Do I need an account?

Most of the site works without an account.

Without an account you can

• Browse and walk every published hike
• Use trail mode, including the quiz
• Download the printable kit and the GPX route
• Favorite a hike
• Rate a hike at the end of trail mode
• Report a problem with a stop while you are walking

An account adds

• Building hikes of your own
• Logging hikes you have finished, which builds a history on your profile
• Badges, which are awarded for logged completions — see Badges
• Rating from the hike page, not just at the end of trail mode, and re-rating a hike later if you walk it again

Accounts are free, and you'll need to confirm you're 13 or older to create one. There's no password to invent — see Signing in with an email code for how that works.

Who are you posting for? Right after you sign up, you'll be asked whether you're posting content as yourself or on behalf of an organization. If it's an organization, you'll also give its name and the type of organization it is — a business, a registered nonprofit, a youth group, and so on. This is private: only site administrators can see it, and it never shows up on your public profile or on any hike page, the same as your email address. You can change your answer at any time from profile settings.

To credit hikes to a group, such as a historical society, a museum or a troop, add it as an organization. Your sign-up answer only fills in that form. It doesn't create an organization.

See Your account and privacy for what we store, and Choosing a username for how your username works and when it locks.