I just hope that Garmin can stave off the temptation of going to a subscription model either for their watches or Connect.

i wouldn't necessarily be opposed to a garmin subscription model. i have both a garmin watch and a garmin bike computer. as such, i am effectively paying twice for the platform aspects. if they were to substantially drop prices for the devices - charge for the hardware only - and then fund the platform from subscription then i should theoretically actually save money. of course the more likely approach would be to have the subscription on top of device prices and regardless as an existing garmin owner i would not initially expect to pay any more but perhaps when buying a new device at a cheaper price i would understand having an ongoing subscription charge on top of that. i don't think you can reasonably sell a device which is reliant on a charged platform to perform its basic function though. the charged services must be on top of the standard device features. some garmin watches are quite standalone, some (particularly the lower end ones) are quite reliant on connect to process data for them.

its all about how you position the charges and communicate them. strava have done this appallingly badly so will likely suffer for it (its made me reconsider my premium subscription)

I agree with both of you - what you get out of paying has no value

i just purchased a new bike computer. Have been using a Garmin of some sort or other to track all my cycling and running for about 12 years; along with Garmin connect as my log. When i needed to replace my bike computer about a month ago i thought about getting a hammerhead karoo 2 .......but am too invested in the garmin universe to change - at least when it is a close call on which computer to get. ....and that is what i think the value in Garmin Connect is to Garmin. It has to keep customers and drive repeat sales.

i do also have a Strava subscription (coming to end of year 1 in a few months). if nothing else the price increase will make me check what i can do with a paid subscription v free.

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And the question remains. where were you.

If you're using it for a tracking/analysis platform there's little reason to subscribe to anything other than Trainingpeaks. You can upload from any device via their free platforms (Garmin still has to go through the free version of Connect, but uploads automatically from Connect to TP).

The product that Strava provides for their premium subscription simply does not add up to their asking price. It's innovative features are segment competitions and personal heatmaps. The actual training analysis on Strava is rudimentary.

It's been said before but it's worth repeating. Strava is a social network first and a training tool second. The average person does not exercise at all, and the average Strava user is putting in 3-5hrs/week. Their premium subscription, wisely, is tailored towards this athlete.

I like their recovery app that comes free with paid subscription. It provides pretty good PT type of exercises. It also has decent core/flexibility training routines.
Can I do Strava stuff using other apps? Yep. Is $60/year a reasonable enough price to have everything handled in one app? My time is valuable, so for me the answer is yes.

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Next races on the schedule: none at the moment

i roughly agree. i'm even happy to some extent to pay just to support the stuff you don't have to pay for (given that they don't have ads in the conventional and intrusive sense). however i am likely to change my mind if the price goes up much which is why i can see this backfiring on strava badly as they tip people over their willingness to pay and premium subscription numbers nosedive, potentially actually reducing total revenue

It flatly is NOT worth $99/yr. At $79 it is questionable. $59, ok.

I will likely not renew and do Trainingpeaks only.

Chasing segments may be fun but I found often a wasted training ride. Also heatmaps is nice but….lemmings will also follow each other off the cliff! How many times I rode something that is “hot” to realize it is shit. Nowadays I use Google streetview, ncdot road volume map, and will detour a mile or two driving home to check out part of a route.

That's fair. I could argue that such routines are available for free online with a short Google search. But the great point you said is "my time is valuable". It's a tricky calculation for Strava as to how their users value their time.

Sidebar-Is Strava looking to IPO? I see potential on their platform for ad revenue, but their current subscription model doesnt make sense as a tech sector company unless their operating cost is near zero. The potential user base just isn't that big.

Well, TP or any of the myriad free and subscription services which can give you good metrics.

If there’s one thing you don’t do as a fitness company, it’s piss Ray off. He’s got more influence than just about anyone else in the industry. It will be interesting to see Strava’s response in the coming weeks and months.

