Garmin Explore GPS: Phone vs InReach Mini

Hi there! It looks like you’re conflating a number of communication and positioning technologies. The three are related, but work independently of each other, and serve the following purposes (in the.context of using an inReach Mini 2):

• Cellular network: provides a data connection between your phone and the Internet. Allows you to sync recorded activity data (such as detailed location points recorded by the inReach device) between the Explore app and the Explore/Mapshare websites. Also lets you view cat videos. Available only when in reach of a cell tower.
• GNSS positioning (of which GPS is one specific implementation): lets your inReach device, but also your phone, figure out where you are and what time it is (in case of your phone: only if location services are enabled). Available globally.
• Iridium satellite network: allows your inReach device to send and receive messages via satellite, including tracking point location updates. The latter end up on the same Explore/Mapshare web site, but do not require any use of the Explore app. Available globally.

To confuse matters further, there are two forms of location tracking (and the situation isn’t helped by Garmin’s somewhat convoluted documentation), as mentioned above:

• location tracking: when enabled, sends location updates to the Garmin web environment using Iridium messages, using the interval configured in the Tracking settings on de Mini 2. These count against your tracking points quota in your inReach subscription.
• activity recording: when tracking is enabled, the Mini 2 also records location data on the device itself. If you’ve switched the Activity Recording setting from Standard to High Detail, you’ll get a much more detailed recording of the path you’ve travelled. In either case, these points are not transmitted over the Iridium network, but only synced via the Explore app (and onwards if you have Internet connectivity available).

This long preamble hopefully makes it clear what’s going on and helps to answer your questions.

So, cell coverage is irrelevant when recording an activity and tracking your location in the Explore app locally. In fact, you could use any hiking app and use the location services on the phone itself to do that, should you want to. 

When outside of cell coverage, location tracking (via Iridium messages) and activity recording (on the inReach device locally) are both possible, but your inReach subscription plan and tracking interval setting determine how much the tracking point messages are going to cost you.

Hope this helps.

Correct. Just to clarify the point I was trying to make: if one’s only goal were to track one’s location using a smartphone app without needing to inform anyone else of your whereabouts, strictly speaking you wouldn’t need an inReach device at all because you could just use the phone’s GNSS receiver as the (sole) source of positioning information. Clearly there are other benefits to carrying an inReach device, but if it’s just used for navigation purposes, you could do without.

>When using the Maps feature in Garmin Explore and tracking my location, will the app automatically switch to tracking my location via the InReach once I am no longer in cell coverage?  Would that depend on what satellite plan I have / if tracking features are enabled?

There is cell coverage or there is no cell coverage, your phone (Garmin Explore, Google Maps or any other app) uses GPS (GALILEO, GLONASS) satellites for location tracking, not cell coverage. But when there is no cell coverage it may take more time (up to 12 minutes or so) for your phone to acquire your position first time after your phone / tracking apps were off for some time. Phones normally use cell coverage to make GPS acquiring your position much faster. But once your position has been acquired first time, it's already doesn't matter there is cell coverage or not. GPS will work well and fast with or without cell coverage. If you turned your phone off, then turned on in a week on another continent and there is no cell coverage - just be ready to wait a few minutes before GPS can start working properly again.

If for some reason you want to use an external GPS device together with you phone, it's possible, but I'm not sure it makes much sense, just use your phone GPS. If you wan to use an external GPS device together with your phone anyway, you need to know that Garmin Explorer (or any other app) by itself can't switch to an external GPS device (at least on Android, I don't know how it works on iPhones). When Garmin Explorer is connected to InReach device it still uses your phone built-in GPS, not InReach GPS. On Android you need to enable something in the (developer) settings and you need to install an additional app to force your phone (Garmin Explorer) to use an external GPS device (InReach) instead of the built in GPS. Google something like "external Bluetooth GPS Android" for more details. Again, it's possible, but why bother with all the extra steps, just use your phone and it's built in GPS. It was useful feature (ability to use an external GPS device) 15 years ago, but modern phones have great built-in GPS capabilities.

It's not really that hard to do with an Android phone but, as you say, it takes some software and setup.  i actually prefer this over the iPhone where the phone "decides" which source to use based on - something!  I understand your stance on "no value added" with an external GPS source but don't actually agree.  Obviously it depends on your use case but I sometimes do mapping that requires a good track and waypoints to assess after (and during) as well as orienteer using GPS control locations (using a phone app to track and signal but a paper map in hand).  I will often use my Garmin Glo 2 Bluetooth which, among other things, allows me to carry it in a good location for sky view at all times, thus allowing me to put my phone away when not needed (and not worrying about it being blocked from the sky view for best signal). There can be a similar advantage with the inreach as it allows me to keep the phone safe when going over rough ground.

The Glo has another major advantage in that it can provide up to 10 positions per second (although only 4 with an iPhone).  This is in fact how I tell that it is properly connected and being used by my iPhone - I have a couple of GPS diagnostic apps and they will show 4 locations/sec when the Glo is the phone's GPS source.  I also find that the Glo does a far better job of handling the situation when you pause - it does not do the "wondering" that the phone or watch tends to do.

I realize that this is slightly off topic from the inReach Mini (where the higher position data does not apply) but the advantage of wearing it in a good position and connected to the phone still stands.  I'm not sure how much better the new inReach mini is over the older one I have (GPS wise). Now my dream would be to use my Fenix 7X as the GPS source connected to the phone!

I personally use smartphone for maps and navigation, InReach Mini for SOS, communication and tracking (sending coordinates to MapShare) and Instinct Solar watch for what they call logging in InReach devices (saving GPS track), but I definitely need to test smartphone together with the watch as an external GPS. GPS on the watch is working all the time anyway in my case, so probably disabling GPS on the phone, but enabling Bluetooth on both devices will reduce total power consumption (I'm not sure, just an assumption to verify).

razmichael said:

Now my dream would be to use my Fenix 7X as the GPS source connected to the phone!

It's a dream, not a reality.  The watches (at least Garmin) do not transmit GPS data to a phone (or anything).

I didn't know it's not possible with the Garmin watches

Thank you for the helpful explanation.

Got it, thank you. Didn't know this (that a standard smartphone is just as capable at tracking location via GPS as the inReach).