In a development that has allegedly blindsided thousands of third-party apps, Strava has announced changes to its API Agreement that won’t allow other platforms to display users’ data publicly, meaning cyclists won’t be able to use apps like VeloViewer or coaching platforms like Intervals.icu to share their ride or other activity data with anyone else.
The popular fitness tracking and sharing app is used by more than 125 million users, with a large majority of athletes using it as a data hub to track their activities using fitness tracking devices like smartwatches and power meters, and then export that data using third-party apps which focus on specific disciplines like cycling, running, hiking and more. In fact, there are tens of thousands of such apps, according to Strava itself.
However, the new changes in its API Agreement could mean a death blow to the entire fitness syncing ecosystem, with users already warning that Strava is “shooting themselves, users, and third-party apps in the foot with this move.”
Besides the change dictating how user data is shared on these countless other platforms, the California-based company has also announced that third-party apps won’t be able to use any data parsed from its app to perform analytics using artificial intelligence models.
So, what does this mean for you? The first thing to note is that if you use a device — such as a GPS computer — to record your rides and then upload that data to Strava, this change won’t affect that, because users can still access the data generated from their devices; however, apps pulling data from Strava will no longer be allowed to perform any data processing, nor share it with other users on that platform, making leaderboards and segments redundant.
And finally, in a move to “safeguard Strava’s experience”, other apps and platforms will have to maintain a distinct user interface that doesn’t feel too similar to Strava’s own.
Interestingly, Strava wrote that these changes have come into effect from 11 November, despite its blog post detailing the announcement being made four days ago. Here’s the full list of changes announced by Strava:
Effective November 11, the updated API agreement introduces three key changes that provide Strava users with greater control, security, and a consistent experience:
Stronger Privacy Standards: Third-party apps may now only display a user’s Strava activity data to that specific user. Users will continue to have access to their personal Strava data across apps connected to our platform, though there may be differences in how this data appears.
Data Use Limitations: Our terms now explicitly prohibit third parties from using any data obtained via Strava’s API in artificial intelligence models or similar applications.
Protecting the Strava Experience: Additional terms have been added to protect Strava’s unique look and feel and functionality, helping users easily distinguish between Strava and third-party platforms.
More surprisingly, the blog post ends with the note: “Per our Community Guidelines and Guidelines to Ideas, posts requesting or attempting to have Strava revert business decisions will not be permitted.”
Since making the post, Strava has attempted to clarify its position by providing additional context. According to the company, the changes were made to enhance privacy and user control and prevent third-party platforms from utilising their user’s data to train AI models and misuse via generative AI, claiming that “innovation in this space must be handled responsibly and with a firm focus on user control”.
Strava said: “We want to thoughtfully address situations where users connect to a third-party app and are unaware that their data is being surfaced not just for their own use and visibility, but also to other users (for example, in a public feed or heatmap). The latest API changes address this scenario and provide a more consistent framework for Strava user data.”
It added: “Third-party developers may not take such a deliberate approach to training AI models and as a result, we believe the best decision for the platform and for users is to prohibit the use of data extracted from Strava users in this manner. Our previous terms already disallowed the use of Strava user data in model training and development but we’ve made this more explicit in light of the increasing activity in this space.”
This was perhaps not evident in the original post, in which it claimed that it is “proactively refining our terms to stay ahead of advancements in data technology”.
The company launched a beta version of its ‘Athlete Intelligence’ feature last month, allowing subscribers to analyse and interpret workout data into personalised insights and guidance, providing “smarter insights across pace, heart rate, elevation, power and Relative Effort”, as well as aggregating data trends from workouts logged over the past 30 days.
Additionally, Strava believes that these changes will have “no impact to most developers”, anticipating that “only a small fraction (less than 0.1 per cent) of the applications on the Strava platform” will be affected, with “the overwhelming majority of existing use cases are still allowed, including coaching platforms focused on providing feedback to users and tools that help users understand their data and performance.”
However, the popular training and coaching platform Intervals.icu already posted that this breaks all coaching features for them related to Strava data – requiring them to hide not only new user data going forward, but all historical data for coaches.
Nate Pearson, CEO of TrainerRoad, an app that provides users with “Effective, Science-Backed Workouts” based on access to data from Strava, wrote: “This was crazy news to us, too. We’re still understanding the full implications.”
Ray Maker on the website DCRainmaker said: “They [Strava] don’t seem all that committed to “working closely with partners”. As every single partner I’ve talked to over the last 24 hours has been completely broadsided by this change. They all received a generic e-mail Friday night, with a mere 30 days of notice to completely re-work their entire applications. Mind you, a 30-day period that includes the holidays (most companies would give at least 6 months of notice for something like this).
“I suspect we’ll see a lot of companies just shut off the API entirely, and perhaps that’s Strava’s goal. Though, I fail to see how that benefits paying Strava subscribers, and thus Strava’s bottom line. Strava seems to be working very hard to kill off the community of tens of thousands of apps that arguably made it so popular.”
Chris Snook, Director of PR and Communications at Zwift, told road.cc: “The changes do not impact Zwift customers, so we aren’t in a position to provide any commentary,” while Wahoo said that it “doesn’t comment on changes to key partners strategies”.
Garmin and Hammerhead have also been approached for comment.
How is this change going to affect your usage of Strava for your rides and other activities going forward? Let us know in the comments…