the basis that if I get value from something, then I am happy to pay for it. Certainly, I would rather give up Netflx than Strava.
It seems to me that the main mistake Strava made was to give away too much in the free level years ago, hence lots of people don’t really value it.
I see lots of comments that “data has value, Strava should just use that”. I think they’ve been trying to do that, and apparently data about where people cycle and run is just not that valuable. Certainly, not enough to keep Strava afloat, anyway.
The new route creation tool is great, IMHO. It has had me exploring plenty of new routes in an area I have been cycling around for >5yrs.
It is clear they should have treated the 3rd party apps better – as Ray said, they should have given people some notice period.
But, my guess is that they don’t have much funding left. Running out of cash will certainly focus the minds of a start-up… They have been honest. They need to make a profit.
Either enough of us (cyclists / runners) pay for Strava to turn a profit, or it goes. I really hope enough of us pay.
I think that strava are missing a trick on subscriptions and also when then had the tier model. I would pay $2 per year for matched runs, segments and leader boards. If they put the price low enough to be a no brainier the mostly social users might subscribe. $60 per year is far too much.
Ray, is Strava doing a gradual rollout on the new desktop route builder? Using the link from my routes page still takes me to the old version…?
Thanks Ray, its a shame that they are slowly becoming a subscription only service, especially since the recent changes taking away the tiers of subscriptions. I don’t currently subscribe and will miss the segments, it was always good to compare myself to friends, but not so much as I’d want to pay for it.
i think many people are on the same page. i like segments and seeing all my results and my friends. but even if i pay for it to keep going, what if my friends don’t? how much would it matter to me (beating my friends or rivals) if they don’t care in the first place?
I have had a paid membership from time to time but have become pretty frustrated with Strava not listening to user feature requests. For example, Iam a triathlete and would like to have seperate heart rate zones for cycling, running and swimming. Not possible so for training analyses you have to look to other platforms like TrainingPeaks. That makes Strava just a Facebook for sporters en not a tool for them. As soon as they change that I will renew my membership, come on Strava, take my needs serious.
fully agree with these. I would pay $2 per year though… could they get 10 million people for basic features?
I have almost certainly spent too much time and energy thinking about this, but it bugged me that I couldn’t articulate exactly why this announcement affected me emotionally. I think I’ve finally figured it out, so I’ll share it, for what’s it worth.
I never subscribed to Strava, but I felt guilty that I didn’t. Multiple times a year I would see that little subscriber symbol next to a friend’s name and think, “I should do that.” It’s the same feeling I get when the annual NPR membership drive would come on. I would think of the value to myself and my community and think, “Yeah, I really should be supporting this.” I’m a regular supporter of my local NPR (National Public Radio, non-profit and listener-supported for those not in the States) station, as well as my local food bank and local Meals on Wheels provider and so on. I wish I would have subscribed to Strava before they rolled out Summit, a product line that pushed me further away from paying for the service. I say all of this because it explains the relationship I had with Strava.
As many comments have pointed out, Strava isn’t a non-profit and needs to make money. But many who were subscribers paid for it not as a product (i.e. “This is worth $60/year value to me”) but as a non-profit (i.e. “I believe in this and I want to see it continue.”) This doesn’t apply to everyone, but I think it describes a number of people like me who are having an emotional reaction to this news.
But Strava isn’t a non-profit; it isn’t NPR and it needs sustainable revenue. So they are changing the value proposition: instead of paying for Strava because I believe in it and want it to continue, I now need to determine if the service they provided is worth $5 (US)/month to me. Unfortunately, I don’t think it is. It might be, if (as I think their letter to athletes is meant to suggest) they double down on “investing in athletes” by improving the functionality of their services, addressing long-standing bugs, speed up their development process, respond to concerns in public forums, etc. They’ve now set themselves up to prove their worth, whereas before I felt that they were worth the cost and knew I was taking advantage of the fact they weren’t making me pay for it. Their announcement changed my emotional relationship with the service, and that’s why I can’t stop thinking about it.
Tl;dr: It feels like Strava broke up with me.
Exactly same here – I think about subscription as a support for Strava, not that I would get back any value. While in the past I really liked Strava, now they are not the love-brand anymore.
Especially their approach to 3rd party apps is absolutely disrespectful. They should have announced such news a few months in advance. If they don’t care about other developers, I can’t care for them. They could also try to charge 3rd party apps and figure out way how to get some funding from them while not ruining those apps. Instead, they just destroyed so many interesting projects and made angry almost all their users. Not the right thing to do.
not $5 (US)/month
7,99$ / month
It’s $5/month if billed annually. I’m not sure many people would really do the month to month option for a platform like Strava.
>> It’s $5/month if billed annually.
sorry to be a pendant, but there would appear to be no $5/month service, only $60/year.
Removing the training log is such a killer for me. It has been my training log since 2014. Removing that section/functionality from free hurts those who have been on Strava the longest and have invested the most time in the product.
I was looking at subscribing but I really hate the guilt tripping/messaging being put forward by Strava, especially during a pandemic.
I also hate that Strava isn’t in the comfortable position anymore to donate service from deep venture capital pockets. But that free lunch is over and going even deeper into funding (of it was available) wouldn’t have been a winning move anyways – those lost years when they completely feature-froze their core users were already a result of too much funding.
There are only four moves left, besides just closing down:
a) increase subscription fees
b) increase number of subscribers
c) decrease cost through layoffs
d) decrease cost through lowering server bills
I wish they wouldn’t need to do any of those, but they do and I really can’t fault them for trying b) and d) first, particularly since they combine so well (all the axed free features have one thing in common, they cause high per-use server load)
What is the URL for the new Route Builder site? I still see the beta version.
Me too…waiting…waiting
In my opinion this is mainly a bad decision from a communicative point of view.
From one day to another, you can’t remove so many functions that made the service unique.
I’m sure they made survey in advance and they knew about the shitstorm that was about to come.
Why didn’t they make the chances in two or three steps,
e.g. start with limitation of route creation to max. 50 km/80 miles and leadboards to max 20 or 30 total+ followers…
There were so many options to make the transition more “soft”, but they decided to shut the door – at least this it how it feels.
Hi Marc, indeed: ‘start with limitation of route creation to max. 50 km/80 miles’. Would have been a better idea.
I’m generally happy with the new focus from Strava on subscribers. It wasn’t that long ago when everyone wondered who was really Strava’s customer since they were paying very little attention to actual users. I hope they continue the trend from this year of building more cool stuff for subscribers
Ray, thanks for the write-up. It’s an interesting conundrum, and I don’t know how I would have addressed the revenue issue if I was them. I don’t think I would have changed the core features of my product with no notice.
I subscribed to Summit for a few months. I liked the analysis features, although they never were explained well-enough to me to be anything more than number candy (is my fitness vs freshness absolute or relative? What is a good number? How do I get Strava to think I’ve rested more? etc.). When I ended my subscription, I didn’t miss it since the things I actually cared about were free: Segments and estimated power.
I just went over to Garmin Connect, which I’ve used for years, and checked out their segments. There is one segment in my town, and in five years it has been crossed 24 times. I live in a small town, but there are a lot of good Strava segments here (one of which I KOM’d last week!), and I had a lot of fun chasing them. What concerns me is that the only reason Garmin Connect Segments isn’t fun for me is that nobody uses it. If Strava is going to remove 95% of their users from segments in the future, that effectively makes it Garmin Connect segments. A KOM doesn’t mean as much if there’s no risk of someone stealing it from you.
I’ll have to decide if I want to pay for Strava. As a Garmin user, part of the price of the devices I already own includes Connect. Apart from estimated power, Connect offers everything that Strava offers (that I use), and I’ve already paid for Connect.
I guess I’m off to import the Strava segments I care about into Connect. Then, I can go out and beat myself. Whoops. I mean, “Beat Yesterday”.
Any idea when the new Route Builder will roll out to all Subscribers. I am still seeing the old beta version. Personally I find the route surface choice fantastic. I have been using the Builder to map out randonneur routes and invariably they have included gravel sections that I missed before loading the route to my edge.
Strava took something from paying members as well today. Our ability to compare ourselfs to our non pro athlete friends. This change in my view may drive non paying members away as they now get very little value for handing strava their data. And less data from everyone makes popularity routing useless. Heatmaps, training data and even segments. As a paying member I have no intrest in competing again a Pro Athlete(who will get better value from training peaks).
Ray – I’m a Strava freeloader and at least as of 1700 EDT today 5/19, I’m still seeing full leaderboards. FWIW, I can live with Strava making full leaderboards and the route builder part of paid premium features. I don’t pay that much attention to leaderboards (although it is nice to look every once in a while), don’t use the Live Segments feature, and have become a fan of Ride With GPS for building routes. But can you confirm that Strava ride data (speed, distance, power, HR, etc.) will still download/connect to third party training apps? It did today for me (I’m a Xert user). My understanding is that Strava is only breaking certain features of connecting to third party apps, right? Thanks and cheers, Chuck
Great article DC Rainmaker.
As you said, they should have rolled out way more positive features to counter the backlash they knew had to be coming. The gaping hole is with teams being able to create challenges and other virtual options as we continue to train on our own and need some sort of competition.
Strava just broke their USP. I don’t get it.
It won’t change how I use Strava. Everything syncs to Strava so it will continue to be the hub for my data (much to their relief I expect), and I’ll continue to enjoy seeing my club mates’ swims, rides and runs.
I will miss segments a little. But not enough to pay £48 a year. There’s a long list of websites I’d pay a subscription to before Strava, each of which will provide a better insight into my data than they can manage, and some of which are considerably cheaper.
I strongly agree with your suggestions. In fact, now that I’m paying for the routebuilder I would expect more capabilities. I like having everything in one place, but the added functionalities of GPSIES (more detailed, add new starting point, reverse direction, select multiple markers) had me leave strava frequently. I didn’t mind since there is only so much you can expect from a free service, but they will need to step up their game now. Soon.
I strongly agree with your suggestions. In fact, now that I’m paying for the routebuilder I would expect more capabilities. I like having everything in one place, but the added functionalities of GPSIES (more detailed, add new starting point, reverse direction, select multiple markers) had me leave strava frequently. I didn’t mind since there is only so much you can expect from a free service, but they will need to step up their game now. Soon.
I’m fairly certain that DC Rainmaker pays for Strava…
Yup, I’ve been a paying Premium…err…Summit…err…Subscriber for 8 years (in two weeks actually) – pic attached.
I’m happy to pay Strava as I personally get good value out of the features I use the most. That doesn’t mean I can’t criticize when they do shortsighted things, or praise when they do good things.
Yes, sorry, this was meant to be a reply to user Tor who was suggesting you don’t want to pay.
8 years subscriptions aside, you have tons of unread notifications! Aargh my OCD…
Haha haha!!! Loved your comment, except please don’t claim OCD if you don’t really have it, as that’s misguided against those who have OCD. If you are diagnosed as such, then you have my respect.
Strava needs a family plan
??????
Ray is right. Every company needs to earn money. But i also don´t like the idea of cutting of non-paying members from features, that have been free to everyone since beginning.
As an innovative company, they should acquire paying members by the rollout of new features instead of preserving the old ones…
I am a total Strava newbee and I feel bummed and confused about this change. I don’t know what I am going to do, but I’m surprised how much I care.
I only downloaded Strava because I participated in a virtual 6K about 3 weeks ago that required it. After the 6K provided cool details info about my run, I was motivated to continue running.
