A Speedometer in Your Browser
Your phone already knows how fast you are moving. The GPS chip inside it can work out your position many times a minute, and from the change in position it can calculate speed. This online speedometer puts that information on a clear, easy-to-read dial, with no app to download and no account to create.
It is handy in plenty of everyday situations. Check how fast your bicycle really goes, see the speed of a train or bus you are riding in, track a morning run, compare a car's speedometer with real GPS speed, or simply satisfy your curiosity on a flight before the phone goes into flight mode. Your location stays on your device; the page never uploads it anywhere.
How to Use the Online Speedometer
- Open this page on your phone and tap Start tracking.
- When your browser asks, allow location access. This is needed to read your GPS position.
- Wait a few seconds for the GPS badge to turn green. It shows how accurate the signal is, in metres.
- Start moving. The needle and the large number show your current speed, and the Trip panel fills in as you go.
- Tap Pause to stop, Resume to continue the same trip, or Reset trip to start again from zero.
Keep the page open while you travel. Browsers stop sharing location with pages running in the background, so switching to another app will pause the readings.
What Each Reading Means
- Live speed is your current speed, smoothed slightly so the needle doesn't jump around.
- Max speed is the highest speed recorded during the trip, ignoring readings taken with a weak signal.
- Average speed is the distance travelled divided by the time spent moving, so traffic lights and rest stops don't drag it down.
- Distance adds up the ground you have covered, in kilometres, miles or nautical miles depending on your units.
- Moving time counts only the time you were actually in motion.
- Heading and altitude show the direction you are travelling and your height above sea level, when your phone provides them.
Choose Your Units
Switch between km/h, used on Indian roads and most of the world, mph for the UK and the United States, m/s for science and sports, and knots for boating and aviation. Changing units converts everything instantly, including your trip statistics and the speed alert. The dial automatically extends its range if you go faster than its scale, so it works equally well for a walk or a high-speed train.
Speed Alert and HUD Mode
Enter a number under Speed alert, such as 80, and the speedometer warns you whenever you go above it. The dial glows red, a short beep plays and supported phones vibrate. The alert waits until you have dropped back below the limit before it can sound again, so it won't keep beeping while you hover around the number.
HUD mode turns the screen into a large, bright, full-screen readout. At night, place the phone flat on the dashboard below the windscreen, and the mirrored digits reflect the right way round in the glass, just like a head-up display in a modern car. Tap Mirror to switch the reflection off if you prefer to look at the phone directly.
How Accurate Is GPS Speed?
With a clear view of the sky, phone GPS is usually accurate to within a couple of kilometres per hour at steady speeds. Many car speedometers deliberately read a little high, so it is quite normal for this page to show a slightly lower number than your dashboard.
Accuracy drops in a few situations. Tall buildings, tunnels, dense forests and parking garages block satellite signals. Inside trains and buses, metal and tinted glass can weaken reception, so sitting by a window helps. Speed can also lag by a second or two when you speed up or brake sharply. Laptops and tablets without a GPS chip estimate location from Wi-Fi networks instead, which is far too rough for measuring speed, so a phone is always the best choice.
Battery and Privacy
High-accuracy GPS uses more battery than normal browsing, especially with the screen kept on. For long journeys, plug your phone into a charger. The Keep screen on option prevents your phone from locking mid-trip on browsers that support it, and you can switch it off to save power.
Your location is processed entirely inside your browser and is never sent to a server, stored or shared. When you close the page, the readings are gone. Only your settings, such as units and the alert limit, are remembered on your device.