Giving it two more stars than it deserves only because it works, despite the inconveniences I mention below. I’ve not found it as hard to set up as others may describe, but am dismayed that when setting up a geofence you have to physically scroll the map and zoom in to the location you want. For some reason they have not provided a search function to allow you to pinpoint an exact address. Very inconvenient for when you are setting up a geofence in a location that is far away (I.e. across the country) and you don’t know enough about the location. I had to switch back and forth between the phone’s native map app and Footprints several times to pinpoint the locations for my long distance geofences. Also, when setting a geofence the map can only display in hybrid mode, even when you change the main screen’s map settings to just a plain old graphical map. This makes setting a the above mentioned long distance geofence even more cumbersome, as the map refresh rates are much slower. It would also be great if you could use a logged waypoint to set up a geofence. No can do. Lastly in the complaint department, tracking others won’t work unless you switch both location tracking and location sharing on for your own phone, even though you may not be giving others (I.e. your kids) permission to track you. What this tells me is Footprints is forcing you to track yourself and is likely using your location data for their own purposes.
Kept dropping “friends” and stating I didn’t have any. Bought three year subscriptions for me and two kids in January. One has started stating it has expired. Had to continuously allow location sharing even when set through the settings. While it worked, it had good functionality but now is just a waste of money.
A few things to know - it's a free app, and free to use the first month however after that you pay $.99/month or $2.99/year or $4.99 for 2 years - which I'd say is reasonable for what you get. You have to get the program on all phones you're following and they have to give permission. I got this app along with setting up Find my Iphone with the icloud program on my iphone 4 for comparison. Find my Iphone only shows current location - and is pretty accurate. You can use it for iphones/ipads on your account. I like being able to look at both to see what the difference is in location, however for the most part I've been impressed with the accuracy of the locations on Footprints. You can't count on it being always exactly right, but it's been pretty accurate most of the time. We live the country where you normally have weak cell signals and the accurancy on our property shows if its in the driveway, in the house, on the patio, in an outbuilding, neighbors, etc. It takes a little figuring out to get it set up, but I had it installed and working on a phone within 15 minutes. It seems to update mostly when there's a positional change and you stop for awhile... such as I could see a phone at the grocery store, a stop light, another stop light, and the driveway. if you're in motion it doesn't seem to put a waypoint. You can set it up to show the last so many waypoints - which is great if you're trying to track something and can't look for awhile.
I have been reading the other reviews and so far the only negatives I have seen are only that "You can't track other people" THIS IS NOT THE CASE. The person has to give you permission. Once that is done you are up and running. I would say 90% of the time it is pretty dead on. I downloaded the free app and after using it for a month I had no Issues paying the Subscription fee. My children are all grown and out of the house now and moved away and it's really neat to be able to watch them travel or just have fun letting them know they are being watched. Also my mother in law is getting up and years and if she needs rescueing all I have to do is tell it to give me directions to her and it does. She doesnt have to give me directions. I cant tell you all the reason's i like this app.......Had a small glitch when "updating" the app but emailed Tech support a little slow in responce but all in all problem fixed. :) Still happy with the app. Question: when will it (or if it does how does it work) have a notification when a friend comes within a certain distance from me and not a fence? But i do like the fences :) Good Upgrade
I really wanted to like and use this app. Unfortunately, it doesn't work. I have tried everything including setting it to the most sensitive settings possible. It is hours late reporting that my children have arrived at school. It had my son's location off by three miles all day. The alerts come in randomly and even though my children have the exact same settings, the reports and waypoints for them are drasticaly different. I tried to email the company and got no response. I called iTunes and they have no contact information for the company. The "support forum" isn't even set up. I downloaded life360 and it is working beautifully so I know it is not an issue of my phone, service area, or provider. I like the control features offered in footprints better than life360, but I'll go with the one that actually works. In addition, the $3.99 I paid PER PHONE is non-refundable because it is an in-app purchase. I would like to at least cancel the service and clear my data from their records, but I cannot contact them and they don't answer emails. I really should have noticed the majority of reviews are negative so shame on me. Don't make the same mistake I did.
