Pebble OS Grid App

When I'm walking I don't tend to navigate via GPS (although I do sometimes use one for track logging) as I still prefer a paper map but occasionally it's useful to be able to just double check your location by asking the GPS for the OSGB grid reference.

If I've not got my GPS with me I can use my phone to do the same thing using the excellent GPS Status & Toolbox app. But that means fishing the phone out of your pocket and that can be a pain, especially in the rain as, like most phones, mine doesn't like getting wet (nor does the touch screen work well).

So I was quite chuffed to come across this little app today for my Pebble Time watch (which is waterproof of course). OS Grid is a free app which, when you run it, shows you the time and asks you to click to update. You press the middle right button and it then asks your phone for a fix. Within a few seconds it comes back to you with a grid reference¹.

You can then leave it running as a watch face and, if you want another fix you press the button again. So this way it doesn't cane the phone battery by running the phone GPS all the time.

1. And accuracy, which isn't great with iOS but with my Android phones I was getting sub-20m accuracy, and time of last fix.