I only discovered segments a few days ago. I loved it! I loved receiving the after-the-fact notification that I had placed in a competition I didn’t even know I was in! I had run on a 1/3 mile obscure segment and placed 12th. Because of Strava I returned to that same place and “raced” two days later, pushing myself much harder than I otherwise would have. It was wonderful. I then began exploring segments and marking them, preparing to go race strangers. The last few days I’ve spent substantial energy trying to get my husband and brother to try Strava, because of the fun I’m having with the segments part.
Now, I don’t know what to do. Do I consider myself enough of a runner to subscribe? No…I don’t consider myself a runner. I played soccer in college, which required running, but I am not a distance runner. I don’t train for races. I have no bibs hanging on my wall. But did I experience motivation because of the segments leaderboard? Yes, definitely. That was the only reason I was telling other people to try Strava after only experiencing it for a few weeks! Am I a competitive athlete? Yes…I love games and competitions. I like the pretend trophy and I was motivated by improving my rank. It was really fun! After learning about segments, I definitely spent time looking at the leaderboards, staring segments, finding them, and setting more goals.
I will need to think about this a while. I think it comes down to what I see the value of the segment leader board. I don’t plan to train for anything spectacular, I don’t need advanced athletic analytics or maps…but I love to play and compete, especially with friends.
EXACTLY and strava is missing this huge point. there is a bit of addictive physiology here, some dopamine released each time you get to see your segment placement whether its a KOM, top 100, whatever you are shooting for. by taking this this away from the free users, you’ll never get them hooked in the first place! drug dealer 101
I’m a casual MTB rider and avid walker.
I heard about Strava from friends, and it was Strava’s popularity that brought me there.
I like to compare my time over segments with other riders.
I’ve even created a couple of segments.
Being able to expand the leaderboards on segments is fun for me, but I will never be KOM.
I will never be in the top 10, unless it is a segemnt that’s off the beaten path.
I’m in my late 50’s, and not an athlete.
I would probably consider paying a one-time cost of 10 to 20 dollars for premium membership.
But $60/year is not gonna happen, and if the app doesn’t have the things that I use it for, I’ll just find another free app – the reason I prefer Strava is because I see so many people I know on it, and I enjoy camparing with how they did on segments.
Someone will see this change as an opportunity, and will offer an ad based “free” alternative.
Strava will go the way of so many other forums that didn’t appreciate their “free” users.
If Garmin is smart, they will open up Garmin Connect to other fitness trackers uploading data.
It would be one more reason to choose Garmin over the other brands – the fact that their products work seamlessly with their app.
I bought a Garmin because my Samsung smart watch didn’t work with Strava.
I found that as Garmin refined Garmin Connect, I use it as much as Strava now.
A lot of users will leave Strava, and the one thing that made them KOM will be gone.
Strava’s biggest “selling point” is the vastness of their user base. When that fades, so will they.
It’s pretty clear what they’re doing, and it’s the most lazy way out of their own poor decision making. They damn well know segments is one of, if not the number one reason why a lot of people use it. So what’s a quick way to scheme up money? Take the most popular aspect, and hide it behind a pay wall. It’s like they have no ability to innovate new ideas. Then if that wasn’t insulting enough, let’s take away users’ ability to view their own ride log and segment times. It’s like insurance in case their first lazy scheme didn’t do the trick.
I have the money to pay, but I’m not going to be threatened or guilted into subscribing, just so I can see my own damn data! This really is a low class move.
Would you pay if it was $2 per year?
At this point I would not, I’ve been thinking of deleting my account for a while. When I first joined you could link up your BTLE or ANT+ sensors and everything was tracked in a single application. They removed that functionality a year or so a go, and I only used the segments to compare how I was doing on each ride, not to compare against others. So with that moving behind a paywall that removed any reason to pay. Being 50+ I will never be the fastest nor every “Go Pro”. For couple of years subscription I can just get me a good head units and track my own segment data. Already have the sensors, and a smart watch with will be more useful in my eyes.
I see some suggesting that Garmin Connect segments might replace Strava segments. But GC segments are unpopulated and lame compared to Strava. But wait…maybe not for very much longer as former Strava users pivot to GC? Shouldn’t this be Strava’s biggest nightmare – that users stop uploading rides/runs and making the whole site…stale? If both of the paying Strava users want to keep paying to see each other’s results…shrug…
Do they even exist anymore? I got my garmin just when they tried to displace Strava with segments, so I know those well, but these days I can’t find any mention of them in the Connect app.
Anyways, I doubt garmin would even be up to the task of dealing with that data deluge, e.g. Watopia segments that are done by tens of thousands of users on a strong day. Even Zwift themselves don’t really tackle that data like Strava does, they purge everything after the months…
Ha Ha, isn’t it amazing what happens when we are asked to contribute to something that we assumed would be “free” forever. Perhaps prioritize all those other subscription. How often do you use them? Easy to set and forget. Imagine if there was no Strava what would you do for a social cycling network? Perhaps setup a Strava User Group to provide input and direction to what users want to see.
They used to be a very innovative company. Great UX, early use of algorithms, maps and geo reference applications (it was very difficult to do what they did when they started, they were unique) and then the concept itself of a “segment” which was only a part of a line, until Strava came..
I’m not sure if and how much they charge for their APIs consumption, but if things did not turn out fine they probably kinda missed the API economy.
Now, if your ability to transform data into information heavily relies on data, you want data for the cheapest: taxing 95% of your providers is very short lived, as you will sustain the cost, in their case it will be expressed in lower interactions (which I’d track accurately now) and churn.
Segments, specifically, do not exist unless users actively define them, so you really want people to fully engage with them. Certainly not stepping away.
And more if you consider that they were, and still are, the unique selling point of the Strava social service, the feature they engineered so well that it protected them from Garmin’s attempts at replicating the concept.
So now, they are in a way lowering that barrier.
Flybys also qualify as a strong differentiator, even though they never came out of the labs. But now we know if they did, it’s be premium.
I’m totally on board with your opinion on the crappy way Strava Is treating partners. No excuse for it. I haven’t used routes before, but was just about to try since I got a new Garmin computer . I agree the main reason I sync to Strava is to share activities with friends too, not to place on leaderboards
Strava’s segments were the one and only reason I signed up many years a go. The rest of their web and particularly their apps were unremarkable and done much better by the completion. Like many others have noticed, for many years there have been numerous bugs unattended to and features randomly added and taken away. One that I miss most is the ability to sort segment leader boards by age AND weight. Time by age and weight really is a meaningful comparison. So what if a 20 year old weighing 50 kg beat me up Mt Ventoux! And its the closest you get to a proxy watts per kg within an age group. It was there for many years and then, puff, gone with no explanation (that I saw).
Since the Strava community created all the segments they can also delete them right?
I wouldn’t be surprised if disgruntled customers deleted all the segments they’ve created since they can’t see the leader boards for free anymore. Obviously Strava could undelete them but that might involve resources that they can’t afford?
Can I add new shoes from my phone yet?
Strava has always been arrogant and non responsive to their customers. First, they had no ability to upload photos from a computer desktop for the longest time. Second, they got rid of google maps, so no one can recon the routes with street view. Then, the changed their UI and basically screwed up the use of the BACK button on the browser—a fundamental usability web design flaw. The company is runned by complete imbeciles.
Strava is not the only one.
Today morning I was totally shocked when my Fitbit account told me, I have to pay to access e.g. my sleep pattern or steps counter, etc. All my data is hidden now! >:-( …after buying Fitbit HR, Fitbit 2 HR, Fitbit 3 HR and having more than 4 years of data, I cannot access them anymore ‘for free’, out of the blue! (…or I missed a previous Fitbit communication, can happen…)
has anyone else seen the new route builder pop up in their Mac/PC side of things? Mine still leads to the beta. Would love to play around with these new route features..
Here s a change.org to protest for that
link to chng.it
Ray, I think you mentioned somehwere at some point that Strava doesn’t want to do advertisement. I think Strava has a fundamentally flawed business plan. They have to decide whether they are a social network (e.g. twitter) or a service provider that people are willing to pay for (e.g. dropbox). If they are a social network, they have to find a way to monetize free users (aka. ads). If they are a freemium service, they have to actually build compelling features.
They aren’t investing effort in building customer demographic data and selling ads (this is not simple). They are not building new killer features that customers pay for. All they seem to do are bug fixes and trying to charge for existing free service. They are not even announcing plans for new features.
I love Strava just not enought to subscribe and who knows what I am missing not having a subscription as requiring a credit card is not a free trial.
Leaderboard and competing against mates is what got me hooked on Strava in exchange they get aĺl my stats to do whatever they do with it and thats about what it is worth.
Hi DC. I’ve never commented on your website but this is the final straw in the glass. I went over and deleted my 44 created segments and some of them were places people had not been to.
Why should I create segments for all to enjoy if I cannot benefit from it myself? As you have said segments is what differentiated strava from other cycling apps. Now that there is nothing holding me back, I’m going to look for an alternative app that offers me segments for my own personal goals.
No longer having Google Maps may be caused by google ‘doing no evil’ not. I’ve seen other sites where maps can no longer be shown. Garmin Basecamp [their gps app] no longer lets you export to Google Maps /Earth.
I suspect this Google wanting a fee
Ray, remember “First Sports Tech Cloud Platform & Incubator Announced by Zone5 Ventures”?
link to dcrainmaker.com
Any news on that? Do you think the strava change might have an influence here?
Maybe some services want to become more independent of strava for data sync…
Would be interested in your thoughts…
Nothing new there. I don’t see any impact to data sync there. All of the changes Strava has focused on here are on the API to pull data from it, rather than push data to it.
Thanks for your feedback, appreciated! Nevertheless will be interesting to see if and how those things develop.
So as of today (5/20) I seem to still be able to see the full leaderboard, but the route builder is gone. But I can still see/ edit all my old routes. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
It is awesome. I am inspired by it.
The emerging model means that consumers need to recognise the commercial value of our personal data. As a non-subscribing Strava user I have previously donated my data in return for what I have perceived as a valuable service. I have been indifferent to who Strava gave it to.
Now they want me to pay them when I give them my data or give me less for it than they did before. It seems to me that they should be charging 3rd parties for access to aggregated data that mine forms a small part of. At the point they start doing this they will be having their cake and eating it.
I am most interested in whether ZwiftPower still has access to my Strava data. In the meantime I remain undecided whether to subscribe but it will be all or nothing for me.
Leaderboards are broken anyway with all the cheaters and or careless people that leave their GPS on while the bike is on the car and don’t crop the activity later on. The only leaderboards that are being kept relatively consistent are for popular segments where having the KOM gives certain bragging rights.
And if only 10% of your population pays for the services but the other 90% generates most of the cost then that’s not a sustainable business model. You can try to boost the 10% intrinsically or simply start culling the 90%. In this case they chose the latter.
According to a poll on sporza.be with 7.880 votes so far, 61 % will keep on using the free version, 27 % will look for a different app, and 12 % will take a subscription.
If this would materialize, and strava can increase its paid user base from +/- 4 % to 12 % while only losing 27 % of its non paying user base, I think Michael Horvath will be a happy (and wealthy) man. 4M additional paid users at 60 EUR pp would bring in a nice yearly 240M. That should be enough reward to put our timeline bank in chronological order :-).
The biggest load of.bullshit in their letter was the section on making a profit.
The stated they habe 180 people working on the app and they dont make a profit. What a load of old crap! Any business with 180 employees not making a profit would be out of business, any trainee accountant can tell you that, its just conplete nonsense and a lie. What they are really saying is ‘we’re now greedy bastards who want MORE money’.
Also, if a company with 180 people working for it with a worldwide user base of millions can’t make a profit then then there is something seriously wrong or the owners don’t know jack shit about how to run a company.