I shouldn't have to buy a subscription for every phone or iPad I want to track! The instructions tell you to register each device with a separate email, but you have to buy a subscription for each one! That's ridiculous! Then the up-to-date info is terrible! My kids will be gone for hours and footprints says that they're still home. Thought it could be in the settings but I've tried every possible combination.
My wife and I have been using Footprints for over a year now to track our two kids. It took us quite a while to configure the app and indeed customer service didn't really help. But once we figured it out, we were able to add many locations (fences) and now we get notifications whenever our kids arrive/leave home, school and all their activities. It's also pretty accurate and doesn't waste too much battery. We just renewed our subscription for all 4 of us for two years ($5.99 if I'm not wrong). I had issues with the renewal and it charged me 5 times, but I just called Apple Customer Service and got my money back right away. It turned out I had to uninstall and reinstall the app and then it worked like a charm. To my best knowledge it's the best app that keeps track of the kids whereabouts out there. So don't get discouraged if it's hard to set it up or if customer service is not good. It's worth using it once you go through the hurdles.
I am a long time footprint user and love it for my family. (No friends or boyfriends). It is great to know your sisters are about to arrive or home safe. You can be a backseat driver on cross country trips helping them with rest stops and hotel directions. We love it. You can also turn off your families ability to track if you care, but we mostly see it as a safety thing. That said with my last iOS update to 9.something my screen went blank and would not work. I contacted the app company and they said this was a problem with a few users but if I deleted the app, restarted my phone and downloaded it again, it would work - IT DID. I am very happy to be up and running again and wanted to share my fix. (Or their fix).
This is a good program for tracking your kids. It shows you where they are and how long they have been there, along with a history of where they have been. You have options at set-up for distance, frequency and how many stopping points you want to see at a time. You have the option of sharing your own location with your kids or to turn your own phone's tracking off. The support was very good when I ran into a glitch (due to my own error). They walked me through the process until it was corrected. I would recommend this to other parents. I have friends who use this to keep track of their whole family and they are very pleased with the program, too.
It took 10-15 highly frustrating moments to set this up on 3 iPhones (4S). Permission was added on all phones listing the contact info of each. I was so impressed for "1day only"!! Though, with all phones in the same room, in the same house, it would display one in the backyard, the other in the home and the last a few yards down the street....... Huh? But close enough, I was still impressed. The next day nothing!!! It only showed my location and could not locate the other phones. No setting were changed or even touched, it just spontaneously stopped working. I deleted the app(s), repeated the steps & it did the same thing aaarrrrggghhh!! I've emailed their technical support, but 1 week later have received no response. Great App?! NOT!!!!! Good Idea with very Bad Execution. I would highly recommend you not Buy/Renew this app until they make improvements, not even with the dollar...
I set this up on mine an my parents phone. I set theirs to last 15 waypoints. An mine as well. I have them permission an they gave me permission. At first it seems to work fine, although it would only mark the last waypoint of everyone on everyone's phone. If I clicked to look at myself I seen everywhere I been that day. However after using this app the first day, the next day I noticed it marked waypoints at where I had not been. But it was close. A few more days pass an now when u click friends it shows mom me mom. Instead of mom me dad. I don't have any idea why. I tried everything to fix it. Even deleting an reinstalling. It would have been really neat if this thing could work right. We would have bought it. The good thing is u can see everything everywhere an zoom in an out an know all the streets. But you can also do that on google map :D I wouldn't recommend this app.
This is a great app once u figure it out. Pretty easy to use. You have to set it up on your phone and on the phone of the person u want to track. Used it for the trial period and it was good enough to purchase. Paid $3.99 for my phone and $3.99 for the phone I wanted to track per yeah ( NOT per month) well worth the money to know where my teen is and love the speeding notification. I was able to to call my teen to tell her the kid that she was riding with was going too fast.. Also love the parental controls so my teen can't remove the app or mess with the settings.. GREAT APP.. Learn how to use it before posting a bad rating. :)
It's a good interface and it's easy to track people and set limits. My family is actually capable of doing it themselves now. We have mobile me but you have to sign in to each profile to follow the family. This is pretty much instant and shows whoever I want on my list. Ya it cost money to keep using but hey subscriptions are the worst thing. I pay like $149 for mobile me, what's another $2.99 for this. Both a year long. It's kind of like a add on to enhance the tracking feature. Thanks for the app guys and I hope you keep the updates coming with new features.
