Velocity GPS Dashboard is a versatile GPS dashboard app for users of all types of road vehicles. Use Velocity to records your journeys, monitor and regulate your speed, and see live navigational data to improve your situation awareness. This guide explains the capabilities of the wearable app and how to get it up and running on your Wear OS smartwatch.
Topics:
- Download and install
- Map of displays / quick reference guide
- Starting the app / GPS modes
1. Onboard GPS and hybrid mode
2. GPS tethering (from paired handheld app) - Speed guidance controls
1. Overspeed warnings
2. Maintain speed - Signal indicators
1. GPS connectivity
2. Bluetooth connectivity - Afterword + download link
The RAMS series (Road Air Marine Speedometers) is a range of handheld and wearable GPS Dashboard apps tailored specifically to different modes of transport; Velocity for land vehicles and Mariner for marine vessels.
Download and Install
Download Velocity GPS Dashboard from the Play Store on your watch. You can do this from your desktop browser while signed into your Google account, or directly from the Play Store app on your watch.
Map of displays / quick reference guide
Velocity for Wear OS is designed for easy switching between data displays, and for each display to be legible at a glance while riding a bicycle. Swipe up and down to navigate between each section. Tap ›› on any statistic display (time elapsed, distance, average and top speeds) to cycle between them. Using your watch’s crown or rotating bezel is the fastest way to move between displays.
Refer to this handy Quick Reference Guide to learn where each of the displays are:
Starting the app / GPS modes
When you start the app for the first time you will be prompted to select your preferred GPS source for the app:
1. ⌚️ Onboard GPS and hybrid mode
Onboard GPS primarily uses the GPS capability built into your smartwatch. GPS hardware in watches may be subject to more latency than phones and tablets due to their smaller size. By default, the app uses a ‘hybrid mode’ – combining GPS signals from both your watch and paired handheld for more accurate and timely location updates. Alternatively you can choose to always use the watch’s onboard GPS alone by switching off hybrid mode in the settings menu.
💡 You don’t have to have the app installed on your handheld device to use its signals in hybrid mode.
ℹ️ Journey recording and storage is not available in onboard GPS mode due to the limited memory and battery capabilities of smartwatches
2. 📱 GPS tethering (from paired handheld app)
In tethering mode, your recording session will be synchronised with the app on your paired smartphone. All journey statistics will be mirrored from the phone, and your watch will act as a secondary display.
When you start a journey in tethering mode, your watch will attempt to start the app on your phone and begin recording your journey. On some phones, and depending on your system settings, you may have to start the app manually if the system is in sleep mode. You may need to change your power management settings allow Velocity to start up in the background.
Starting and stopping journeys
The app will start a new journey session automatically when you start the app. You can change this in settings with the ‘Automatic start’ setting. To start a journey manually, tap and hold on the screen to start the session. A single tap will prompt you to tap and hold. The ‘tap and hold’ action is a safeguard to prevent you from activating the GPS when you don’t intend to.
While you have an active journey session, tap on the screen for the pause and stop controls; the continue button below will dismiss these controls. If you are in tethering mode, these buttons will control the journey/recording session to your phone.
Speed guidance controls
Velocity offers two speed guidance options designed to help you to regulate your speed while riding or cycling. Scroll down in the settings menu to set these features up in advance of your journey:
1. Overspeed warnings
The overspeed option will warn you once you exceed a speed that you’ve set in advance. The speedometer will glow amber, sound alarms, and vibrate to warn you when you’ve in excess of your overspeed target.
2. Maintain speed
The maintain speed option lets you set a Target Speed, and then prompts you to speed up or slow down when you’re approaching or exceeding that speed. This works by informing you with different sound and vibrations patterns as per the following three scenarios:
- As you’re nearing your Target Speed, your watch will sound continuous beeps and vibration pulses at one-second intervals. The dial will appear green; the speed numeral will appear white.
- When you reach your Target Speed, you will be alerted with a single high-pitched beep when you reach your target speed. The dial and speed numeral will both appear green (pictured above).
- When you exceed your Target Speed, your watch will sound continuous beeps and vibration pulses in a lower-pitched warning tone. The dial and speed numeral will both appear amber.
This is a minified version of the same feature in the phone and tablet version of the app. Follow this link for more information and visual examples:
💡 The average speed monitor is not currently available on the Wear OS app. If you’d like to request this as a feature, do let us know via the feedback form.
Signal indicators
The following two indicators will appear on the speedometer depending on the GPS source that you set:
GPS Connectivity
The three-colour blinking signal indicator is used across the dashboards so you’ll be able to quickly gauge your signal strength at any time.
Bluetooth connectivity
📱 GPS Tethering mode only.
In tethering mode your bluetooth connection status will be indicated on the speedometer view with one of two colours. This indicator will appear amber while the watch waits for the first signal from the smartphone app, or if it loses connectivity during your journey session.
Remember safety first
Velocity was designed in the cycle-centric city of Amsterdam to utilise the latest wearable tech to increase awareness of speed for cyclists. While the app can serve as a useful aid in safe cycling, it is important to remember to keep your focus on your surroundings and prioritise the safety of yourself, any passengers, and other road users at all times. Be sure to adjust your settings before setting off on your journey.
Check out the handheld version of Velocity for more useful capabilities such as the average speed monitor and journey data exports.
We’re always working to improve Velocity for Wear OS and Android. We welcome your feedback so we can prioritise what matters to you most in the next release.
Download Velocity GPS Dashboard for road vehicles on Google Play:
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