OuterSpatial User Reviews

Customer Experience

Positive experience13.6% of reviews
Neutral18.2% of reviews
Negative experience68.2% of reviews

~ Based on 44 written reviews from the US App Store.

What users say

Is OuterSpatial Safe?

OuterSpatial: Get Outside appears safe based on user ratings. AppsHunter Safety Score for OuterSpatial is 90/100.

This assessment is based on 880 user ratings, with an App Store average of 4.5/5.

Safety Analysis

86.8% of ratings point to a safe experience
4.4% of ratings suggest some concerns
8.8% of ratings point to a risky experience

~ Based on 880 App Store ratings for OuterSpatial.

Is OuterSpatial Legit?

OuterSpatial: Get Outside appears to be a legitimate app. AppsHunter Legitimacy Score for OuterSpatial is 85/100.

Based on 85 of 100 points across 7 verification signals from App Store and developer data.

Top reviews

Crashes every time I try to use it

I can open the app then click on something like a hiking trial and it that opens but the moment I touch anywhere on the screen it crashes. I can reproduce this every time so it should be an easy bug to fix. Do that and I’ll reassess and update the rating if warranted. For now it’s one star since the app is unusable.
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Response from developer

Sorry about the trouble, Tripp! The issue you were running into should be resolved in the 2026.06.3 release, which went out yesterday. Please update, and let us know if you're still running into the crash: visitors+ios@outerspatial.com.

Trash

None of the “log in” buttons work. I’m so confused how I can’t do the hike challenge without logging in yet the app will not allow me to log in and set up an account.

Can’t login

Login won’t work, email sent with code but when pasted in says it doesn’t match. I wanted to participate in my parks program but this is too frustrating!

How to book cottages at CC

Is this the way we will be able to rent the cottages 6mo. out?

So Helpful

The thing I love most about the app is that once you find yourself in the park, you can use the map to make sure you are on the correct trail going in the direction you desire.

I love it.

Response from developer

Glad you're enjoying the app!

Not user friendly

Cannot get outings to check-in.

Love this

I didn’t know this app exists !!!! I wanted to go hiking and thank gods I accidentally step on this app !!!!

Needs improvement

Font is tiny and no way to adjust. Locations without details lock up the app.

Response from developer

Thanks for the feedback, Market Chi! We’ll take a look at both the issues you raised. If you have any other feedback, we’d love to hear it: visitors+ios@outerspatial.com.

Neat Hiking App

Great App for seeing all the secondary trails & hidden gems not noted on the regular park maps.

Impossible to sign up/log in

I would love to use this app, but it only sends codes to email, and both my email platforms read those as spam and blocked them before even getting to the spam folder. I can’t whitelist it without seeing the initial email address. How about a text option? No help menu either.

Response from developer

Sorry about the issues you're running into with log in, BethW_PR! Please reach out to our support team (visitors+ios@outerspatial.com) and we'll get you up-and-running. We'd love to learn more about which email providers are blocking the auth codes, but if you can whitelist @outerspatial.com that should work. I've also taken your feedback to the team, and we're going to take a look at adding additional auth code verification methods (like SMS).

Just get all trails

Low count, decent overlay.

App is useless

This was supposed to replace the trail app put out by the Ohio DNR but it is garbage. Google maps has more trail info that this app

This app is trash

It’s embarrassing that the worlds 5th largest economy has this app for its state parks reservation system.

Want a specific date for that campsite reservation? You’re going to have to page through a calendar, one week at a time, just to get to the date and see if it’s even available.

Is your date 3 months out? Get ready to tap that screen for a while. Oh and if you try to go back, or inadvertently move your finger in any direction it doesn’t like, it closes your search and you get to start over.

Want to know when that park opens up? There’s a filter, but it doesn’t really work.

It’s pathetic. And I’m sure the great state of CA paid millions for it.

Recreation.gov is infinitely better. To the maker of this app: Do better, or better yet just give up the contract to a capable developer.
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Why is this app not named CA State Parks? Weird name to try to remember

This is a cool app, but trying to remember the name of app to open is ridiculously difficult. Why isn’t the obvious name used relating to State Parks???
The app itself is of value please seriously consider changing name. More people would download with a name they could find and quickly identify its purpose.
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Response from developer

Hello, OuterSpatial is used by many state park agencies across the United States (including CA State Parks), and it is also used by federal agencies, city/county parks and recreation agencies, and nonprofits. So the app name can't be specific to a single agency or geographic area.

App unusable at this time

On latest version. Search doesn’t result into anything and can’t see any maps, nothing.

Always “updating”

I’m not able to use this app. Every time I try it says “checking for updates”. I even went to the App Store and updated the there. Then opened. Same result. I’d really like to try this app but it has never worked.

