A competitive analysis of 11 free NYC subway apps.

While researching potential ways to address the growing problem of subway station crowding in NYC, I took a hard look at 11 different free iPhone transit apps. To compare all these varied apps, I looked at 22 possible features. I also rated all of the apps on a somewhat arbitrary scale of 1 to 10, with 1 being the least useful and 10 being the most useful of apps.

My comments will mostly focus on the 5 top rated apps, as many of these apps rated very poorly on my 1 to 10 scale.

Notifications, GPS, and Commute Setup

The 11 apps I looked at varied significantly in their ability to send you notifications (of transit related issues) and their use of GPS.

Notifications can be incredibly useful for commuters. The ability to receive an alert about delays on a subway route can mean the difference between being stranded at a crowded station with no trains coming, and the ability to take a “Plan B” route.

Surprisingly, neither NYC MTA owned & developed apps I looked at provide notifications. While the MTA Weekender app is geared towards informing commuters of weekend service changes, the MTA Subway Time app gives the real-time status of service on the 1,2,3,4,5,6, L, S, and SIRT subway lines. This app could be seriously improved by offering the ability for users to receive notifications during rush hours (or any time they chose to schedule receiving such notification).

Nearly all of these apps want access to your GPS location, but only Citimapper, Transit and Moovit seem to use that information to your direct benefit.

Only 3 of the apps allow you to set up your normal commuting route (to see schedules and alerts for).

Schedules and Service Disruptions

I want to preface this group with 2 clarifications: 1) the MTA publishes schedules for all of its subway lines and 2) ‘GOs’ is MTA lingo for “Planned work”. This usual means rerouted train service, often late night and on weekends.

For the MTA apps, I was surprised the Weekender app doesn’t show weekend subway service schedules. The Subway Time app doesn’t show schedule information either, but it is able to show you where trains are in real time, so that’s a pretty fair trade off. It is notable that there’s no way to presently show when trains are behind schedule on many subway lines. Real time data is only available for the 1,2,3,4,5,6, L, S and SIRT trains. This data actually relies on signal system technology that is very slowly being upgraded across the system — so don’t expect to see this data for all routes anytime soon.

Nearly all of the apps show planned work/service disruptions, which is great. Some present this information better than others — The Weekender, CitiMapper, Transit and Ride On Time leading the pack.

This feature set is perhaps the only one that the Ride On Time app outperforms many of the other apps. It is perhaps the only worthwhile feature of the app though…

Crowding and Plan B: What other routes can I use?

When I first started looking at all of these apps, I was most interested in seeing if any of them showed any sort of information on Crowding. Not surprising, none of the apps can provide this information, since it is not readily available from the MTA. If it were available, it could provide useful context, much like how google can now tell you how busy stores are depending on the time of day, or how much traffic there is on the highway. If you’re like me and hate crowds, you can plan accordingly.

Alternate route information is critical in NYC, where our underfund transit systems are in a perpetual state of flux. Nearly all of these apps show you subway maps, but some are not interactive and don’t use your GPS location. Both Citimapper and Transit are better at showing commuters what their options are.

Special Events, Routes & Exits

Similar to crowding data, none of these apps provide information on special events. Let’s say there is a parade, or a Yankees or Mets game. On a normal night, next to no one will be getting on the 7 at Willets Point late in the evening. On a game night, the station will be overcrowded once the game lets out. The already crowded 4 train can become extra-sardine crowded on Yankees game nights. This is valuable, predictable information.

I was a little dismayed to see none of the apps using dashboards. We know that commuters stick to specific routines. Having a dashboard that shows all relevant information to your commute right away would be really amazing and is a missed opportunity.

Another feature that is lacking is information on the closest subway exits and entrances. For an app like Transit, this can spell trouble. For one trip, it advised me to take a bus to a subway entrance 2 blocks away, when there is a much closer entrance. Neither entrance is obviously so far as to require getting on the bus one stop.

The Nice To Haves

When your main commuting route is blocked, it’s nice to know the options. One of them is Uber, and only a few of the apps show you Uber information. Also, citibike, and car2go information is nice to have, which Citimapper provides.

Only Citimapper shows you transit options in other cities, which makes this a significantly more valuable app to anyone who travels. Switching cities is ridiculously easy in this app.

Most of these apps also didn’t come with an onboarding flow. There’s nothing worse than opening a new app and having no directions at all of where to find what you’re looking for, or what features are awesome and highlighted. That said, some of these apps don’t offer much to begin with. Neither “NYC Subway” app struck me as being any more useful than downloading a subway map from the internet, or asking random strangers for directions.

For the best results, you need to be online via WiFi or Cellular Data, and that can be a problem in many subway stations. The only app on this list with a true ‘offline mode’ is NY SubwayViews — which only shows you subway maps and offers zero information on schedules, service alerts, etc.

Advertising, Garbage and Ratings

Some of these apps are absolutely rendered worthless by the advertising. There’s nothing worse than being in a rush, looking up directions, and then being hit with a huge overlay ad that forces you to wait 5 seconds to see the data. Guess what? In those 5 seconds I’ve decided to move on to the next app and never open the ad-heavy app again.

Likewise, In-App purchases are ‘garbage’ to me. Some of these apps had some hidden in the software, but I didn’t look at it.

Final Ratings

As you can see, Citimapper was my clear favorite. Transit App and Moovit rounded out the ‘useful’ pack. The MTA’s own two apps here rated well, in that they do what they set out to do (but could be easily expanded upon). As for the rest of the apps — I question why some of them even exist. Transit Tracker lost a lot of points on not color coding the subway lines on the map correctly, and seemingly omitting the entire 6th avenue line.

None of these apps are 100% perfect, but Citimapper, Moovit and Transit app are definitely worth a look for both expert and non-expert commuters.