Outrun is a beautiful, privacy-first iPhone running app

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outrun
Run, in private, with Outrun.
Photo: Bruno Nascimento/Unsplash

Outrun is a privacy-focused run-tracking app that integrates with the Health app. (It’s also a seminal arcade racing game from 1986, but that’s not what we’re talking about today.) The Outrun running app is a great alternative to all those running and cycling apps that upload and/or sell your data to anyone who wants it, or drive you crazy with ads. Or both.

Outrun running app

The Outrun running app is great to look at and safe to use.
Great to look at and safe to use.
Photo: Outrun

Apart from its insistence on privacy — the developer says that the data collected by Outrun doesn’t leave the device unless you choose to share it — the app is also beautiful. The simple screens contain everything you need, and nothing you don’t. The main screen, the one that’s visible during your workout, shows a map with your current position and the path you’ve run so far, along with distance, duration, pace and calories burned.

The details page is equally clean and simple, but offers extra info, like your altitude over time, average speed and so on. And the history screen shows a little tile for each of your most-recent runs, with a map, distance and total time.

Syncs with Apple Health app

Finally, all this is integrated into Apple’s Health app, so it gets collected and collated with all your other health data. It even offers a dark mode.

It’s hard not to recommend an app that gets so much right. Even the price is a good, honest, subscription-free $2.

Outrun

Price: $1.99

Download: Outrun from the App Store (iOS)

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