So far so good. Just turned on fences for the kids at school. I hope this stays working consistently. I just renewed w a subscription to it. $3.99 is nothing compared to the worry and anxiety of your child missing! Now I know where they are if they aren't answering my call or text. And no I don't use it often or to catch them, just to ease my mind, when I need it. Thanks again, helping missing children searchers like myself, become obsolete is a good thing! Update drops my kids constantly. Can't track them at all, not cool. Really frustrating.
The best. No other app has provided the simple yet thorough user interface that I've seen with this app. I am truly impressed.. I can open tons of apps, close them, do whatever and Footprints manages to successfully report my location and show me other friends and families locations. It just.. Works. It really is inexpensive (just a few dollars for YEARS of service).. And to try it free before you buy makes it that much better. Thank you guys for the great software! Keep it up!
Awesome App, it allows Me to see that my wife has made it to work safely. The price was awesome, and the two-year subscription service was a fantastic bargain for the peace of mind that it gives you. If you have Someone you care about on the road early in the morning ,or late in the evening, just knowing the fact that they got to their destination safely is all that matters. We use it every day and am looking forward to new features In future releases.
It sure would have been nice to know right from the beginning that this app costs money, instead of LYING about being free. I was ready to download this app on my parents iPhones and recommend it to all my friends. I'd rather stick with the "horrible" FaceBook app that I have to manually update, or instead use Foursquare. There are plenty of better apps out there that don't lie about being free, and actually ARE free. $4.99 for two years? I wouldn't pay $.99 for this app, even if it was a one time charge. What a great way to scam people out of money. Take something that everyone else offers for free, add a yearly subscription fee, and this app is only useful IF your friends are stupid enough to pay the subscription fee too! Here's a better idea, you want to know where someone is? CALL THEM! They'll either tell you, or they won't. It's the EXACT same thing this app does. But it's a thousand times less creepy/stalker-like.
Great app and for a couple of bucks per year it's well worth it..why people complain of $4 I never know ..the app does exactly what is says and is easy to use..great way to keep on eye on your kids or keep in touch with friends.. Would love to know if would work with friends in another country ?..still gets 5 stars from me..great app well done.
I should have trusted the other reviews!!! Do not buy, this APP is a rip-off. Just as stated by others, this APP works for a couple of days, then stops. I bought to keep track of my 10 year old daughter, and did fine for 3-4 days, but now has "locked" on her phone's old location from 4 days ago. This is useless to me. Find My iPhone works much better and it's very accurate as to where my daughter's phone is when I check, it just doesn't provide tracking information, which is want I wanted. Move on to another APP, the developers of Footprints should go back to the old job.
I just started using this a few days ago, and it hasn't worked right from the start. When my son is in school, it tells me he is two blocks away. When my son is at home, it tells me he is several streets away. Today I texted him to tell him to get home, and he told me was home. I had to confirm with my older son that he was telling the truth. That was 4 hours ago. According to this ap, he's still there! I am home. I see my son is home, and his phone is here too! This ap sounds good, but has turned out to be "too good to be true." Disappointing and unreliable. Don't waste your time or money.
I think those giving poor ratings don't understand how it works OR don't have the app and phone permissions set to disallow their child from disabling location services. This thing works perfectly for me, and is far superior in not only location accuracy but in cost to something like AT&T Family Map. Best app I have ever bought.
I've used this app for almost a year now. I've got the parental controls set. I can tell if my child is speeding and if they are where they say they are. I've set up geofence notifications and they work well too. The only thing I have noticed is sometimes the notifications are delayed a bit. All in all a great product!
Like another reviewer said, sometimes it works, but a lot of the time it doesn't. The first few months we had this it seemed to work well, but after we renewed for the year it really went downhill. Stops working often, then we are sending texts back and forth "Your footprints are messed up" and try restarting the app. It just hasn't been serving it's purpose.
I downloaded this app and used it for the full 30 day trial. Worked awesome. Was very happy. Once my time expired I immediately paid the two year subscription price for three phones ($5.99 x 3). Worked for about a week then stopped. I have tried everything. The designer does not have any contact info or email in the app. I can't get any help. It's amazing how app worked great until I paid? Stay clear of this app. If mine gets fixed I will come back and update my review. However at this time it's a one star.