The later is certainly true by these latest changes. They haven’t a clue.
There will be a mass exodus of this platform all down to the owners but they have let the usual human greed get in the way.
Its the same old story, business owners get greedy, try to take more money from their loyal fanbase, fanbase leaves, business owners don’t know whgly and in the meantime a new group of kids with lots of energy create a new platform to match and better the old one and its free. BOOM! Strava goes the way of the Dodo like MySpace….Sega…
By the time they realise it will be too late.
For Strava payroll is not the majority of their cost. Their cloud cost probably dwarfs their payroll. So how many people they have working for them and says very little about their ability to turn a profit.
I’d highly doubt their cloud cost is that substantial in the grand scheme of things.
Looking at some of the whitepapers/video/engineering tidbits* they’ve shared, nothing is that massive. Early last year they had a 120TB database warehouse. That’s nothing in terms of costs for that (storage-wise). The bulk of their IT costs would undoubtedly be front-end systems to support their AWS based architecture, as well as transaction costs depending exactly on how they architected the system, which there was a handful of numbers tossed around in terms of instances in the video, but nothing that’s huge financially.
Not at all discounting anything technical in Strava’s architecture, but there’s no way it’s costing tens of millions of dollars in terms of AWS bills. Having 180 employees that are heavily skewed towards engineering and high paying salaries spread in the Bay Area and Denver, are what drives their costs.
*https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Us9nIki7K3M
This is a ridiculous comment. They are a tech startup. Size (whether stated as revenues or # of employees) and profitability are completely unrelated. See Uber. You don’t even need to be a trainee accountant to know that.
The fact they still exist at all is proof they are better than the 90+% of tech startups who flame out after a year or two – Ray has written about more than enough of those who had cool products but couldn’t execute.
While we may all be unhappy with unfixed bugs/deficiencies, or a lack of exciting new features, or with the immediacy of the impact on 3rd party developers, if 90% of your cost is consumed by non-paying customers, you have a problem that needs fixing, and soon.
I think they would have been wiser to differentiate the tiers a bit differently, such as non-paying gets ads and limited features (but I would have left most or all of all the segment goodies), premium gets no ads and all the features.
I suspect the social sharing and segments is what attracts the most initial users, and the premium members pay either because of “community” (i.e. glad to pay for what I enjoy) or because the analysis, safety and other features work for them vs Garmin Connect, TrainingPeaks, etc.
>> systems to support their AWS based architecture
sounds like strava have just done the math and realised their ever increasing database size is generating an exponentially increasing cpu usage – not a good combination when you have no cost control over your computer hardware such as AWS.
Thank you Ray for the great article.
I’ve been having a hard time coming up for reasons to pay for a subscription.
Yes I will miss the ability to see how I stack against my friends on segments and definitely Strava routes but at $7 a month is a big ask when this was just free.
I would expect something new of value for many of us who are not paying members.
I say sell our data.
I won’t pay until they implement some sort of auto flagging feature. I run and bike and we have a lot of 2:00minute mile runners here in South Florida and I’ve flagged them and they are still on the leaderboard. It’s not worth it and it’s super frustrating.
This is in my opinion why people won’t pay for strava – all the data is unverified and therfor of no serious interest to the average joe. How does anyone know if someone at the top of a cycling leaderboard achieved that time on a normal bike or an e-bike ?
The only feature I use is ‘Matched Runs’ it allows me to track my progress against previous efforts of the same route. I can’t see the benefit of opting for a subscription for this service alone.
Does anyone know any competitors that still allow you to see your previous records against matched runs?
The alternative seems to be I revert back to my Excel Sheet and manually keep my records like I was before.
Any help is appreciated, thanks.
golden cheetah
Profitabilty: 55.000.000 users. If 10% is willing to pay EUR 5,— per month then they earn EUR 330,000,000. That is a lot of money.
“It’s only $5 per month…”
“All these people complaining about $5 per month riding their $10K bikes…”(heard last night during our regular virtual Worlds ride)
It’s not just $5 per month. It’s a value proposition and if it’s worth it – in addition to yet ANOTHER monthly subscription. Also not everyone is buying a 6k+ bike every year or other year. I have been a free account for some time since they have neglected many user requests over the years – for example if you are a social app where is the user to user messaging? It has been requested since 2013 and the best they gave was @mentions.
I have been on the fence to subscribe at times but the features (data analysis and route building) to push me over just never materialized or were much better done by other apps/software, user interaction seemed half baked, and the company seemed not responsive to users. I did/do enjoy Segments and measuring myself against other locals and people I follow, but it’s not going to be a huge loss to see that go. But that is not enough to make the value proposition worth it yet. They will need to add somethings that will make it worth it for me personally. This appears to be a recurring theme among non-paying users.
Then there is their history with 3rd party apps. It’s just a sour note that colors my opinion on them. Not enough to make me stop using the app. But doesn’t exactly encourage me to subscribe if you know what I mean.
I get it. They have to make money to survive. I’m not against that at all. Just make the value worth it for me to pay. I can see paying $2 maybe $3 per month at the most based on how I currently use Strava and what I might gain verses staying on the free option. I think the tiered membership was a good idea and they should go back to that. However, for that to work they need to have tiers with features that users feel are worth the extra and set their service apart from the other free alternatives. Again value proposition. If 75% of the free member ship signed up at a lower price vs 12-15% at the higher price, I think that would get them where they would need to be or beyond. The challenge is finding the tipping point price. I don’t think whatever calculus on price they have already done is on point.
Are they charging 3rd party apps for access to the data? Perhaps they can institute a tiered or volume based recurring fee for 3rd party apps. This would offset the high volume data costs from the biggest consumers. Seems fair to me. Maybe they are already doing that I just don’t know.
Bait and switch strategies kill companies
These are sorry times many of us are using exercise and Strava to analyse and track performance. The Corona pandemic has seen many of us salary sacrifice. For users be confronted by such changes in these difficult times shows demonstrates only that, like so many other companies that have grown exponentially, it is being managed by a load of greedy narrow minded bean-counters who most probably take no pleasure in exercise. I for one am already looking at alternatives to track my activities…… as if they couldn’t be making enough income through the advertising… pure greed!
These are sorry times. Many of us are using exercise and Strava to analyse and track our performance. The Corona pandemic has seen many of us salary sacrifice. For users be confronted by such changes in these difficult times demonstrates that, like so many other companies that have grown exponentially, Strava is being managed by a load of greedy narrow minded bean-counters who most probably take no pleasure in exercise. I for one am already looking at alternatives to track my activities…… as if they couldn’t be making enough income through the advertising… pure greed!
Just an open comment after seeing and “replying-to” some of the others below… a common response theme it seems, especially from those who are paying for the service, is “it’s not wrong to ask someone to pay for a service that adds value”…
A 2nd common response is “why mention services that you are willing to pay for, but not Strava?
Now, simply add those 2 questions together and you have the answer. For 95% of Strava users, it does NOT add enough value, to be worth paying for. It doesn’t compare remotely to dedicated training sites, it’s a “training-log-lite with social tracking” service basically and a few add-ons (particularly under the, already, for-fee sections).
Extend those questions, again for those who pay… if Strava loses 95% of it’s base (or even 50%)… if your “friends” list that use Strava last week is 50, and this week, only 25 continue tracking/using Strava, the usefulness to YOU, the paid user, has just plummeted (if comparing segments, seeing “friends” activities, etc mattered, if not, then this isn’t an issue, continue onwards).
The reason people pay for is they are BETTER than what Strava delivers, AND the users, actually VALUE the services they provide. The fact they use those, and DON’T pay for Strava, is because the social features, simply are NOT worth enough to pay for, when the core services that matter, are better handled elsewhere.
If Strava continues on this route, I see the following happening… die-hard Strava paid users may continue. The % of paid users will increase, but NOT the number! Critical item there! If 50% of users stop using it (because the fun stuff isn’t free anymore, and it’s NOT worth our dollars for it), then the total user base drops, and the “percentage” of paid users automatically increases….
Then, the paid users realize “hey, I went on a group with with 20 people last week, but only 5 are showing up in Strava, and I don’t know the 2 people who beat me to the finish because they aren’t using Strava anymore”… eventually those “socially oriented” users are going to drop out… this leaves the “core” as users who want to use Strava data/log management…
And that, will be the eventual (maybe years out) collapse of Strava. They’ll have a higher percentage of revenue per user, but the value even to paid users drops (why pay for Strava when 5 other services are MUCH more thorough and detailed in their metric abilities)… then the user base of paid users numerically drops… revenues drop… and “support costs” don’t drop so much (because still have to maintain the functionality of what was built for “all”)…
Doesn’t have to pan out that way, but it’s a prediction, in 2 years Strava may have completely lost relevance, if not solvency, compared to it’s position today, thus hurting the paid users as much or more by sacrificing the “free” user base. There are other, better, ways… many have been mentioned, I won’t rehash.
I think the number of free users who drop will depend on how the data is generated. If like me I generate data from Garmin I’ll probably leave the link in place and my data will continue to be there. Others who use Strava to record their activities are more likely to switch.
I guess Strava know these numbers and made a calculated decision.
I uploaded a ride to see the new deprecated leaderboard. But I couldn’t really appreciate missing everything since Strava returned “Too Many Requests” fault and refused to load.
Must be a lot more overhead to not display the old default stuff bringing the works down.
Every single day I submit my data to their servers. Now they want me to pay for comparing with data of another user like me. No thank you. The other user who pay will not see my data and i wonder if he will be happy to see he us niw the only runner on the segment we use to have plenty. Bye bye. Taking away is not a good habbit my mom used to say.
All users remain on all segment leader boards. The only difference is if you aren’t paying, you can’t see anything other than the top 10. The paying user will still see everybody, including you.
Hi Ray do you think there could be an avenue opening up for someone like Zwift to tap into If people do turn away from strava?
Perhaps being able totrack real world cycling and having a real world level assigned separately (as running is now) it would also be able to translate the meet up function across as well. Allowing for swimming would also validity Zwifts triathlons a little more!
Or will Strava remain the only social network with Zwift sticking to its current form?
Either way thanks for all your write ups / videos.
I finished a workout this morning and checked Strava and realized that something was amiss. I’m a bit disappointed not because features were stripped, but because how it was executed and can’t help but feel that this will lead to a weaker company long term. I think short term, it will add some critical revenue and related liquidity to their MRR, a key factor for their investors.
However, I think it will invariably lead to a weaker company with a shrinking market cap. My guess is the decline in market cap will happen over time and will mostly likely be preceded by a “pop” related to a short term inflow of $$$ relating to the current change. (% of free that concert to paid)
Obviously, Strava had a problem which was:
1) Free Strava was “good enough” for a large % of users;
2) For those on free, the features behind the “pay wall” weren’t compelling enough for the cost;
3) The % of paying members weren’t enough to keep the company a going concern.
On the surface, it seems like a simple solution:
Screw the free members who have gotten a free ride for years. We “have their data“, they’re now hooked on our crack marketing, and we now can force them to upgrade. Those that don’t upgrade, will continue to use, albeit with fewer features.
Therein lies the danger. Weather Strava recognizes it or not, the value of the firm lies in the current user base of 50M members and the associated network effects that it has created for Strava. Losing a large portion of that user base and associated network effects, will exert tremendous damage to Strava. The more users (paid/unpaid) make the app more useful to everyone. If a large portion of members stop using the app, network effects drop and the value for paid members declines. Not a good solution.
