Record your hikes with the HiiKER app to keep your route, time, distance and elevation. You can record on your own, or follow a guide route: one of our hikes, a hike you’ve planned, one of your recordings or a GPX file.

In this article: Start recording · Follow a guide route · While you’re recording · Pause, finish and save · Import recordings · Moving from another app · Good to know

---

Start recording

1. Open the Record tab.
2. Tap Start. HiiKER starts recording straight away.

The bar at the bottom of the Record tab also has:

• Download – save an offline map before you lose signal. See How do I download offline maps on HiiKER?
• More – choose a guide route to follow (see below).
• Directions – driving directions to the start of your guide route, in your maps app. It appears once you’ve chosen a guide.

---

Follow a guide route

1. On the Record tab, tap More.
2. Under Choose a guide, pick one of the options below, then choose your hike, recording or file.
3. Your guide route appears on the map. Tap Start when you’re ready.

• Start without a guide – record your own route.
• Choose a HiiKER hike – follow one of our hikes near you.
• Choose from my hikes – follow one of your planned hikes.
• Choose from my recordings – follow one of your previous recordings.
• Import GPX – use a GPX file from your phone as your guide.

You can also start from any hike page: tap Start Navigation and HiiKER opens the Record tab with that hike as your guide. Then tap Start.

If you tap Start while you’re more than 1 km from the route, HiiKER asks Still on your way? Tap Get directions for driving directions to the trailhead in your maps app, then tap Start when you get there. Or tap Start now anyway to record from where you are.

With a guide route, PRO+ members also get turn-by-turn navigation and off-route warnings.

---

While you’re recording

• Your time and stats show at the bottom of the screen.
• Tap the stopwatch button to see all your stats, including time, location, distance, speed and elevation. Tap Back to Map to return to the map.
• You can lock your phone or use other apps. HiiKER keeps recording in the background.

---

Pause, finish and save

1. Press and hold Pause for 2 seconds. Holding it means you can’t pause by accident.
2. While you’re paused, tap Resume to carry on, or Finish to end your hike.
3. HiiKER shows a summary of your hike. Tap Next to rate it, add photos, a name and a description, and choose its privacy.
4. Tap Finish on the last step to save it.

Your hike is saved in My Recordings on the Home tab. You can save it on the trail with no signal: it uploads to your HiiKER account automatically once you’re back online.

Don’t want to keep it? Tap Discard Recording on the summary. Discarded recordings stay in the Recordings bin for 7 days in case you change your mind. See I discarded a recording — can I get it back?

---

Import recordings

Recorded a hike with a watch or another app? You can import it into your recordings.

In the app (iPhone and Android)

1. On the Home tab, tap My Recordings.
2. Tap + at the top right, then Import recording.
3. Tap Choose Files (iPhone) or Choose GPX files (Android) and pick one or more GPX files.
4. Tap Import Files.

On the website

1. Go to My recordings on hiiker.app.
2. Click Import.
3. Drag and drop your files, or click Choose Files. You can add several GPX or FIT files at once.
4. Click Import Files.

A recording needs a time on every point, like the tracks a watch or a tracking app records. A route exported from a planner has no times, so it can’t be imported as a recording. Import it as a hike instead, from My Planned Hikes.

---

Moving your recordings from another app

We have step-by-step guides for exporting your recordings and importing them into HiiKER:

• Move recordings and hikes from AllTrails to HiiKER
• Move recordings and hikes from Komoot to HiiKER
• Move recordings and hikes from OutdoorActive to HiiKER
• Move recordings from Strava to HiiKER

---

Good to know

• GPS works without mobile signal, so you can record anywhere. Download an offline map first so you can see where you are.
• On Android, turn off battery optimisation for HiiKER so your phone doesn’t stop the recording in the background. HiiKER offers a shortcut the first time you tap Start. See Battery Optimisation on Android.
• Finished too early? You can pick up where you left off. See How do I continue a previous recording?

Related: Turn-by-turn navigation · How to Use HiiKER’s Off-Route Warnings Feature · I discarded a recording — can I get it back?