# How to Vibe Code Your Own AllTrails (and Stop Paying for It) > Trail Guides & Maps for Hiking, Camping, and Running - Site: https://alltrails.com - Category: Outdoor & Fitness - Platforms: iOS app, Android app, Web app - Verdict: **Serious undertaking** (42/100 vibecodeable) - Estimated effort: 4-6 weeks of focused development and debugging ## Verdict Build a personal offline-first trail tracker subset with Expo and Supabase, but keep paying for AllTrails to access its massive proprietary trail database and offline global topo library. Replicating AllTrails as a solo developer using AI coding agents is a serious undertaking primarily because of geospatial data management and offline vector map rendering. While an AI agent can quickly scaffold a Next.js web directory and an Expo mobile shell with a Supabase database, rendering multi-layered topographic maps that work reliably without cell service requires complex MBTiles packaging and native Mapbox bindings. Furthermore, your personal clone will be completely empty of the 400,000+ curated global trail guides and user reviews that give the real app its actual utility. ### What you can't replicate - The crowdsourced database of millions of real user reviews, trail conditions, and photos - The proprietary catalog of hand-verified global trail geometry maps - Partnerships with major outdoor brands and park authorities ## What it does Digital outdoor recreation platform providing hand-curated trail maps, topographic layers, user reviews, photos, and live GPS activity tracking. ### Core features - Geospatial trail discovery search by location, difficulty, and length - Interactive topographic vector map rendering - Offline map package downloads for zero-cellular coverage areas - GPS activity recording and background live-tracking - User reviews, ratings, and photo uploads - Custom route builder with elevation profile calculations - Safety check-in / lifeline tracker - AI-assisted route generation summaries ## The business ### Pricing - Free: Free - AllTrails+: $35.99 / year - AllTrails Peak: $79.99 / year ### Funding $225.4M raised. - Seed Round (Nov 2010) - Venture / Growth Round (Oct 2018 - $75M) - Private Equity / Growth Round (Nov 2021 - $150M) Investors: AngelPad, 500 Startups, Spectrum Equity, Permira Founded 2010. Team size: 200-380+. ## The hard parts - Rendering smooth offline vector/raster topographic map tiles locally on mobile - Continuous background geolocation tracking with low battery drain and dropped-signal handling - Spatial indexing and graph query performance for hundreds of thousands of interconnected trail geometries - Cross-platform state sync between web route editors and offline-first mobile local storage ## How to vibe code AllTrails ### Prerequisites - Node.js (free): Runtime environment for building the web dashboard and running Expo mobile tooling. - GitHub (free): Source control repository and CI/CD pipeline link for deployment. - Expo Account (free): Required for building and testing the cross-platform mobile app via EAS. ### Recommended AI tools - Claude Code: Best-in-class multi-file terminal agent for scaffolding complex full-stack apps and debugging mobile bridge layers. - Cursor: Ideal AI code editor for fine-tuning React Native UI layouts and vector map rendering components. ### Stack - Frontend: Expo (React Native) + Next.js - Backend: Next.js API routes / Node.js - Database: Supabase (PostgreSQL with PostGIS extension) - Auth: better-auth - Payments: none - Other: Mapbox GL SDK, SQLite (offline mobile cache) ### Hosting - Vercel (Hosting the Next.js web application and route builder dashboard): $0/mo - Supabase (PostgreSQL database with PostGIS spatial indexing for trails and user activities): $0/mo ### Build guide 1. **Scaffold Monorepo and Database Schema** — Initialize a TypeScript monorepo containing a Next.js web app and an Expo mobile app. Set up Supabase with PostgreSQL and enable the PostGIS extension for spatial querying. ``` Set up a monorepo with a Next.js web dashboard and an Expo React Native mobile app using TypeScript and Tailwind CSS. Connect Supabase as the primary database provider. Write the SQL migration script for Supabase using the PostGIS extension to create a 'trails' table with a geometry (LineString/Polygon) column, difficulty level, length, elevation gain, and a 'activities' table to store recorded GPS breadcrumb tracks. Ensure proper spatial indexing (GIST index) on the trail geometry column for fast bounding-box queries. ``` 2. **Implement Trail Discovery and Spatial Search API** — Build backend endpoints and UI components to search and filter trails based on geographic bounding box, distance, and difficulty ratings. ``` Implement a Next.js API route that queries Supabase/PostGIS for trails within a given geographic bounding box or radius from a user's center coordinate. Add filtering parameters for difficulty ('easy', 'moderate', 'hard'), minimum/maximum length, and search query keywords. On the frontend, build a discovery screen featuring a list of top local trails with elevation profiles, star ratings, and distance metrics derived from the database. ``` 3. **Integrate Interactive Maps and Custom Route Builder** — Embed Mapbox GL within both the web app and Expo mobile app to render topographic maps and allow users to draw custom routes. ``` Integrate Mapbox GL JS into the Next.js web app and react-native-mapbox-maps into the Expo mobile app. Build a custom route creation tool where users can click points on the map to draw a polyline connecting trailheads. Calculate total distance and cumulative elevation gain on the fly using turf.js or PostGIS spatial functions, and allow saving the custom route directly to the user's profile. ``` 4. **Build GPS Activity Recorder and Background Tracking** — Implement location tracking in the Expo mobile app to record user hikes in real-time, storing breadcrumbs locally and syncing them online. ``` Build a GPS activity recording screen in the Expo mobile app using expo-location. Configure background location permissions and foreground services to track user coordinates continuously during an active hike. Store recorded breadcrumbs locally in an SQLite database using Expo SQLite to ensure persistence if cellular connection drops. Display the live path on the Mapbox view with elapsed time, distance traveled, and current pace. ``` 5. **Add Offline Map Package Download Capability** — Enable users to download bounding-box map tiles and trail geometry packages for offline usage when venturing into remote areas. ``` Implement an offline map download manager in the Expo mobile app. Allow users to select a geographic region or trail area to download vector tile packages and trail metadata JSON into local device storage using expo-file-system. Configure the Mapbox offline manager to load tiles from the local disk cache when network connectivity is unavailable, displaying an offline indicator status in the UI. ``` 6. **Polish UI, Community Reviews, and Final Testing** — Add user reviews, star ratings, photo upload handling, and perform comprehensive end-to-end testing across web and mobile clients. ``` Build a community review and photo upload subsystem. Implement a form allowing users to submit star ratings, written reviews, and upload photos linked to specific trails, storing images in Supabase Storage. Add polish to the mobile navigation tabs ('Explore', 'Saved', 'Record', 'Profile') and write comprehensive integration tests for the trail search and GPS recording loops. ``` ### Cost vs paying **Starting costs (one-time):** - AI Coding Assistant Subscription: $20.00 - Total: ~$20.00 one-time **Ongoing costs (monthly):** - Vercel & Supabase Free Tiers: $0.00 - Mapbox Free Tier Allowance: $0.00 - Total: ~$0.00/mo - Paying for the SaaS instead: $3.00/mo ($35.99/yr for AllTrails+) - Build time: 45-60 hours - AI tool credits: $20.00 (one month of Claude Pro / Cursor Pro) - Break-even: Never (subscription is cheaper and includes millions of trails) ## Sources - [AllTrails Home Context Scraped Data](https://alltrails.com) - [Medium - Modularization of the AllTrails app](https://medium.com/@beagan.pat/modularization-of-the-alltrails-app-1) - [Tracxn - AllTrails Company Profile](https://tracxn.com/d/company/alltrails) - [Wikipedia - AllTrails](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AllTrails)