How automatic mileage tracking actually works

"Automatic" is easy to claim and hard to do well: start too eagerly and your log fills with parking-lot noise, start too late and you lose deductible miles, poll too hard and you're the app that killed the battery. Here's exactly how GigOdo's engine decides when you're driving, when you've stopped, and why no route ever leaves your phone.

A shift, start to finish

1
You leave home. If you've set a Home Zone (a circle around home, 150 meters by default), crossing out of it starts recording - no speed guessing needed. Without a Home Zone, Auto-Detect starts when it sees driving speed (about 11 mph) or a position jump too large for GPS error to explain.
2
You work. Full GPS runs only now, one fix per second, adding up distance as you go. The floating bubble shows live miles over the DoorDash or Uber screen; the notification shows tracking status. You never open GigOdo mid-shift unless you want to.
3
You stop somewhere. Red lights, drive-throughs, and dropoffs don't end the trip - five full minutes without movement does. Park at a restaurant for four minutes and the trip is still rolling; finish for the day and it files itself. Trips under 0.4 miles are discarded as noise.
4
You come home. Crossing back into your Home Zone stops and saves the trip instantly. The bubble flashes the saved mileage in green for a few minutes, so a glance answers "did it record?" - then GigOdo goes into battery deep sleep until you move again.
5
You review. Detected trips land in a queue: swipe right to keep a work drive, left to discard the grocery run. Add what the trip paid (or type your whole day in plain words and let the AI log it). Only claimed trips count toward your deduction.

Why the review swipe matters for your taxes

No tracker can know why you drove - and the IRS deduction only covers business miles. GigOdo makes the business/personal call yours, one swipe per trip, instead of silently assuming everything was work. The result is a contemporaneous log that reflects your judgment - which is exactly the kind of record IRS documentation rules favor over a platform's year-end estimate, and stronger than a log padded with unclaimed personal drives.

Engineered against the two classic failures

Phantom trips. GPS in a pocket indoors can drift hundreds of meters and look like driving. GigOdo requires the evidence to clear the error bars: a start needs real speed or displacement larger than the fix's own accuracy radius, and a Home Zone exit needs two consecutive fixes clearly outside the circle after accounting for accuracy. Setting your Home Zone while you're away from home won't fake an exit either - only actual crossings count.

Missed trips. The opposite failure costs real money - a lost 200-mile week is $152 of deduction at the current IRS rate of 76 cents per mile (72.5 cents before July 2026). So inside the Home Zone GigOdo suppresses only the noisy speed trigger; a large, accuracy-cleared displacement still starts recording even if the zone logic thinks you're home. And because Android's battery optimization is the #1 killer of background trackers, GigOdo detects it and warns you with a one-tap fix - the Battery page covers that guard in detail.

Privacy is structural, not a promise

GigOdo uses GPS points to add up distance, then discards them on the spot. There is no route to upload, subpoena, or leak - only mile totals, times, and the pay you entered.

That's also why GigOdo never asks for your Uber, DoorDash, or Lyft login: there's no account linking, so there's nothing for a platform to detect or flag. In a year when linked driver apps are drawing deactivation warnings, the safest connection is the one that doesn't exist.

Manual mode, for when you want the wheel

Auto-detect is optional. One tap starts a trip, one tap stops it, and you can add pay and platform on save. Plenty of drivers run manual for a week, watch the auto-detect queue catch the same trips, and then switch it on for good. The bubble works in both modes - and on Android it stops a trip without leaving whatever app you're in.

Let it catch your next shift

Free forever. No trip cap. No card. Set the Home Zone and forget the app exists.

⬇ Download for Android
APK setup guide · iPhone? Use the web app

Auto-tracking questions

What makes GigOdo start recording?
Driving speed (about 11 mph), a position jump too large for GPS error to explain, or - with Home Zone set - simply driving out of your home radius. Manual start is always one tap away.
When does a trip stop?
Five minutes without movement, or instantly when you pull back into your Home Zone. Drive-throughs and red lights won't end it; trips under 0.4 miles are discarded as noise.
Will it record personal errands?
It records drives, then you decide: swipe right to keep a work trip, left to discard. Nothing counts toward your deduction until you claim it.
Does GigOdo upload my routes?
No. Coordinates are discarded the moment distance is computed. Even Pro sync moves only totals and figures - never a route.
Is auto-tracking free?
Yes - Auto-Detect, Home Zone, the bubble, unlimited trips, and review are free forever. Pro ($2.99/month founding price) only adds cloud backup, sync, the weekly AI review, and tax extras.