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I subscribe because I somewhat like the features but also because I like Strava in general and I'd like them to stay in business

The price point is still below any sort of pain threshold but they should certainly be clear and rational on increases

I don’t use any of the tools outside of looking at segments for power, time and heart rate, and I wonder if it’s worth the $11.99 a month (it isn’t), but I can’t get the data without it. I wish there was a lite version.

my opinion on Strava: they failed in create a business model to make profit from the fantastic website/social network. It seems that instead of create content to worth pay premium subscription, they removed free content. It has no sense that you can see some information in the web that are only available in the app for premium (for example).

For example: intervals.icu create the exact content that integrated into strava would be a premium worth content. Or Veloviewer.com content. But they loose those trains.

GoldenCheetah... and it's free.

Yeah, I'm kind of in disbelief by their dismissive responses to him. I can only imagine whoever he was dealing with in PR/customer support didn't fully grasp who they were interacting with and that person is in hot water back at corporate now. But, that too is indefensible. If you are in PR in this industry you should something know thorough is coming when dcrainmaker emails so you bend over backwards to accommodate.

Same here. I use the recovery app several times a week. It has paid for itself many times by eliminating PT visits just to do some exercises.

It seems to me they almost felt that folks on the interwebs wouldn't talk to each other....or rather they were counting on it. Seems to be working well for them.

Is strava profitable? I haven't been following for years.

I had a free trial of the premium and never went for it. I think most of my friends who used it were free members and only post their workouts for friends to see.I had wko3-5 and training peaks for workouts. For the advanced metrics - my garmin, tp, and wko did all of that. To us, it was a site where we did not want to annoy facebook friends.

I've been a paying Strava user since 2012. There isn't THAT much with the premium subscription that I utilize. For me, $59/year wasn't that big of a deal to support a community that pretty much all of my friends use and interact on. I use TP for actual training analysis.

What kills me is the lack of communication to current subscribers and not gradually increasing prices at some point over 10 years vs "guess what...we're raising the price $20". Heck, I renew in March and nothing has been communicated to me. My renewal is still showing $59. I know that will reflect $79 once I get within 30 days of renewal.

I totally understand raising subscription prices...it's a business after all. However, you would think during a period of 10 years that they might have thought about raising the price at least a little bit. Had the cost gone up $3 this year, I don't think most people would have cared (or noticed).

Will I still pay $79 to subscribe...probably. I hope this ordeal is a good lesson to their management about running a subscription business.

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"Most of my heroes don't appear on no stamps"
Blog = http://extrememomentum.com|Photos = http://wheelgoodphotos.com

Overall I have been giving Strava the benefit of the doubt for a few years now, but given how they seem to think their customers are cash cows without letting their customers have proper price increase information, I'm done paying for it - at least for now.

Yes, I cancelled. We'll never know if I'd have paid $80 a year for Strava.

I won't send my money to a company that treats their paying customers in this way.

I was trying to read up on how Strava actually intends to becom profitable, and this guy has a pretty great analysis. Most alarmingly, these numbers from 2020:



Where Lapsed users are completely inactive, casual is 1-2 activities/wk and athlete is >2 activities/week. I can't imagine that many people go on Strava unless they have posted their own workout, so you're looking at a daily userbase of around 4 million people. That's a shockingly small global share for a social media network. Even the much maligned Truth dot com claims 2 reportedly has active users.

https://uxdesign.cc/...plained-456fa22b0d71

Wow!

This kind of answers the query I had earlier - of how I was flabbergasted that Strava was unable to sell more partnerships/sponsorships for the app. The easiest way seemed to be via the monthly Challenges. I'm surprised more brands are not in on this sponsoring these. It's a VERY limited number that do. But if the numbers are that "small", Strava is probably having difficulty selling these, and brands are probably asking themselves are these worth it!

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

This is interesting. What is the market for strava? It's people who care, and that have enough money to waste (arbitrary 50k after tax income). How many people on earth have enough money to waste on strava? That would be around 100-150 million. How many of these exercise daily? 5 to 7.5 million. How many care about strava premium features?

I don't think there will ever be a huge market for paying strava users.