So how will this play out? No one knows, but let’s assume:
– 50M total users
– 5% current paying users= 2.5M
– Average rev/member= $50
– Revenue estimate: $125M
– Conversion rate of non members due to change:
~5% (2.5M new paid members)
– Non paid members that stop engaging w platform due to changes: 75%
– non paid members that continue to use with limited features: 25%
If this rings true, 33,750,000 users may stop using the app all together!
The network effects and social features are what make strava awesome. Driving a huge portion on the network away will damage the company and the brand and lower the value of strava over time to the paid member base. The fax machine is a perfect example of the huge benefits of network effects. When there wasn’t a critical mass of fax machines (early on and now again), they are worthless.
My take is Strava should have 3 tiers of membership and should work on move migration by adding features to higher tiers. I would set the “old free” level to a nominal amount, $5-10 per year. Get a huge portion of current-free members to stay on crack and pay SOMETHING. Add rich features to the upper tiers with the increase in revenue.
What should terrify Strava: if garmin ever decided to kill their feed to Strava, bankrupt the company, and buy it for pennies on the $$ and relaunch themselves.
Mike
Whether your numbers are right or not, the idea of a mid-tier membership occurred to me as well.
That said, they probably rejected that based on their Summit experience and concluded there was one thing they could sell (data comparison), and they might as well sell just that.
Yup – I’d pay something per year. I was thinking $2 per year but might stretch to $5.
They took away Training Log view!!! the one with all the circles. that was my favorite.
this is extortion. (and I’m gonna’ pay- but be pissed off about it)
That’s some nice (10 years) of data you’ve got there. Be a shame if anything happened to it.
Pretty sure they don’t care that much about your data. It’s not by itself worth much to them and they’re not trying to monetize it (or at least not well) – like “hey, Morey is in the top 5% of cyclists by distance – let’s pump him with tire ads”
Strava charges municipalities north of $20,000 per year for a licensing fee to use the data. According to Strava’s site, they’ve got 300 cities signed up (it’s unclear how old that claim is though).
Look, that’s not a ton of money in the grand scheme of things. But it’s also not something they want to throw away either.
I’d argue that everyone’s data is actually more valuable to Strava in aggregate to make routing and such better. What Strava omits in their long justification piece is that with 97% of users not paying, those 97% of users are contributing the vast majority of the data that the 3% use to build their routes with Route Builder. Route Builder’s success (in terms of being impressive at building routes), is due to the 97%’s data, certainly not the 3%. Ironically, the 97% don’t have access to it.
That said, I have no problems with that limitation. I think Strava is free to charge whatever they want, and I’m happy to keep paying my fees each year. As I’ve tried to say many times, my issue here is communications around it, and around how they’ve positioned things over the last decade leading up to this moment. They’ve tried to spin this as “We want to focus on the people that support us”, except, what that message completely fails at is realizing their *entire* success as a product is built upon the entire community – not just the 3%. Without that community, they have no product.
I am absolutely not in favor of working for free. However, the fee should be no more than Spotify 4$/m (strava 8$), where they have to pay to artists.
Agreed Ray but don’t you think that Strava took a calculated approach? How many Garmin / Polar etc are going to stop feeding things into Strava? How many casual athletes that use Strava to record data (e.g. my wife) care about segments?
I suspect there is only the relatively small subsection of determined / competitive athletes that use Strava app to record and so the hit to the 97% will be tolerable and this will drive some additional revenue.
Today I bought a Garmin for seeing segments etc. No luck for that then. I will not buy strava, instead start to enjoy cycling at a lower pace. Hopefully Komoot is going to work well with Garmin.
You can create segments in Garmin Connect and put them on your head unit if you want to.
I’ve been a Strava user since early 2009, paid for full subscription as long as I can remember this was offered. So nothing should have changed for me, right?
Actually the “improved” route planner is so good that I cannot even see my own street, what are they thinking.
Segments were very interesting for quite some time but now I have ridden about every segment in my neighbourhood with all possible wind conditions many times, so it has lost it’s significance for me.
So Strava: thanks for effectively cancelling my subscription!
Well said sir. I agree their approach to attracting new paying subscribers leaves a lot to be desired, particularly when there are many more alternatives out there either free or at a lower subscription rate than what Strava is charging. I just removed the Strava app from my phone. For me as a runner, Garmin Connect provides all the functionality I need in tracking my runs and training progress.
You know they need the high number of users to make this work and without them it is just another log program. I am a free user and have made 15 segments in my area that has 100,000 people and a National Park near by with lot’s of visitors. If everyone that made segments would just delete the segments they made the segment issue would be over. They might have 10% of the segments they have now and not as much interest.
Also on the part they need to make money and that is a given. As Ray pointed out they have not done a good job of finding way to make revenue. We have a local huge event that brings in 10,000+ riders a year and pay handsomely for timing chips. I have suggested contacting Strava and see if they would set up some thing where their routes could be uploaded and Strava take care of event timing. It would simplify the event logistics of dealing with timing chips and probably save them some money and make Strava a bunch of money. This to me is a no brainer. I would bet 95% of people doing cycling event (maybe not racing but tours) have a smart phone so all they have to do if they haven’t already is download the app and let there device send it to Strava. Strava would have to set it up so you could pull up the say 100k route for that date. They would get some new users and possible premium paying customers and make possibly a couple dollars per rider and events all over the world. They could make timing chips and companies almost obsolete unless I am missing something and I could be. I have done this on my own before and event and was able to get results for the day but after the day is over there is no way to pull just that day out.
I’ve been on Strava since the dark ages and have been consistently impressed with the level of service I’ve gotten, even as a free account user. I’ve considered upgrading to one of the premium plans for a long time but, as a trail runner, it’s never seemed worth it. But $5/month? I can swing that to support a product I get a lot of enjoyment and information out of. Maybe it’s different for cyclists, but none of the competitors to Strava are even close to what I want.
Seems like they also killed height corrected pace for running.
You pay (MORE) for Zwift and all, other trainer software, xert, whoop, etc. Why should Strava be free? If you truly can’t pay up then fine, you can still use a limited subset but really, what’s the big deal here? Let them make profit and ensure they stick around.
It’s a cynical move when people are trying to connect in sport somehow. Almost Everyone’s income has taken a hit so the timing is bad. Most companies raise money by adding value not extorting from loyal users. I’m researching which app to move to.
Strava must not know it’s platform or it’s user community. I have been a paying member on and off for years and it usually was dependent on how hard I was training or events I was committed to. I always questioned the incremental value of the paid membership because the platform failed to innovate the last several years. The lack of innovation allowed others like Relive.cc or Elevate to fill the gap Strava failed to provide.
Now with removing segments for all but paying members, Strava has fractured the one key value aspect it had over the other competitors. It was valuable enough for users like me to link my Garmin account and to provide mide ride data to Strava. Strava could then use that data to build a large user base and try to monetize a large community. Rather than develop innovative solutions like AI analysis and insights of data, or other value aspects, Strava in turn takes away free features that provides value to both paying and non-paying members.
Removing that value means I see no need to continue to provide my data to Strava. That in turn provides less value to paying members. It is a downward spiral of diminishing returns. This tells me all I need to know. Lack of innovation, lack of understanding of Strava users, and poor treatment of members, paying members, and the partner community. I don’t see this resulting in the outcome Strava is planning.
If I was to look for a offline strava alternative what would be one? I use it mainly to analysis my power zones and curves post ride.
Have you tried goldencheetah?
Golden Cheetah for sure. Way better than anything Strava would have given you, and it is really free!
Yeah, golden cheetah seems to be the most respected analyzer out there. It has a “share” function that would also connect and “sync” your Strava rides.
I and all the other users already contribute with to Stava by providing my data which they on sell. Charging me to sell my data, hmmm, not sure that makes sense.
As the saying goes, if you aren’t paying for something then you are probably the product.
I am unlikely to pay for it, the value equation is not there.
They are a business and have a right to turn a profit, but are we sure they aren’t just crap at running a business, rather than there isn’t a profitable market for selling our data…? As Ray says they appear to be making the wrong stick v carrot choice here, so maybe other choices are just as problematic. Who knows.
This is going to alienate people. After finally giving the option to switch from the dreadful algo feed they do something this stupid.
I for one will likely just stop moving stuff from Garmin to Strava. i won’t delete my account so my status in segments and the ones I have KOM for won’t change, but it does make me dislike them more and want to be less associated with Strava. They are really poor listeners anyway.
As for losing matched runs, all I can say is thank goodness, that feature was dreadful. A run that is 80% the same as another is not a match. I got to the point of running different runs so it wouldn’t match. They should have made that feature user selectable from the beginning.
I would suggest that this might be the beginning of the end for Strava?
Question, DC: Do you recommend another site now, that strava is obviously trying to get money out of you to see anything now? I just went to the site and saw that top 10, with no ranking where you stand on a certain segment. I guess I could always strive to beat my own numbers, which, but you can’t even see your own efforts which is kind of stupid, since they are our records!
All this is going to do is lessen my time on the site. I don’t have the appreciable income to fork over to a site like this, even if you break it down to a small monthly charge. This might be the one charge that “breaks the bank”, since the visitor is already bombarded with small fees form zwift, trainingPeaks, and other sites. It adds up. I don’t necessarily find strava that valuable, other than to keep in touch with a few friends that are active like myself.
No, I don’t see any viable alternatives here for Segment-focused efforts. For non-Segment things that are plenty, depending on the specific slant you want (e.g. routing would likely be Komoot or RideWithGPS, training analysis could be anything from the device companies site like Garmin Connect or Polar Flow, or more complex at TrainingPeaks).
Realistically, I don’t see Garmin Connect as an alternative for the features people lost around Segments. At least, not directly. As others have pointed out, Garmin mostly abandoned their Segment focus about a year or so after they started it. And that was what, 5-7 years ago now? People simply aren’t building Segments in Garmin Connect in any meaningful way.
You didn’t know that you can manage your segments with RideWithGPS !? It’s been for years. With more data than you have on Strava. But with fewer users to compare.
Except there’s no such thing as RideWithGPS Strava Live Segments on 3rd party devices.
I got the most of what has been written. If this is the way strava is treating people then they deserve to go. I was considering upgrading but now I am not sure I will. If that is there way of getting subscribers they don’t deserve custom . People will react negative to a gun to the head. Good bye strava I don’t need kudos to keep cycling
Tried to activate the Trial subscription and in the middle of the process I got the message “Too many requests”.
I cannot reach my account anymore. I can reach Strava.com but as soon as I login I get the message “Too many request”, without any mention on what I did wrong. I do use a chrome extension (elevate) that reads my Strava data, maybe that is now tolerated anymore.
Any idea if I have to wait an hour, a day, longer?
If Stava fix the maths on the leaderboards, I’ll pay, I’ll be happy to.
I am looking at a leaderboard just now where the person above me completed the run at an average speed of 1mph faster than me at 29mph when looking at the “Analysis Page”.
However, on the leaderboard, Strava indicates he completed it at an avg speed of 32mph which is not only a jump of 3mph but also above the maximum speed he achieved for the entire segment.
How on earth can Strava do maths like that? It makes that leaderboard completely bogus. Are we expected to pay for that?
On the analysis page, the speed and other numbers as reported by your head unit are shown. For segments, Strava only takes your GPS data into account (time + location), because that’s (often) more accurate than the speed reported by your head unit, and at the very least it’s consistent. (same time = same speed)
With almost all the dubious segments local to myself, the gps based timings are borderline impossible and the headunit timings are reasonable (and I am not under-estimating the ability of the athletes either). Additionally, if you look at the blue trace recorded for the ride and compare it against the segment length, the ride is often shorter resulting in skewed timings.