I really like this app, I got it to keep up with my son! It works great! It tells me every 15 min where he is and provides an address if I want. I have myself on it so if my car breaks down or something my husband know exactly where I am to come and help me. I have not lived in my town for very long and I'm not sure of directions yet. It is very comforting to know I can be found!
I downloaded to keep track of my young son, got a 1 year subscription and after setting up the permissions his phone showed on my tracker for a moment but now has dissapeared, I deleted app and downloaded again with same result. What's the point of this app if his phone will show on and off without me changing any of the settings? Please fix this issue on next update.
It does what is says. I highly recommend it. To extend your subscription for 3 months for $0.99, 1 year for $2.99 or 2 years for $4.99 hardly breaks the bank. I have not had any issues with this product at all. It's better than any similar product that I've seen in the App Store.
Works great. I easily can track my kids, my husband and myself. The most important part is that the phone your tracking: has given you permission, tracking is set to on and the phone is on. If those conditions are not met you will not be able to track.
Usually works ok for the price, but many times it doesn't work or is very delayed. My biggest complaint is now I'm getting spam and junk email so they must have sold my email address. I NEVER got spam/junk emails before downloading their app. I'm getting hundreds of them. I know it was them because we have two phones set up and now both accounts are getting the exact same spam/junk emails.
I appreciate the ability to share location and tracking with family and friends. It is even fun watching them travel around. Also, great options in Settings - control of battery and desired accuracy. Thank you!
Agree with other users- when this works, it's fantastically accurate for location and speed; when it doesn't work= total waste of money, completely blank/black screen, and there's zero customer service outside some sassy uneducated person responding to an email days later, if ever! I'm wondering-- if, God forbid, someone's child or elderly relative gets lost or stolen how SUED will this company get?!? FIX THE APP!! Update what you need. Get on it! It's been weeks now of blank screen.
I have tried them all (iHound, Tingo, 360 and many other. Some of them are out of business). The application has a great user interface and it is one of the few apps that allows you to generate geo fences to alert you when your kids enter or leave the zone (school, home etc) I would be the first to admit that support is problematic, but if you play around and read the help file you should be able to figure it out and set the tracking and alerts. Highly recommend. Reasonable pricing for a year of service.
Don't know what happened but the app isn't working today...on all 4 iphones, the permissions disappeared and wont accept them when put back in, And it isn't tracking or notifying when geofences are crossed. And, I can't seem to renew the subscription which is expiring in 8 days. Ugh! Fix these issues! We rely on this app to track our two ASD kids.
Amazing... the best application I saw until now. As a business owner this app allows me to track my drivers and sales people and tie it to the reports they are providing. As a father of teenagers this app allows me to track them and know where they are at any given time. It works perfectly.
Its very usefull, everytime i check the fon it tells the route for the whole day. But i was hoping they could make the software turn the gps automatically even if the fon target turn off the gps/3g. Also i keep forgetting the passcode. I dont know how to retrieve it.
I love this app! It does everything I need it to track my child's whereabouts. The only thing I wish is that you could create a geofence by entering a specific address rather than having to navigate to the location via the map. That is very difficult. Please update.
After trying this app for 6 months I am deleting it. Sometimes it works, more often it doesn't. My kids' phones are on, and the app gives me the current location of one but the location of my other one from 8 hours ago! I have tried everything in settings to no avail. There is no refresh feature, so what you see is what you get. Too bad, as this app has real promise and could serve a really important need.
I thought I knew where my kids where till I found out their actual / real location was miles from where they actually were. Not the kind of peace of mind you need. validate the real location vs where your loved ones happen to be. At times it works so well that you are amazed. But more than three quarter of the times it missed the real location by miles.
This is how a kids tracker should be! It's easy to use, has a beautiful interface, and shows me where my daughters are all the time. More importantly, it shows me where they have been throughout their day. Kudos to the developers.
I'm very happy with Footprints when it's working, however I do have issues tracking other 'friends'...kids. It just started skipping days? it isn't consistent (i.e. no notifications then the work .... Will be a brilliant app and a handy parenting/safety tool once its consistent
Have had this app for years and love it!! Had issues when we updated the iOS but after trying everything I deleted it and loaded again...now it works great again 👍👍
It seems to be a little slow capturing the GPS signal and reporting location although that may be in the settings. Other than that the app is great for setting boundaries and getting alerts when my child leaves/enters the set area.
