GPS accuracy iOS 13 and/or 11 Pro Max

If you are sitting on your patio most likely the phone does not have a clear view of the sky in all directions. Your phone needs to be able to see at least 4 satellites to get an accurate position. As the satellites move very fast, your phone will see different satellites every few minutes. The erratic track is a typical symptom of incomplete GPS coverage. Get the free app GPSDiagnostic, which will tell you (among other things) how many satellites your phone is receiving at any given time.

Everyone having trouble should get the app GPSdiagnostic for a few bucks. Go outside and open it. For me, it takes the better part of a minute to acquire 4 or more satellites. It bounces around between red and orange and green and back to orange. + - 50 or 60 feet. But then it settles out and for me that was all green and + - 16 feet. In the woods (most of the trees don't have leaves yet) it was about + - 20 feet. But all green.

GPSdiagnostic is the gold standard. It is telling you exactly what your GPS hardware is doing.

Make sure all your hiking apps have background app refresh turned on in settings general. If google maps works well for you in the car and your hiking map shows bad tracks and GPSdiagnostic shows good data then I can guarantee that it is your hiking app. redmonk78 found this out with a hiking app that worked fine and one that didn't. The hiking app needs to do GPS filtering and not all do. I use Guru Maps Pro (formerly Galileo Pro) and I think it is a great app and it works well as long as I wait until all the satellites are acquired.

I would be curious to hear from the folks having problems and their experience with GPSdiagnostic. As far as waiting for a software fix from Apple, I wouldn't hold my breath for that.

A summary in one place of my advice:

1. If google maps in the car does not work well for you, insist that Apple replace the phone. If google maps works for you, the phone likely is fine and go on to step 2.
2. Get the invaluable app GPSdiagnostic. Go outside with no trees blocking you and run it. Let all the satellites settle out and acquire (should take a minute or more). It should be green and say + - 16 or 17 feet. If it is significantly higher, insist that Apple replace the phone. If it is fine, then your phone is fine and go on to step 3.
3. Get a hiking app that has GPS filtering. Guru Maps Pro is the one I use (formerly Galileo Pro), there are others.

DexterII, here is my advice repeated from page 9:

A summary in one place of my advice:

1. If google maps in the car does not work well for you, insist that Apple replace the phone. If google maps works for you, the phone likely is fine and go on to step 2.
2. Get the invaluable app GPSdiagnostic. Go outside with no trees blocking you and run it. Let all the satellites settle out and acquire (should take a minute or more). It should be green and say + - 16 or 17 feet. If it is significantly higher, insist that Apple replace the phone. If it is fine, then your phone is fine and go on to step 3.
3. Get a hiking app that has GPS filtering. Guru Maps Pro is the one I use (formerly Galileo Pro), there are others.

@mrich75 - have you tried turning off WiFi? Some of us have noticed much improved GPS once WiFi has been turned OFF. Not a fix, but at least a workaround until they fix it. I too have had multiple tickets with Apple for this and got referred to the engineers. On my last call with them, they said they plan to include fix with next update, but were not sure when that would be.

I had this problem with the app Guru Maps Pro, but I found that if I let the GPS acquire for about a minute or two then the track would be OK. I used the app GPSdiagnostic to tell when the satellites are all acquired. And Guru Maps Pro uses GPS filtering, which is settable by the user. For those who see weird stuff with their hiking or running apps - do these apps do any GPS filtering? I would bet that apps like Google Maps do use GPS filtering.

I have had zero problems with Google Maps in the car. I do notice with GPSdiagnostic that the satellite data is worse in the car than outside. No surprise here, since you are enclosed by metal.

I do think this problem is real, but I guess my phone is slightly better than some folks' phone. But look into GPS filtering for hiking and running apps. It is interesting that redmonk78 had no problems in the car (I assume Google maps or Apple maps) but did with the hiking app. I suspect the hiking app had no filtering.

Agreed! Everyone needs to report this issue to elevate the priority! I reported this issue for my iPhone 11 Pro months ago and have had two appointments at the genius bar and several phone calls with Apple Support trying to get a resolution. On my last call with them, which was over a month ago, they acknowledged that there was a problem and said that a fix would be coming out with a future software update, but they didn't say when. There has been one update since I last spoke with Apple support (ios 13.4.1), but that update did not fix the issue. In my case, I have noticed that GPS is significantly better if I turn OFF WiFi - not a great solution, but at least it makes my GPS data somewhat decent when I'm using running apps or playing Pokemon Go. My GPS is horrible in any app that uses GPS, so I think it is definitely the iOS and/or a hardware issue that is causing the problem. I never had this kind of trouble with any of these same apps on my previous iPhones (X, 6S).

redmonk78, I was wrong to tell you to open a case with Apple. There is nothing wrong with your phone. We need to get out of the weeds and see the bigger picture.