These problems make the top end of the leaderboard questionable.
In all honesty, I am not paying for wonky math and a leaderboard that only reflects paywall users.
Perhaps the reason for the abrupt “empty data” returned from APIs was to prevent a sudden rush to download historical segment leaderboard data in bulk.
If 3rd party developers had found out about the change in advance, they may have decided that having historical leaderboard data is better than nothing and grab and store it all themselves. For all segments. Worldwide. Which would be a massive bandwidth hit to Strava’s network.
I can see how there would be some value in comparing my segment efforts to other athletes’ efforts, even if I didn’t have the latest results.
There’s data call limitations on most apps/accounts, that would kill attempts there.
How to get back at Strava?
1. Delete all your segments. Why should someone get it free?
2. Delete rides and close account. Less users to compare makes for a shit experience
3. Switch to another service and sell it to your friends (ex ridewithgps)
4. “Segment bomb” Strava. Create tons of crap, duplicates segments to pollute the segments.
5. Ruin the KOM. Juice up rides with a new accounts. Speaks for itself.
6. 1 Star rating in play store. Tiktok style rating!
I think Strava should realize there are different athletes with different needs. Not as complicated as they thought before, but there is quite a difference between those who just like the stats (segments, leaderboards, etc) and those who want a full analysis of their activities. For the latter group the subscription fee is quite reasonable. For the first group, it is too much, especially if you realize that you pay for many features that you problaby not going to use anyway.
So the solution is simple: create a light subscription, in the order of 10$ max 20$ per year, for those who just want the statistics, i.e. which was for free until now. That is more like a reasonable amount for what you will use, and I will be happy to pay that.
And happy also to say that as far as I can see, my Virtual Running Races App (www.runnermaps.nl/virtual), based on Strava, will keep working. Fingers crossed.
Makes sense mostly but the people who really want to analyze their activities are doing it with a legitimate tool, like TrainingPeaks. Strava is not legit enough for hard analysis. Its primary value adds are leaderboards and the social media aspect.
Just checked, and I’ve been subscribing to Strava since 2011. I let my membership expire last year during the third-party developer kerfluffle. That was more a precipitating event than anything else, as they never seemed particularly customer-focused to me, adding features no one asked for and blowing off their user community. This recent move makes it *less* likely, not more, that I’ll come back into the fold, as most of the folks I ride with aren’t paying subscribers, and so Strava will have less value for me going forward. I’m already paying for a bunch of subscriptions like Trainer Road, TP, Rouvy, Fubo.tv (gotta have something to watch on those long Sunday trainer rides).
One thing I always find bizarre about these kinds of conversations: inevitably there are a number of people who demand to know why you cheapskates aren’t willing to “cough up the money” to support Service X. “It’s less than the price of a cup of coffee a day!” But Strava isn’t Médecins Sans Frontières. It’s a commercial service in what’s I’m told a free market economy. If they provide a service that people find valuable (and part of that value is not irritating their customers) people will pay for it. If not, not.
Up until now, I consider my relationship with Strava vaguely symbiotic, or at least barter based: I give them my data, which they sell to governments, councils and cities for town planning purposes, and build a very detailed global elevation dataset. I also tell them how many bikes I have, how often I replace them (so they can estimate what I earn), where I live and where I work. In return for this I see how I compare to the rest of the global population on segments, but I know there is a lot of ‘suspect’ data in there,but that’s ok because its free, and I can filter it out so I only compare against people I know and who’s data I trust.
I have kept up my side of this by uploading data on an almost daily basis since 2012.
I think that if Strava wants me to up my side of the bargain, they need to do the same. If I pay for access to segment leader boards, then Strava has to do a lot more to keep those leader boards clean of bike rides marked as runs, car journeys marked as bike rides, e-bikes marked as regular bikes, and various electronic doping methods. I know I wont ever get to the top of most segments, as that’s where the local elites and pros hang out, but they need to ensure the playing field is level and fair, and there not there yet.
Before this change I had no interest in summit/premium as I get those features elsewhere as part of a package (trainerroad & veloviower) or for free (gamin connect) so all those features don’t sweeten the deal for me.
I’m only going to upgrade if I really miss the segment leader boards, and I’m not going to miss them while in lockdown and only riding the trainer, but time will tell, and if I do upgrade, I expect Strava to step up too.
This news almost feels like I lost a friend. Strava essentially just got rid of the reason they were the most popular fitness app. There are so many free apps that do exactly what Strava now does for all non-payers. To paywall 50 million users will likely make Strava irrelevant for most people within a year. Was a good run while it lasted. I’m pretty sure there are a bunch of app engineers who will be working overtime the next month to get their free leaderboard app up.
Ray, you, more than most, surely know that perception is reality.
Whether or not you meant this to be a takedown, the number of commenters here saying (paraphrased), “yeah, you’re right, I quit and I’m taking my ball (segments) too” should make it clear that many (most?) perceived it as such.
When you open with “Today, Strava sold its segmented soul.”, it’s pretty easy to see how George and others reached that conclusion.
As a paying member this affects me less directly and immediately, but if Strava winds up losing it’s place as the go-to for sharing ride data (“Strava or it didn’t happen”), this will have been a disastrously wrong decision (and we’ll all be worse off, until a new king rises). If they retain the critical mass of subscribers, free on not, it will be VERY difficult for a new contender to dethrone them on the social side.
Would you agree the most common scenario is “come for the segments, stay for the route planners and analysis”? If so, I think a hybrid ad/premium model where the “free” accounts pay for segment and segment leaderboards via ads, and paid members get no ads plus more advanced features. Maybe only paid members can CREATE segments would be the biggest carrot?
Like others here, I’ve had an emotional reaction to this, and a few thoughts come to mind as to why.
I’ve been on the platform since 2012. In that time I’ve been a subscriber on and off. (To your question earlier Ray as to paying monthly, I cycle and live in Canada and do a lot of my rides commuting. So once it gets too dark, cold and icy, I would cancel my membership and pick it up the following year.)
More than that what riles me up is not only did I pay for a while, but I helped build the platform. As an early user I put in a lot of the segments that have been popular in my region. And over the years while my performance has declined with age, I’ve still curated some of those segments and flagged people driving them etc. Without someone doing this work, the platform has no value, yet the expectation of the Strava is “someone” will do this for free. I’m happy to, but expect something back in return. It’s frustrating that after all these years they can’t run an algorithm to flag impossible segment performances, which to me implies they simply rely on self policing for free.
Also, been somewhat of a data nerd, I’ve had my fair share of technical issues with the platform. I use Golden Cheetah to look at the RAW data, so know that Strava is messing with it. It has definitely got way worse from a data integrity point of view the past couple years. I bring this all up as I have opened various support cases with them and had no meaningful resolution 90% of the time. Regardless of paying or not paying, support has been middling to poor over the years.
Their whole tale of being there for the athletes also does not ring true. Recently my daughter has started keeping up with me and we enjoy riding together. She is a serious athlete for her sport, and works hard at training. However as she is under 16, Strava refuses to display her heart rate data. Garmin has no issue with it showing it. This really got me irritated, more than the segment thing. If you truly care for athletes, then give them the tools to train. And of course, she is expected now to pay $5 a month to not see her HR data but to see her leaderboard position?
All of this brings me round to the bigger question of why and why now. I’ve been in technology and business for years. You do this for two reasons. Either you need to pay the bills, or you are looking to sell.
When we have record high unemployment figures across the planet, now is a time everyone can get some leniency from creditors. If money really was the issue this is completely the wrong time to deal with it this way. Anyone in corporate PR or Communications would point this out.
So my suspicion is they want to inflate the value and dump it. There is no long term play they allude to in the post. The investors want out and want to get a big return. They are doing the quickest thing they can to get the revenue numbers up and dump the platform on someone else. The reality of reading this thread I get the feeling some people, maybe 5%, will pony up the money and the revenue numbers will move substantially up. However, more likely than not, a good 50% of people will disengage with the platform, either by no longer posting to it, or simply not checking in any more. This will crater long term retention and the value proposition will die. The investors by then would have their money and be long gone and the new owners be holding on to a lame duck. We thought they built a community for us. They think we are a commodity.
People. Come on. There is some serious lack of thought here.
If you don’t use segments or need any of the subscription features, then don’t subscribe. But don’t go on and on and try to get others not to use Strava. That’s just trying to dig their grave. Obviously they need to get to some level of profitability otherwise they won’t be around. That’s not good for them, for me or for anyone for that matter including you. We should be paying their fees and thanking them for what they do and what they’ve done for help me and you to ride and share experiences with our friends.
This industry is awash of free stuff which is killing innovation by hurting companies like Strava to invest money on resources in R&D. So many tools that connect to Strava by developers with too much free time and doing stuff for fits and giggles. In these times where many people are in need of real charity, charitable donations by developers who develop stuff and give it away free is shameful, quite honestly. We should not be telling anyone to use free stuff. It’s equivalent to telling people with money to go get food at the food bank.
Interestingly I think the emotion from people here is a good indication for Strava. If people didn’t care they would not comment. Most people seem to value Strava as a central app for fitness and and want to see it as a place where everyone can meet.
I think part of the reaction from me and others is not that Strava need to make a profit, its that we don’t agree with how they propose doing it. No doubt Strava have looked at the stats and made the best decision in their opinion.
The way Strava have done it and the announcement that went with it does not seem to have convinced many of the readers on DCR.
Cutting off 3rd parties’ app without warning was a sleazy move, anyway you want to look at it. And that integration is something that Strava should build upon, not create roadblocks.
One of the strengths of Strava is that it was seen as an universal storage for fitness activities. It served as a universal remote thingy between disparate systems. One could send to Strava and also retrieve from Strava.
Sure Strava can’t be expected to provide such service for free, but trying to make the individual users to pay, instead of the 3rd parties that feed of that database seems like a strange decision. Especially since you want to keep having a large user base feeding that database.
Had a subscription in the past, during special training periods, but right now I’m a free user. Just did the rounds in the app and browser, to check what I’m using Strava for. Realized I was just distributing kudos and tracking shoe mileage. Group training organisation is done outside Strava, so the social aspect is lost on me. Migrated shoe database to Stryd app (released in the latest version), will delete account just by principle, knowing I will not make any difference to Strava. No hard feelings.
Ray – what was the last item that had 550+ comments on your site? This seems an emotive subject and to my mind shows people care about Strava in some form at least.
Most Garmin/Wahoo product reviews have that many comments (usually into the thousands). Some others popular products from Polar, Suunto, Favero and a few others as well.
But for a non-product review (or non-giveaway post), it’s less common to have more than a few hundred comments.
Training Log is also now a Subscriber only feature. Worth noting…
THIS is the biggest loss to me. So now (as a free user) I can look at my most recent workout, but the only way to access others is to manually scroll back in the feed? The whole point of using an app like Strava is to keep a training log. Many, many other apps do this for free, and I am not at all willing to pay for this basic functionality. If it hadn’t been for this loss, I might have paid for some of the other features, but taking away the ability to even access your previous workouts is just plain greedy.
I just posted this on facebook………
Well done Strava – you’ve sucked everyone in during lockdown, waited for everyone to settle in, then added a sucker-punch by pulling loads of features unless you subscribe.
I was about to subscribe anyway, to use the more advanced features, but you’ve just performed the cardinal sin of blatant profiteering that Rupert Murdoch would be proud of!