This is a great application and worth every $. I had a problem setting up my new ipad3 with this app, but contacted support and Sollico walked me throught it. Very patient and thorough. I give an A+++++ for support. Highly recommend Footprints.
I set up the fences despite the poorly worded instructions yet none report entry/exit properly. Only after I open the program does it update and send notification. It is supposed to auto-update when it senses a new cell tower but defaults to a ten minute update even though I did not select that option. Good app idea, poorly executed. Not good enough to pay money for. On a good nite, it did provide some valid albeit untimely tracking data.
Tried many. This one was good for a while then something happened. Switched to Citrus Location now. It's not tacking as this one but to my grown up kids it's actually more appealing because they actively share their location instead of being tacked all the time. Citruslocation dot com.
The app works great except for: there needs to be a predator tracker that marks the area that family members are in, there should be a feature for overseeing all family members at once on the map, a check in request button would be great, and family texting option. Other apps have these features so I am going elsewhere. :(
I tried reinstalling it on my little girl's phone because it wasn't tracking her at all. It tracked her successfully once when I dropped her at school. Then I received notice that my daughter was across town. So I called her school to make sure I didn't forget a field trip or that her phone was or was not stolen. Sure enough, she's in her classroom and her phone is in her backpack and I just wasted everyone's time.
This app is awesome had some issues when I got my new phone but emailed them and they fixed me right up , if your having problems delete the app and reinstall works every time !
The vendor has no tech support - period. It does not refresh locations regularly. Even with the refresh setting at once a minute, sometimes it will lag behind 10, 20, or more minutes before refreshing location. We wanted to use it to keep track of our teen driver, but with refresh lags like this it's pretty much useless. Don't waste your money on this app.
Just spend some time playing around with the settings. I set it for maximum updates and its works flawlessly. I am using it to track my lawn care employees while on the job.
Where are your kids? Where have they been? With Footprints, you can track your kids and share locations with family and friends, anytime, privately. It all happens automatically, whether your phone is in your hand or in your pocket. All in a beautifully clear and simple interface. Now, parents can keep track of their children's whereabouts and see where they have been, couples can know that their loved ones arrived safely at their destination, friends can locate each other, and even managers can keep track of employees in the field. Footprints tracks and shares locations automatically – in real time, all the time. And it does it privately. It's really different from other apps that simply show the current location or require some kind of manual operation to share locations. With Footprints, you can set up Geofences, like your kids school, and be notified when these fences are crossed. You can even activate movement sensors that will notify you each time your loved ones are on the move. Features: - Tracks movement throughout the day and logs waypoints without user intervention. - Parental control feature allows for sharing locations at all times, without a disabling option. - Lets you share waypoints by granting specific permissions. For instance, you can share your last 50 waypoints with a friend for two days. - Geofence and movement notifications can alert you when someone moves or crosses a fenced area. Speeding notifications can alert parents when their teenagers go over the speed limit. - Designed to sync seamlessly between your iPhone and iPad. - Runs in the background – without draining your battery – by leveraging Apple's Significant Location Change technology, which monitors location changes as your device “sees” new cellular towers. (Footprints typically logs a waypoint when there is movement of 500 meters to 3 km or a quarter-mile to 2 miles, depending on cellular coverage in the area.) This default setting provides a good balance of timely location updates without draining the battery. - Initial free subscription period makes it easy to get started. - Privacy Policy: Complete privacy is a key feature of Footprints. Your location data is only shared with the people you explicitly grant permission to see your location. Your registration information is never used to contact you, never sold to others, and never used for advertising. - Requirements: iOS 8.3 or later. (Footprints 1.6 supports iOS 4.3 and later). Footprints must be installed on all devices tracking or sharing locations, and each device must have a valid subscription. - Tracking Disclaimer: Devices without a GPS and cellular connection (iPad Wi-Fi, iPod touch) can only track and share waypoints when connected to a Wi-Fi network. - Battery Disclaimer: Continued use of GPS running in the background can dramatically decrease battery life.