Response from developer

Hello Dreasry, the behavior you’re describing doesn’t really make sense but we’d love to help get you back up and running. Can you reach out to our support team at visitors+ios@outerspatial.com? As a last ditch fix, you can try uninstalling/reinstalling the app as well.

Maps are broken

The map is completely broken. It shows no trails and says “No Results” even when I have no filters selected. Search function also doesn’t give any results.
I tried zooming in in the area of a couple state parks and still the map shows no trails at all.

Response from developer

Hi SnaiDog, sorry about the problems! We don't yet have comprehensive trail coverage for all communities in the app, but we regularly add new organizations to improve/expand our coverage. That said, if you're seeing the "No Results" dialog without applying any filters, it sounds like you're running into something other than a data coverage issue. We'd love to figure out what's going on and help you get back up-and-running. If you're open to it, can you reach out to our support team at visitors+ios@outerspatial.com?

Billed?

Updated Review
I re-downloaded the app, there was no window saying I had been billed. I can read “contact data collected” as being my contact information. This is an assumption. It would have helped me if the developer clearly stated it was only my contact data that was collected.

I live in Alaska and checked out two trails close to me. Good information and I will probably use this app in the future.

Old Review
As soon as I clicked to download a window popped up that I had been billed. Why this app wants access to my contacts I don’t know. What does that have to do with direction. I didn’t download the app.
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Response from developer

UPDATED RESPONSE: Thanks for the additional context, clickclickbam. To be clear, Apple only gives us the ability to check a limited set of preset categories to communicate privacy info about the app. We only, however, use your contact info (email address and name) for product-related functionality like sending you email notifications that you choose to receive, allowing you to participate in challenges hosted by our partner organizations, etc. All of these features are opt-in. The app is completely functional even if you don't log in, in which case you do not need to provide any contact info whatsoever. PREVIOUS RESPONSE: Hello clickclickbam, the OuterSpatial app is completely free. If you were billed for something, you were billed by another app. Additionally, OuterSpatial does not ask for access to your contacts. It sounds like you may have been experiencing issues with another app.

Where’s the filter for overnight stay?

Need to find California state parks on the map where I can spend the night, driving thru down to Arizona. Maybe I’m missing something but all I see is hiking & other activities but not camping or overnight stay, just want to pull over spend the night sleeping in my vehicle legally & safely, willing to spend a park fee over staying at a motel or hotel where my vehicle might be broke into while sleeping in my room…
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Response from developer

Hi kslisle, we are working to expand the filter and search tools in the app, but we just added "Camping" as a quick filter type based on your feedback. So you can now filter the Explore tab (both map and list view) to show only locations that support camping. Thanks for the feedback, and happy exploring!

Where’s the transit?

UPDATE: The developer responded. Thank you. Unfortunately, the guidance did not change my results. I had already tried searching “transit” multiple times with no luck. I tried developer’s advice, which was to search “Transit & Trails”. Only got 4 results, none of which appeared to contain transit info. Also tried without the ampersand, but no difference. Looked again for other means to search. No luck. What is really needed IMO is a transit icon. I also found the dev’s advice a little condescending, because I noted that as a nondriver I already know how to patchwork together goggle and other platforms to figure out recreation via transit, but they highlighted that this could be done. It remains a time-consuming and inconvenient proposition, which is why having this info in an app would be so helpful. While it’s possible I’m simply not using the app correctly, it seems like a simple search of a term using the search function would not result in zero results? I also poked around the rest of the app to see if there was a different search avenue, but didn’t see anything. I love the idea of this app, but without the transit info it is not useful to people who can’t drive or people who are willing to try accessing recreation without a car. Something we desperately need.

PREVIOUS REVIEW: I found this app via BayNature’s transittotrails.org site, which redirected to Outerspatial, which hyped that it was now the source for transit to trails info. The description said that bike and transit directions were provided. I cannot tell you how fantastic that would be. Downloaded and spent a couple minutes getting oriented and then looking for any transit info whatsoever. If I can’t find it in 5 minutes, it’s really not useful. I can’t drive, so transit info is really important and although I am a seasoned transit rider who generally can find this info on my own, it takes time to do that for outdoor stuff. Would be nice to have that made easier. (I am actually working on such a project.) Now I have downloaded the app and found nothing, when I could have found at least something on goggle (sic) maps in the same amount of time and at the same price of $0 Is the app free? Sure, that’s great. But free and useless as opposed to the original resource through which I found the app, which was a map of transit-accessible hikes in the bay area. If this app does include transit info, it’s not easily accessible. So, not worth even the $0 I paid for it. If I sound frustrated it’s because those of us who can’t drive are constantly facing this stuff and it gets old fast. I would pay a small amount of money for this upfront but since I can’t tell if the transit info is better using a paid account, why would I risk paying for an app that doesn’t actually offer easyily accessed useful transit info for outdoor destinations?
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