Oh well, back to ….. uurrggghh…. Garmin connect it is then
The whole issue for me is that segments are 90% of the point of using Strava. It has assumed a large role in my cycling and running experience because I can see what the best athletes do on the climbs and routes anywhere and then compare myself to them, as well as other athletes I follow. I WANT everyone to see the entire leaderboard. The whole point is to know where you stand. If only a small group of people see it, then it ruins it. What’s the point of a track meet if nobody records the times and places? Strava has become like a community service. It’s the place where everyone records everything and so segments have become meaningful as a measuring stick for capability across all athletes. I mean I started paying for it awhile back to have access to live segments. So I don’t mind paying. But it kind of ruins it anyway, or degrades it, if everyone can’t see my segments. If everyone can’t see their own place on the leaderboard, they’ll probably stop caring as much. And then the whole thing just loses its place as a sort of official record of all serious athletes’ efforts. Someone needs to pull all the existing Strava leaderboard data and build a new app that Includes existing leaderboard and the. just has leaderboards as its main feature.
Another way to look at it… As things stand now, for me, I like the leader boards but how much value do I get from them? I already pay for Spotify, a couple podcasts, and a meditation app… All of which I like and I feel I receive value from them. Strava just does not give me the same value for this never-ending pay-as-you-go life. Garmin Connect gives me the data that I need.
I am done with strava! I will put my account to sleep or kill it.
DC Maker,
any suggestion on other apps that will record segments for comparison? I just want to see my own results.
somebody else here suggested:
Polar Flow, TP for training metrics; Mapy.cz, Komoot for routes
any other suggestions? thank you DC maker, you are the best reviewer ever.
If you are just focused on your own efforts you can create segments in Golden Cheetah. You can compare your efforts on the segment from different rides but it’s not as easy as Strava. It’s ride focused and not segment focused.
That said the people that are constantly working on the platform probably already have a solution that I don’t know about.
thanks James. my friend just told me that you can create segments on garmin connect so for now my problem is solved.
I will check out golden cheetah and see research other options. it would be nice to see my kids results and my own together on the same page when we run together.
I’m not sure how this comment will be received but my reaction to Strava’s ‘stick’ IS emotional because it reminds me what it felt like to be in an abusive relationship. My needs/wants/requests being ignored, no actionable steps taken to improve things that are going wrong, getting blindsided with a slap/punch/kick, and then telling me I have to ‘fix’ the problem.
I realize for some this analogy may seem illogical but Strava lost me and any data I’ve given them forever because it took me years to learn how to recognize bully behaviour and abuse of power and I would be ashamed to be associated in any way with a company that so openly treats users and collaborators with such disrespect.
It is nothing to do with them needing to be profitable. It is everything to do with that feeling of choice being taken away and then being ‘forced’ (not asked as Strava keeps saying) into a no-win situation. It’s HOW they’ve gone about this and HOW they’ve treated everyone that makes it so unappealing to support them in any way.
My current free Strava isn’t working or tracking properly but I put up with it because of my love of the segments and my mini-wins and comparing to my friends and my past efforts. Even if I have a shitty ride, I might have done one segment really well and that means so much. Hey, no relationship is perfect right? But this move crossed a line as far as trust … you don’t take something away that you’ve offered to me and that I’ve contributed to building and then tell me I have to pay to get it back, especially when the rest isn’t working well and you’ve made me feel invisible when it comes to feature requests.
It’s honestly makes me feel like an abusive partner suggesting I marry them and then they’ll treat me nicely. And for that reason, I’m out. In fact, I will happily PAY another app offering the same things as Strava (but without the glitches) even if Strava reversed it’s decision. Again… my history as a human being means I no longer believe ‘I’m sorry, it won’t happen again’ after a punch has been thrown.
I 100% get not everyone will relate to this and that an app making a business decision that I find offensive is NOT the same thing as an abusive relationship, but it has created the same emotions for me and omg that makes me mad. Clearly, it’s emotionally hitting a lot of people or there wouldn’t be such a backlash when we can logically look at it and understand that this is ‘just a business decision’.
Call it pride, call it a CoVid anger vent, call it being cheap… I will miss the good times Strava, but you just became too much of an asshole for me to stay. PS – thanks for doing it at a time when people are already riding a fun emotional roller coaster edge and can really have an over-reaction to stuff.
kitkat I can tell you that you are not alone and a lot of people have not realized what just happened because there are not using strava due to the pandemic. very timely and snickly approach from strava I must say!
I can tell you that as popular as strava is, it will get hit hard and a new app will rise. just like myspace once was popular, then facebook, then instagram, and the list goes long.
I just request to get my all my strava data because I don’t trust them. you can do that here: link to support.strava.com
you can get bulk export of your data and hopefully use in another app which there are many out there. before you know it there will be a new one that everyone uses, maybe StravO….
Thanks for your perspective. You absolutely hit the nail on the head. Strava is basically made up of the data users ( free and paid for ) have given it for free. To take it away from them is basically stealing. From what i’ve read it sounds like strava’s creditors have announced they are going to pull the plug so strava are desperate. And desperate people make mistakes.
I don’t think Strava are struggling at all.. they have over 40 million users and more than a quarter million Premium, paying members.. thats a lot of lettuce coming in each month.. They are not going away any time soon..
>> thats a lot of lettuce coming in each month
do you have any sources for strava profit ? all i have read is that it never turns a profit.
Great article Ray. I don’t see your tone as anti Strava as much as anti poor form.
So I have been a non-paying member of Strava since 2011. I migrated from Map My Ride when my friends started to join and the Kudos began to flow.
Initially I used it as my ride log and analysis tool. With my acquisition of a power meter, Strava became more of a social hub where me and my friends could brag over who wasn’t the lowest in the local segment rankings.
I probably created about 10 of the segments around town and love to use those as a quick gauge of personal improvements.
I use Golden Cheetah for all of my ride analysis and TrainerRoad as my indoor training app of choice. So I don’t need Strava for analyzing my ride.
Garmin Connect, Map My Ride and Golden Cheetah are all logs all of my rides. So I don’t need Strava as a ride log.
Until last week I didn’t really use the route planner all that much. I maybe had 3-5 routes. However I got a new head unit that can utilize routes and so I was busy testing both Strava and Ride With GPS to see what route planner I preferred. The recent integration between Strava and Garmin was pushing me towards Strava as my preferred route planner.
After the recent changes and a recent ride, I was sad to not be able to compare my efforts on segments I created. So I just recreated them in Golden Cheetah. It’s just not as quick and easy to compare 10 years of rides (they may have a way in Golden Cheetah and I just don’t know how).
I will miss comparing segments with my friends. If people do drop off (although I don’t think too many people really will) even the paid version of the segment leaderboards get a little less meaningful.
I loved the fly-by feature.
I’m lucky enough that should I want, I could pay for the subscription. However, in its current form, I don’t know if there are enough compelling reasons for me to subscribe other than that of wanting Strava to succeed. If they come out with some great new features or if I deceive that the segments and routes are something I can’t live without, I’ll subscribe. Until then, I will remain a free user.
I struggled to read 600 comments but I would like to know how the (DCR) Strava users (will) decide…
Can we have a poll to see what percentage will a) change to subscription model b) stay “free” c) leave strava.
Too many requests, can’t even connect to the site.
What I would have liked to stay free
– my own training log
– top10 of my friends even if I have more than 10 connections, show me top 10 and my best. I cannot care less about the top 10 overall or women, won’t ever beat those times
– Route builder basic. I think Garmin must have known about this thus adding komoot sync to their api..
I’d add more, but can’t even to connect to Strava’s website anymore…
WE GAVE THEM DATA FOR FREE, Now they are selling it back to us for 5$/month
Since I became Summit member they making so many changes that I really dont need, and taking things that i needed (like support of some sensors) I feel so stupid that i forgot to delete this free membership and gave them whole year money, it is mechanism created to cheat and take money, and if they are not profitable company yet (one of the most expensive or the most expensive app for android) I dont think they will ever become one.
I cannot wait for some other app to start their own segments for free and it become popular,
IT IS SO SIMPLE! LETS START IT ALL OVER AGAIN, IT IS OUR EFFOR > OUR DATA – we will do all the KOM’s once again, we do it every day…
Why does “Toolbox for Strava” continue to work?
Is this app not affected by the current changes?
The main question is, if the traditional Silicon Valley model will work in future.
Are people all over the world with medium wages willing to pay for features developed by people in high labour cost countries with a silicon Valley prices? I believe not. The feature set of Strafa is not worth 60 Euro a year. A Fitness Studio in Germany starts from 12 Euro an month. In Silicon Valley it might be decent price. But not in Germany where I live. In other parts of the world as poorer areas of the US, China, Vietnam, Rumania people simply find it not an good deal.
I beliefe in future those apps like Strava will be developed in areas there they can reduce the monthly price less than 5 EUR a year.
First I was a bit angry when I read the news on their website and figured I cannot compare segment times to my buddies any longer – neither could I see my own personal history on segments (2 of the most used features for me that keep me motivated).
Then I realized that I have been heavily using their service since 2010 for free… Free for 10 years. I also realized how much I would miss if Strava was gone (i.e. if they go bankrupt). So I signed up for the service that has been part of my life for a long time now. After all I spend 10$/month on music and 15$/month on movies. Why not spend 5$/month on a service that has proven itself to me for the past 10 years.
Frank, is not about the $5 , it is about the way they did it .
If you give someone something for free you can’t say after 11 years “O by the way you have to pay me for that what I give you 11 years ego “?
They are too lazy to make additional changes to Strava for which they could charge on payed account .(if someone would need that).
They could charge $1 for premium and with 55 million users they could make more that they will make now.
It’s partially about that, but even some facilities need to start charging when the time is right. What I think most dislike about it was 1) the timing of the implementation and the lack of any announcement 2) their innability to address other failures within the application, like segment finder and some of the annoyances in route builder that a person could never seem to circumvent.
As someone else pointed out it was a highly inappropriate way of making changes, because other 3rd part aps or apis hang off their system as it was built before, so there was no warning that these things would fail instantly. IOW they just did what they wanted without any care or regard for how their app changes would affect others, and that’s bad business policy.
The other side of it is the data sales, which for me is a dishonest angle. If you’re going to take others data and sell it to whoever then your application should be free. IOW you can’t have it both ways, charge people for what you believe is a premium service and also profit on the backside when you sell your data to someone else.
As I posted elsewhere what I thought was stunning was that they expended resources to take something away from people…shocking actually unless you are under the gun. Where all the PE dollars went is beyond me, it sounds a lot like Strava people have been living pretty high on the hog without regard for how the application at some point in the future had better pay off. Perhaps had they focused on what consumers wanted vs what their funding group wanted they could have charged the $ they wanted for the application and ended up on the winning side, when push comes to shove I wouldn’t want to be the MySpace of the sports world, and with the inaccuracies in the GPS system that render Segments a worthless component, eventually I think Strava might get there. And after all, Segments is really the only thing Strava has that set it apart…in all honesty. And IDK about others but I’m not looking at Strava for social anything…isn’t there enough of that garbage already? Trying to create the FB of sports apps…meh, why bother?
Strava has become the Specialized of Apps. Unlikable for the public and bullish to its chain partners and peers.
I find the profitability aspect very intriguing. On the one hand I get it: servers and developers are not cheap and Strava appears very uninterested in having advertisements on their app. On the other hand, I would think that finding investors for an app that has 50 million users that freely give you plenty of information about their movements would be about as hard as selling ice cream on the seaside. Can you imagine how much you would have to pay to get 50 million people to give you the information that they upload to strava? In addition to the 250,000 who are willing to pay, there are, in my opinion, two possible options for generating revenue. One, for free users have ads. If you don’t want ads, pay for the service. Two, anonymize the data, and make hundreds of millions from it.