Why did you come to this thread in the first place? You saw a bad hiking track, although google maps worked fine for you in the car. You have proven (GPSdiagnostic) that the GPS hardware in the phone is fine and that your hiking app had no GPS filtering. You found at least one app that worked fine because it did have GPS filtering. That filtering is necessary. Looking at little things like turning 45 degrees is not productive. You want perfection in the GPS signal and it is by definition imperfect. I suggest looking for a hiking app that you like.

Nate

AW5 user here and seeing exactly the same issues with wonky GPS tracks. Me and some fellow runners nailed down the issue to cellular. Whenever we have activated cellular, we get wonky tracks, whenever it is off, the tracks look very good.

I went to Apple Store in Amsterdam for this problem. Short story: the problem might software problem caused by an app on your iPhone 11 Pro, so fully reset and clean up the iPhone 11 Pro will solve the problem. No, you can’t use reserve copy to set up your phone or the problem will be back. Install all apps you have one by one.

And this is the test result using Strava installed on a clean iPhone 11 Pro. I am sitting in my living room for 5 minutes. And my GPS had an episode.

Another example: I walked my dog in the neighborhood and you can see that I walk over a building and on water.

Apple should admit the errors ⚠️ and fix this or compensate.

Everyone should pay $3 and get the app GPSdiagnostic. It is invaluable. It shows that it takes up to a minute for my hiking app Guru Maps Pro to acquire the satellites to an accuracy of + - 20 feet. When I allowed this time and started my track I did not get any weird points on it. Satellites were consistently about 80%. In the car running Google Maps it was more like 50% and accuracy was about + - 50 feet.

For the Uber driver - get Apple to replace the phone. I have had almost no problems with Google Maps. Occasionally it gets off, but not often.

I've been having this issue as well ever since “upgrading” to the iPhone 11 Pro in November 2019. My GPS is overestimating distance by ~14-30% in my running apps and the track is visibly jagged, like it things I’m zigzagging when I run. By accident one day, I ran with the WiFi turned OFF and noticed that my GPS data accuracy improved quite a bit. So, now every time I run, I’ve been turning WiFi OFF and data is much better. This is totally counter intuitive, but it works for me. Of course, that is not a solution, since it would be ridiculous to have to turn WiFi off every time you want to use GPS, but it is a workaround until Apple fixes it. I have reported it to Apple, and they have asked me to send them more data. Below are snapshots of two runs I did. The first one with WiFi on, 2nd with it OFF. I’m curious to know if this works for anyone else.

redmonk78 said: "I personally have no problem with navigation using google maps, but my GPS tracking (hiking) is horrible"

Your hiking app is not doing GPS filtering. Strava and GPX something have no option for GPS filtering. Guru Maps Pro does (it is settable and it is a great app), and it works fine as long you wait for the satellites to acquire. I would guarantee that google maps *is* doing GPS filtering, and the fact that it works for you in the car with a weaker GPS signal points to the hiking app as a problem. What happens if you do your hike with google maps? Does that work? That would be a good test.

mrich75:

If google maps works horribly in the car then you have a real problem with the phone and you should get Apple to replace it. But your zoomed in tracks with no scale may be normal since GPS is not perfect. There is always about a + or - 20 feet inaccuracy and it will never be perfect. And you expect perfection.

Same experience as you turning WiFi off on both my watch and phone now lead them to being almost exactly the same. Previously at least 10% error.

Replacing the phone won't help. iPhone 11 owners (including myself) have been noting this issue for months and there still hasn't been a fix, even for those who've replaced their phones. The GPS-based apps (including running ones) have been horribly inaccurate since I've "upgraded" from an iPhone 7. There was even some small coverage on this issue in December from some of the Apple blogs (e.g. 9to5 Mac).

It's unclear when Apple will address this...or even if they will, as they haven't made any acknowledgement of it. Would be great if we could identify a path for elevating this issue as I'm frankly quite disappointed in my purchase and Apple because of this.