Grūps App v0.9.13 is a big one. The map has been rebuilt around real-time movement, geofence alerts are now dependable on both iOS and Android, trip history has become genuinely useful, and a battery drain bug that's been around too long is gone. Here's everything that changed.

Maps & Location

The map now feels alive. Other members' avatars update in real time as they move — no more tapping refresh and waiting — and your own avatar appears at your current position as soon as you open the map, including on Android. Pressing the locate-me button now moves your avatar to your position, not just the map view.

Interacting with the map has also been refined. A long-press anywhere now opens a context menu with options like Create Place and Show Everyone, while a regular tap no longer accidentally starts place creation. Place icons have been upgraded to crisp, colorful SVGs with circular badges that match the color you assigned, and all 15 categories now have distinct icons that display correctly in the category picker. A few smaller improvements round things out:

  • Any group member can now create a geofence place, not just admins
  • Long-pressing the map before creating a place pre-fills that location automatically
  • Tapping the map during Step 1 of place creation moves the center pin to where you tapped
  • The preview circle is removed from the map if you cancel out of creation

Geofence Alerts

Geofence notifications are now reliable. Enter and exit alerts fire consistently on both iOS and Android, including when the app is fully closed, and they survive switching between Wi-Fi and cellular mid-trip. Notification titles now show the place name correctly — "Home Arrived" instead of "undefined Arrived" — and the group name appears as the bold heading. You'll also no longer receive a duplicate "you entered" alert every time the app reopens while you're already inside a place. All group members are automatically subscribed to alerts when a new place is created.

Trips

Trip history has had a proper overhaul. Stops now display as cards with bold place names and rounded corners, and tapping any stop brings up an Actions menu where you can Save Place, Open in Apple Maps, Open in Google Maps, or Share Location. Trips in progress show a live route map with a pulsing LIVE badge, and route lines are now dense and accurate rather than a few jagged straight segments. Stop departure times correctly reflect when you actually left, not when your phone went idle.

If you're currently stationary, a pinned card at the top of Trips shows where you are and how long you've been there — for example, "At Home · 6h 12m". Trips also now load only when you tap a member's avatar, so no member is selected by default.

Background Location & Battery

A bug that kept GPS running continuously — even overnight while you were asleep — has been fixed. The app now properly pauses location tracking when you're stationary, which should make a noticeable difference to battery life. Location points are no longer lost when the app is closed mid-trip, and tracking resumes correctly after the app is killed and relaunched on both platforms. An optional "Stationary Location Updates" setting in Settings lets you send a location ping every ~5 minutes while not moving; a battery warning is shown when you enable it.

Performance

Pages you've visited recently now load instantly when you return to them, with no skeleton flash. Navigating to a group chat skips the loading screen if the data is already fresh, and the app no longer fires repeated background network requests while it's open — reducing data usage noticeably. Profile images in lists now use smaller thumbnails, and images that are off-screen load only when you scroll to them.

Other Fixes

A handful of additional issues have been resolved: page headers stay correctly positioned on iOS and Android after dismissing the photo picker, chat photo uploads on iOS no longer fail with a permissions error, and phone number verification on Android no longer auto-sends the SMS before you tap "Send Code". The Android background location permission dialog now shows Grūps App-specific text, and an About page is now accessible from Settings — tap the version number seven times to unlock advanced debug tools.

Update to v0.9.13 to get everything above. If something feels off, use Report an Issue from the hamburger menu to let us know — we read every submission.