The only thing they are going for are free users money.
We i Our team is looking for alternativ apps – anyone???
Golden Cheetah for analysis tools. It’s a user developed platform that is very feature packed.
Garmin Connect to create routes and track your PRs on created segments.
Hello:
A week ago I cancelled my premium account (it would expire on June, 27th), not due to the main theme of this blog post, but due to the fact that the three Summit packages will be integrated into a more expensive one. Well, today I clicked the button of subscribe in order to check if I could use the free month for new subscribers in order to extend an extra month my subscription and… surprise: the price of my anual renovation is 47.98€, i.e., $52.32 instead of the announced $60 per year.
Have had anyone a similar experience?
Strange way of enticing users to upgrade. There were two possible reasons users did not upgrade: 1) too expensive, 2) they did not care about the premium features.
In my case it was (2). Since leaderboards became premium it is now (1) and (2). (1) because I don’t think leaderboards are worth what they are asking for (nearly as much as basic Netflix rate), and (2) because I still don’t care about the other premium features. I will therefore not be subscribing but I’ll still use the app. Maybe even save some time in the process given that I can’t browse leaderboards any more. So, thanks Strava!
BTW I have an idea for you Strava, and since you like ideas that upset users you will like it. How about you fix the bugs and add the things users were begging for for years, but only in the paid version. I can imagine users flocking to premium in no time! ?
>> There were two possible reasons users did not upgrade:
>> 1) too expensive,
>> 2) they did not care about the premium features.
you missed the third option :
3) they cant see the point in paying for social media
I’m new to strava about 6 months ago. The only reason I even enjoyed it was being able to see how I did against people the same day or the same year for somebody I knew because I sucked so bad at cycling that I would never be able to match up with “all time”.
Definitely leaving it now. Segments were the only thing I really cared about and it definitely is not worth $60 a year. I’d pay $20…. but none of my friends will pay anything at which point I have nothing to compare myself to at which point Strava isn’t any use to me.
Oh well. I can understand that if they can’t make a profit, what’s the point of continuing the business. Whether that’s true or a spin on their business model is irrelevant. I for one have always used Golden Cheetah for analysis and Garmin to create live segments since I never sub’d to Strava. The feature I liked the most was being able to see my PRs on segments. Unfortunately, not enough to pay for this feature since there are freely available ways to do it. I already sub to two other bike platforms and am pulling the plug on Strava.
Less functions in basic version
Strava took out monthly km counting and monthly km chart in free version.
Same strategy as airlines. You give passenger less space in eco class and hope that they ll fly business class
I think Strava just signed their own death warrant. RIP Strava.
Its actually quite shocking that Strava can’t figure out how to make money with such a huge and loyal customer base. Shocking!
Strava is a big part of my social athletics circle, and I fully intend to use it. Since everyone I know is on the platform. That’s probably true for many/most casual or more serious athletes. Strava already HAS critical mass and that’s so important, as basically it would be tough to replace them.
The problem is $5.33/mo (or $64/yr) is rather expensive for what you get. I have spoken to a number of people, and $19.95/year, or essentially $2/3/mo sounds like a better value price point. Strava could fix that value equation by improving their mapping features (ie Komoot) or better integration with Garmin, or a number of different improvements! However, its likely that most people view the price as a barrier … its NOT worth it (even tho they value the service)!
No matter how you slice it. Strava should reasonably expect 80% of their customers to pay … it has value … they just need to find the right price. And $64/year doesn’t seem like the right price imho!
Hey Ray I am writing to you because it’s impossible to reach Strava to complain and I know you have a kind ear. I have been a member for years.. a paying member.. I have used Strava on Safari Mobile on my iPad on several European trips to plan and create routes on the road to download to my Garmin. Now with this new “Route Upgrade” They have basically broken the functionality. The map options can’t be reached and the Elevation tab only shows half way.. I know they have a Strava Mobile.. But that is for iPhone and is not optimized for iPad. I wrote s support ticket asking for a link back to the older version but heard nothing back.
If you are using the Route planner the chances are you are somewhere where you are not going to have access to a desk top machine. The iPad mini has been great up till now. BTW RWGPS just released a route planner that blows away Safari on the iPad… But thats another 50 bucks a year.. I hope someone at Strava reads your feedback posts… Love you man…
The reason that non subscribers will never switch to subscribers is that whatever features they currently use on strava, they can also be achieved with a $50 gps gadget attached to their bike and a free facebook account. Strava is a cool idea but they have failed to monetise the data they have been collecting over the last decade. My guess is strava wont be around in 12 months time.
I just discovered that Strava goals can not be made private and the numerous requests to have this addressed?
link to support.strava.com
Just another example of Strava being out-of-touch and in their own, elite, know-it-all world.
Why would I reward a company that doesn’t listen to their customers.
Wow, that request for private goals from 2014 with a “not happening, we’re focusing on social” in 2019 is painful
“not happening” was 2016, my mistake
Dear Cyclists,
Strava is selling our data and still limiting it’s features.
Let’s just ditch Strava and build something new!
With a proper training log and segments. A better alternative!
I will start migrating my data from strava today. Hope to never (until you make up your mind) see you again Strava.
If segment leaderboard is not available for free users, free users should not be included in leaderboard. That would be an honest behaviour. It is unfair to be listed in leaderboard while you are not able to see it.
Our data is the rason of strava’s success as they uses mostly free users’ data in segments (that’s what makes strava so popular). So i dont agree we use strava free, as we contribute with our data.
(I am ok with paying for features other than segments or basic features). While strava gets commercial benefits from our data, we should able to see our data at least .
IMO, hiding segments from leaderboard (choosing who can see option as followers ) is only way to do. So they will possibly understand that there would be no difference among strava and its competitors without lively segment and related features.
I applaud Strava for trying to figure out how to differentiate between free and not free, and give users compelling reasons to pay for the platform. Like Ray, and many here, I’m disappointed in how they executed it, especially around the API. Having built software that depends on APIs for 20 years, and managed many enterprise APIs, that kind of move is incomprehensible and Strava should really reverse that goof ASAP. It’s customary to give third party apps 2-3 months in the consumer space (or 2-3 years in the Enterprise space), and then slowly deprecate the old API for the new one. How that kind of decision gets made is concerning. It could be that they are just cavalier, or that they don’t give a crap about their 40M users, but that seems pretty unlikely. It’s possibly some combination of mis-estimated impact on the users along with trying to cut costs and do the easier-to-do engineering implementation (hey, it’s easier to just turn everything off than to put a lot of fine-tuned configurability into every feature). It might be they didn’t seek community input. That’s generally Product Management’s realm. I’m sure you (Ray) or others would have convened a focus group pretty easily if asked. They could have looked at the analytics of who is using their API and figured out if they should segment and monetize the API separately. That’s another strategy that would completely make sense for them to pursue over the next months…
There are a lot of other things that I really think Strava should experiment with in terms of what is valuable for users. Nobody else really has the segments, the gamification integration with Garmin, the leaderboards, the heatmaps, or 40M people’s exercise history that they do. Each of those areas is a potential area for monetization, and Strava is well positioned to do something really unique and grand with all those assets. Unlike others that think selling that data would be easy, I think there’s a lot of HIPPA laws and challenges to find the right non-evil buyers of that data.
As for how to moneitze, I think a good model is how Newspapers have put up pay walls with teaser mechanisms that show the free users *enough* of the things behind the pay wall that they know what they’re missing. Here’s some really simple ones off the top of my head
# Can only see leaderboard for X segments for free per week/month
# Can plan Y routes per month with the new route planner
# Can only see your past segment performance back Z events…
But each of those requires a lot of analysis, and a lot of extra code to implement. Plus testing to make sure you got it right.
However, changing your API with no notice just sounds like a goof to me. It’s a pretty bad one, and in the Enterprise software world would get a couple Product Managers and Engineers fired. But Strava consumer stuff, so I get that the stakes are different. Nobody is paying them millions of dollars to analyze and store all that data. The good news is that it’s just software and they can easily turn that API back on, while they issue an “oops” email and do a deeper dive on the analytics of how many users are using those APIs… and/or pull together a focus group. I’ll raise my hand to join said focus group. I’ve got plenty of time for Zoom calls these days. I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt and both encourage them to fix what they broke, and reach out to the community to get some feedback before they roll out another big change.
I couldn’t care less about segments, but would be perfectly happy to pay for the mapping tool. In fact, I tried to sign up, but when I did, voila, still no mapping tool. So i in-signed up.
Theres been a mapping tool on Strava for many years. How could you miss it. It’s under My Route… Then Create new route.. You maybe now have to be a premium member to access that functionality.. ( Which seems fair.. except I have beef with the new Mapping Tool…)
Am I just missing it or did they hide all of my history if I don’t pay. I feel 100% betrayed by Strava. I get that they want more people to subscribe but I invested years in storing my rides with them and now they are holding that data hostage. Seems very obnoxious.
I think their recent push with UX/UI updates lately has been significant and deserves credit. These look like small things, but that is some precious development time.
Overall, for $5/mo, It’s reasonably priced and I’m onboard with the changes.
The only part I didn’t fully understand: a non-subscriber won’t see the complete leaderboard, but will their times still show up In the actual leaderboard of a paid user? I understand free users not getting access to the leaderboard themselves, but as a subscriberI’d still want to see how I compare myself to the whole Strava user base, not just to paid users.
the new route builder is awful! much preferred the old interface, it loads so much slower on a webpage now and is a real shame, the old route builder was beautiful to look at this is too cartoon like shame.. its really confusing to work with.
bye sträva from a paying customer.
Dunno if you saw my comment.. but Yeah the “Upgraded” route builder is crap. And completely useless on my iPad… Take a look at RWGPS. their new mobile rout builder works a treat on iPad. and even basic members get to use the desktop version..
I do understand the need to make money and profit, but for me is the incorrect path. They took something that was there, for the free users, and took it away. What they don´t seem to understand is they took data that took years to make for us that run or ride a bike, to see me there, between place 20-30 was great, was a goal. So now they want me to pay feels like when the guy that stole your stereo is selling it to you.
My reaction, I shut down my account with them, I prefered to lost all data to continue sharing my rides with the platform, and the use of my data to build new segments or rides.
A few days into the “new” Strava free edition.
1) I recalled how I perceived them at the beginning: the best implementation ever of an auto-lap and lap-discovery feature. Which is the great technology piece they put together and that’s still there: remember when climbs used to show up by themselves? The form to trim – name them was crap but made the work, and still sucks but gets the job done. That single form is the heart and soul of the platform.
2) Indexing your data ride per segment provided the capability to easily browse back and forth through past rides, see what you were doing then, the pictures you had taken. This was unique. They killed this, now you would have to scroll the log back for years to get there like in every other app. I believe it’s a mistake. It is something that would keep the casual user, the -interested in my data- kind of persona, using the platform.
3) the paywall is poorly thought: if you place a button “see your stats” you don’t slam people against the paywall. Basically you have the feed, your present ride data, and numerous misleading call to action messages that lead nowhere but to the translucent paywall with translucent data of your own which kinda scream.. “we have your data, pay if you want them back!”. Way too invasive. Plus one of every three clicks leads to the paywall. A crap fragmented experience, not really user oriented.
Strava just got a whole lot less useful… the minor features that kept me on it are now gone so what’s the point of staying. My Garmin software does a whole lot better analysis, which I get access to with my devices so Strava offers me pretty much nothing now.
Awful corporate attitude, screw the users we want their money that’s all. They’ll go from the most popular platform to an exclusive niche one. Good luck to them I say, I’ll be elsewhere.
