I’ve been testing this app since Sunday, with high hopes. MileIQ promises to catch every drive automatically – no stop or start required. Especially appealing to me right now as the only thing holding up our tax return for 2013 is that I need to add up my mileage from my mileage log, which is very tedious. The idea of having this done for me for 2014 makes my heart sing!
What is my MileIQ review? I really like that you don’t need to open the app for it to work – as long as you have your cell phone with you, it’s supposed to track your mileage. I also like how easy it is to categorize your trips – just open the app and swipe left to categorize the trip as personal, and right to categorize as business. It’s also easy to add tolls or parking fees manually to your trips.
Unfortunately, I can’t give it a thumbs up just yet. While it is amazingly accurate on the drives it catches, for some reason it misses some of my drives, so I still have to keep my paper mileage log. However, my MileIQ review may change as I continue to tweak a few things. The directions indicate the app becomes more accurate with wi-fi turned on, and my wi-fi has been off this week, so my next step is to see if turning it on makes a difference. I also have an older iPhone (4s), so upgrading to a newer model may help. I’m hoping the glitch is not because I drive a Prius; that would be a bit more difficult to fix! I’ll keep you updated.
Give it a try – the MileIQ app is free for up to 40 trips a month. You do have the ability to pause the app – a nice feature to turn on for the weekend, for instance, if you are concerned you will run over 40 trips a month.
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Great article. Mileage reports are a huge pain for people to fill out and bookkeepers to translate handwriting and totals. Love that more people are working on efficiency.
Adam – Thanks for your comment. See from your email address that you have written your own mileage app, which I will also check out.
Keeping up with My mileage
How does it affect data use. I tried another app that started using 1gb of data a day. Cost me a lot of money and I had to delete the app off my phone.
Mark-
I have unlimited data, and have not paid as much attention to data use as how apps affect battery life. I definitely don’t think it uses anywhere near 1GB a day! However, I will track it over the next few days and post an update for you.
Mark-
My data use was 1.3 MB over 2 days of drives. Assuming that was consistent, it would equal about 0.0195 GB in a month. Not bad at all. I did have my iPhone battery on low power mode, but I don’t think that made a difference. By the way, it is possible to ‘pause’ the app, which means it won’t use any data. Hope this helps you.
P.S. If you do decide to try it out, I would appreciate you using this link to visit their website: https://ww.mileiq.com/invite/MXFIF . It gives me affiliate credit, while it lets you log your miles with MileIQ for free. If/when you’re ready to upgrade, if you used my link, MileIQ will automatically give you a 20% discount.
Just started using the app today. Missed my first trip. Any way to solve that problem?
Hi Bob-
Any missed drives can be added manually from the MileIQ web dashboard. Then read this blog post on what to check so it does not happen again: https://support.mileiq.com/hc/en-us/articles/203802049-Why-did-MileIQ-miss-a-drive-
Sorry for the delayed response – I was completely ‘off-the-grid’ last week on my vacation. Hope my answer helps.
I have another problem with Mile IQ, just wondering if others have the same. I recently heard about it on the radio and decided to give it a try. I logged 157 miles with the application. Google maps says it should have logged 167.2 miles, my odometer says 167.1 so there is a big percentage of the mileage being unreported. This isn’t due to a missed drive, it caught all of my drives.. just under reported the mileage.
Have you tried contacting Mile IQ directly? I have found them to be very responsive and helpful. I had a similar problem with an older iPhone. Once I upgraded to a newer iPhone, Mile IQ became very accurate.
How does it track mileage if one regularly uses different cars? IRS requires make model year end and year mileage, etc.
Since the app is on your phone, your mileage is tracked regardless of which vehicle you are using – it’s actually tracking where your phone goes. You can add multiple vehicles to your Mile IQ account (including make, model year, nickname, etc) and indicate one as default. Drives are then automatically assigned to your default vehicle, but it is easy to go into the app and assign a drive to an alternate vehicle.
BTW, although I use Mile IQ primarily for tracking business mileage, it also allows you to catagorize a drive as ‘medical’ or ‘charity’ or even add a custom category.
Hope this helps you, Guy!
P.S. if you decide to give mileIQ a try, I would appreciate you using this link, as they are having a contest this month to win a gas gift card. Thanks.
How does it know I am in a car? What happens on a train, subway, boat e.g. on a river along a road, plane (assuming it flies along a road), bicycle, marathon or getting stuck in traffic (aka I could also be walking along a road and not be in a car)?
Second question, if my wife and I share the car and want to track our miles on one log, we both need the app on our phones. Can the log be merged? How to you not double count if we both are in the same car?
Ben- Wow! You travel in some interesting ways. I am not sure about the plane, but here is blog post with a comment that may help: https://www.mileiq.com/blog/introducing-auto-resume/. Here’s another blog post on what determines a drive: https://support.mileiq.com/hc/en-us/articles/204475585-What-determines-a-drive-.
My suggestion is to keep the app on and make any corrections when you review the drives – at which time you can easily swipe to categorize as a business or personal trip or delete the trip altogether.
If you are stuck in traffic for over 15 minutes and truly not moving, the app may record several discrete drives, but it is easy to link them in the app to make one drive. However, the app recognizes short stops (like for a traffic light) as normal and will record the drive as one trip.
I don’t know the answer to your second question. I suggest you ask it of the MileageIQ support staff: https://support.mileiq.com/hc/en-us/requests/new
I tried Mile IQ but was not pleased with the app. It would show me driving 15 miles then returning 2 minutes later, at 2 am when I was asleep. Many of my drives would end up in the middle of a lake or a field. Not a reliable app. Talked to Tech Support, they had no answers, said it was a glitch that they could not control.
Sorry to hear this. I know I had problems with the tracking when I had an older iPhone. Your experience is one reason to try the free version of the app first.
MileIQ captured a 6k walk as a 6 mile drive. I know that I can delete it in the app, but I was surprised by the inaccuracy of the distance and that it it caught walking speed as driving.
Sorry to hear that, but thanks for posting your experience for others.
I am not affiliated with MileIQ and wrote this review several years ago. I have found them to be responsive to help requests if you would like to contact them directly.