Hopefully Garmin/other competitors see this abysmal move by Strava and move in to capitalize.
If Strava fails to generate a profit it will cease to exist. I would much prefer it continue to exist and also personally prefer a subscription based model as it incentivises service quality but I acknowledge that this is a function of my ability to afford a subscription. I am slightly surprised Strava has not followed the route of introducing advertising into the free service to fund retaining some of the popular features.
I suspect Strava is not the last of the currently loss making providers of free or discounted services under pressure to make a profit.
I would observe reading the comments that quite a few people appear to believe that Strava is a large corporation rather than a quite small company, 180 odd people, providing a service to many millions of people
$5 a month doesn’t seem like a bad deal until you realize what you’re getting for that (leader boards, garbage route creator, health metrics), isn’t worth the price compared to what you can get elsewhere-
RWGPS has a far better free route creator than Strava ever did (and the payed version kicks arse). Garmin, Golden Cheetah both have far better free analysis tools. Most modern Garmin and Suunto devices also come with the Firstbeat metrics baked in, negating the need for Strava’s health metrics.
What most users (that I’m running across) are looking for is the primary social feature- segments and seeing where you are compared to your friends. That’s that got me onto Strava 5 years ago and kept me there. And without full access to the segment data, I won’t be around once I finish getting my 8 years of data organized in GC (mostly tagging the bikes used for mileage tracking purposes). I haven’t decided yet if I’ll strip my data or set it all to public to force strava to recalculate my position every time someone else rides the same segments I have, costing them money without the benefit of new data from me.
Whats lacking from any of the three alternate services is the segment boards. Playing with RWGPS segments, while there are aren’t a lot of them- they are astounding easy to create, especially compared to Strava. Just mapped out multiple segments from yesterdays ride, took all of 5 minutes to build 6 segments that will probably never be ridden again (the trails barely see any use). It can use more work to get closer to what Strava had but I suspect if a decent # of people migrate over, improvements will happen.
Haven’t tried to create segments in Connect yet.
I’ve been tracking Strava’s business model for a few years. It is disappointing that the company has gone down a path in which they want to give users less rather than more. Considering all the possible options out there for them to pursue, they seem to have chosen one that suggests they are done building up the business and will now start compartmentalizing the functions and trying to hold on to what they have built instead of expanding their ecosystem. Companies that adopt this mindset are likely to find themselves overrun by competitors once the market realizes that Strava has stopped growing and is defensive.
Nothing
Yes…absolutely!
All depends how much money they want,
but 4€/month for just segments ? it’s a bit too much for many people i guess ….
Not only that, there is even less functionality to basic training data (volume of training of a prior week) with the free Strava plan.
Strava not necessarily needs to be free but E 5/month (yearly subscription) is way too much for what I use.
I frequently use the Route Builder but Garmin and Fietesersbond offer similar functionality. So much for Strava.
Strava is simply a service, not an entitlement.
There was a lot of functionality you got for free….not perfect, often flawed and frustrating…but free.
Strava is a business with equipment and employees and daily operational decisions and now apparently unable to continue without increasing its revenue from the pockets of users of this service, so it must make really hard decisions…those with the least worst outcomes. Segments, API’s, 3rd party apps…. My guess is all of that was on the table and they made hard calls that may be flawed as well…happens in every organization.
I see a lot of well articulated emotional posts that took a lot of careful thought and time to create, yet summarize the annual cost is not worth it…if you’re that emotionally affected by the changes to a free service then apparently Strava is worth it.
I was a free user for many years, and now I’ll dutifully pay and see what they do. Strava is no TR or TP: never will be as those companies are light years ahead and progressing, but they aren’t Strava either and never will be.
So I guess we either pay up and see what they can do with Strava over the next few years, remain free with less functionality, or delete and find an alternative….At this point, with all the free service they’ve provided me over the years, I’ll give them a chance to stabilize. If after paying for the service they treat everyone poorly, then perhaps another business may find an opportunity.
This is like Google et al….did anybody here ever really believe they would get all that functionality in Strava for free, forever?
So today (26-May-2020) the routing feature has finally disappeared from my free account on the web (and with the app updates gone from there too).
Now it is just Facebook for exercise unless you want to pay, which is fine for me as I’m not the core audience and subscribe elsewhere for Strava’s other pay for features.
Best wishes to Strava and the paying subscribers. I hope they come up with something compelling for tempt me away from other platforms. I will keep watching with interest.
Well said. For me. The main reason I use Strava is for the Matched Runs function. Since that’s only for paying customers now I’m consider stopping using Strava altogether. The only reason keeping me from doing so is the people I follow. What’s my incentive for paying? So I can get functions that were previously free? That’s a poor business decision. I would rather have advertisers for better free functions… or at least not losing the functions that were previously free.
There’s a loophole so freeloaders can see their total distance for a week; the Club Leaderboard shows it!
Maybe it would be a good time for an overall review of the best Strava alternatives? I know I plan to change, but am not sure which option to go with.
What I don’t get is, why Strava doesn’t introduce advertising in free accounts and keeps premium-accounts ad-free. Most companies in that realm need more than one revenue-stream. And I think an ad-free experience would be a good reason for some people to subscribe.
It’s illy to be upset about what Strava is doing. They need to make money just like any business. The value I get from Strava far outweighs the cost. And for those who are saying: “Yes, but… $8!!!” – Is that really a lot when you probably spent a couple of thousand on a bike and a GPS device and kit and pedals and shoes and… It’s the $8 that’s gonna break the bank? Really? Just have one less beer per week and you’re there. This is much ado about nothing IMHO.
That’s a valid opinion. In my country it’s about the same price as Microsoft Office, which may be good value for some, but not for others ?♂️
As a marketing major, I’ve often questioned some of Strava’s strategies.
It’s a major issue for Strave because at some point they will have a competitor, as most tech/social media companies have had and will continue to have. I think Ray’s point speaks more to the fact that their offering at this point is stale and customer retention for a decent sized chunk isn’t based on features, it’s dependent on them being the only option. Hoping people start paying for a product, without many updates, in a competitive marketplace isn’t a recipe for success.
For me, if they made some minor tweaks I would be happy. Take for example their training plans for running. I can choose the target distance, choose how many workouts per week, but can’t make any other alterations. For longer distance runners, long run day is a sacred day and is not something I would move. Either it matches their pre-selected Sunday, or the whole plan doesn’t work. On top of that, it doesn’t get uploaded to a calendar where I can see a month’s view of what is upcoming nor does it appear anywhere on the homepage telling me I have something to do today.
Initially I felt betrayed, like other human beings I do not like change. After two weeks of thought I miss segments less than I expected. In addition the changes remind me why I keep all gpx/fit files in the cloud as well.
For me Strava is the share bucket of all activities (walks/runs/swims/hikes/ski and mostly cycling). I would like to have my training progress in cycling separated from a stroll in the woods. There are numerous programs which provide this (mostly use golden cheetah).
The good thing about the Strava changes came from the syncing between Garmin and Komoot (link to dcrainmaker.com)
I am impressed by the Komoot route building option (although I miss the heat map option). This was for the main reason to use Strava. That leaves the segments and activity sharing (still free) for Strava. I wonder if I am willing to share my free data only for this. If I cannot see segment, I do not want to be in the ranking either :-)
In the end less users will not only impact the segments for paid users, but also up to date route information. Lets see where this end, however I will not share my credit-card details to uses segments yet
I use Strava for 2 main reasons and one lesser one.
1) I like how quickly I can jump into the app and see my run results. I record with a Garmin watch but their app is little less friendly for just quickly seeing some stats.
2) Compare My Run is by far the main reason I use Strava. It’s very handy to see how well i did on the same route compared to previous runs. (This one of course is gone)
3) The social part. I have a few friends that when I see their runs, it encourages me.
I’ve tried summit before and wasn’t impressed with the extra features. I think Strava knows this and if they can get another 5% of their users to subscribe it might be worth the free users they’ll lose. I for one, will probably be one they lose. Not just because of features I lose, but the way they did it. I don’t even get the choice of keeping some basic features for a lower price. I think a better solution would be a very low cost subscription plan like $1 a month to get some basic features back. Let all the new features go to the full subscription users. I would potentially pay $1 a month or $10 a year for things like the leaderboard and compare my run.
Meanwhile, i’m looking for alternatives.
I have been a long-time, annual subscriber to Strava. I use many of the features, including the fitness tracker, training plans, detailed leaderboards, messaging, segment goals, athlete search, segment explore, and power curve. I enjoying viewing and commenting on the activities of my friends. Now I plan to explore more of what Strava has to offer to maximize my $5/month (about $0.16/day), including Route Builder and other features. I encourage others to do the same. It’s not realistic to continue to expect something for free – remember that Strava does not sell ad space and I appreciate that. The value has always been there, Strava now needs us to realize that and pay for the service they provide. If not, uses can continue to enjoy the features offered in the non-subscription version (that are still considerable).
Taylor,
I’m glad you find Strava worth the subscription fee. I did not before, and definitely do not now. I’m not asking for something for free. Just worth the cost. I’d gladly pay less for fewer features.
Great thread- I’d be interested to get the group’s thoughts on 7 quick questions. Please feel free to send the link to others that may have an opinion:
Strava survey:
link to surveymonkey.com
Once paid for Strava a while back – became disillusion by their hubris and ability to ignore basic requests from users and 3rd parties. Stopped paying for Strava. Not going to start paying again. No goodwill… they burned it. Wouldn’t phase me a bit if they became insolvent and closed up shop. Icarus flew too close to the sun.
I just find out Private segments show your Top 10 results even if you are Free user. If you want to compare your times and efforts to your previous rides just make a private segment. :-)
Hi all,
I agree DCR too. I believe in balance (getting something back for the energy you put into something).
The question is: What is balance in case of Strava? I think this answer is very personal so putting only a money value to it will not work.
The problem i to have with this, is the way Strava did this. I was in good balance with Strava because of Summit. (the older Premium (i previously had) or free option didn’t work for me.) Now Strava is back to Premium only and i must pay more (for features i don’t want and don’t use). So it’s up me to decide to stay or leave.
And guess what? (remember: I’m a long time paying customer.) How do you think Strava informed me?
They offered me three months Premium for the same price as my current Summit subscription.
Al new subscribers are getting 60 days for free!!!
So is this balance or not? (in terms of getting along in relationships)
I’d say giving people a 60 day free trial that extends into mid-summer is basically just hoping a bunch of people forget to cancel. You provided your credit card to start the free subscription trial, and as part of that, statistics say there’s a 48% chance you’ll forget to cancel: link to finance.yahoo.com
Is it a smart business move? Of course. I don’t actually have an issue with that per se. My issue is with the rest of the communications and bait/switch aspects.
Has the privacy zone become a paid feature or has it just been broken and I’m now noticing (usually don’t ride from my house)?
Holy guacamole! My house location isn’t private either.
Can’t be intentional. If they were going to blackmail us with doxxing, it’s a bit pointless not mentioning it in the ransom letter.
You won’t see your own privacy zones on your own maps. So, if you’re looking at your own activity, it’ll show you ending wherever you ended.
You’d need a friend to look at your activity and (assuming you setup your privacy zones), validate that it ends somewhere other than your house. Or, you can use an InPrivate/Incongnito browser tab and paste in the URL of the activity that way.
I was alerted to it not working by other people seeing the activity and commenting. Previously validated that it worked when I set it up a while ago. Reviewed what the zone covered did another activity and it was seen.
I was checking in an incognito tab. Turns out my house was right on the edge of the privacy zone circle. Regenerated the zone and it’s a bit better now ?