How to import a GPX file into Relive
Relive reads a GPX file, but what it does with one is different from most trail and mapping services: instead of drawing your route on a flat map, it renders a 3D flyover video that follows the shape of the track over modelled terrain. The file itself moves across in the ordinary way. What is worth understanding first is that a flyover built from coordinates is not footage of the actual trail, and that anything the video shows beyond the route line â photos included â had to be added on top, because none of it lived inside the GPX file to begin with.
The short answer
In the Relive app, look for an import or "create" option and choose "upload a GPX file" (or similar wording) rather than connecting an account. Pick the .gpx file from your files or from the share sheet if it was handed over from another app, and Relive reads the coordinates, elevation and timestamps to build a route and generate its flyover video from them.
Relive can also pull an activity in directly if you connect a Strava or Garmin account instead of uploading a file by hand â that route arrives the same way, just without a GPX file changing hands at all.
Where the GPX file comes from in the first place
Relive only has a route that was either synced from a connected account or handed to it as a file. A recording app's own export or share action is what produces that file in the first place, writing out the points it logged â coordinates, elevation and usually a timestamp â as a single .gpx file. TrailCam exports a single route or an entire history this way, in GPX 1.1, the version Relive and most trail services expect.
What Relive actually builds from the file
A flyover video is not a recording of the trail â it is a computer-rendered camera path flying over a 3D terrain model, shaped by the coordinates and elevation in the file. Relive is not showing footage captured on the walk; it is showing modelled ground, coloured and shaded from map data, with a virtual camera following where the GPX points say you went. That is why the terrain in the video can look a little different from what the trail actually looked like underfoot â the file describes a path, not a landscape, and the landscape is filled in afterwards from somewhere else entirely.
The route's shape, speed and elevation changes come straight from the file's points, which is also why a very short recording â a track stopped seconds after it started, say â tends to produce a flyover too brief or too flat to be worth generating at all.
Photos are a separate step, not something the GPX brings along
A GPX file is a coordinate format. It has no field for an embedded photo, video clip or voice note, so importing one into Relive brings across exactly the route and nothing pinned along it â the same is true of every service that reads GPX, not something specific to Relive. Relive's own video-building step is usually where photos get added instead: it can offer to match photos from your library against the route by their own timestamps and place them into the video at roughly the right point along the flyover. That match happens inside Relive, working from your camera roll, after the file has already been imported â it is not the GPX file doing the carrying.
Things that go wrong, and why
- The import is rejected or produces an empty video â usually the file has too few points, for example a track that stopped almost immediately after it started.
- The video looks like it flies over hills that were not really there, or misses a climb that was â the terrain comes from Relive's own 3D model of the ground, not from the elevation values recorded in the file, so the two can disagree in either direction.
- Photos do not appear in the video at all â they were never part of the GPX file, so they only show up if they were matched in separately, from a photo library, during Relive's own video-building step.
- Nothing happens when the file is tapped on iPhone â check the extension is still .gpx. Some email clients rewrite attachments as .txt, which stops iOS from offering apps that handle the format in the share sheet.
Why the file is what actually moves
GPX exists so a route recorded in one app can have a working life somewhere else, and handing a hike from a recording app to a video service like Relive is an ordinary case of that. The file carries the shape of the walk â coordinates, elevation, time â and nothing the format has no field for travels with it: photos, video clips and voice notes captured along the original route stay outside the file, the same as they would going into any other service.
TrailCam records the route on an iPhone in the background and keeps photos, video clips and voice notes pinned to the exact spot on the route where they were taken, so that walk can be replayed on the map afterwards without needing a separate service to reconstruct it. A route, or the whole history, exports as GPX 1.1 or CSV; export is part of the optional TrailCam Pro upgrade, and the app itself is free to download.
Questions
- Does importing a GPX file into Relive bring my photos and video clips with it?
- No. GPX is a coordinate format with no field for embedded media, so only the route's coordinates, elevation and timestamps come across. Any photos in the finished video were matched in separately, from a photo library, during Relive's own video-building step.
- Does the flyover video show real footage of the trail?
- No. It is a computer-rendered camera path over a 3D terrain model, built from the coordinates and elevation in the file. It shows modelled ground shaped like the route, not footage captured while walking it.
- Do you need a Strava or Garmin account to get a route into Relive?
- No. Uploading a GPX file directly works without connecting any account â connecting one is a separate way to bring a route in, not a requirement for the file-based route.
Recording your own routes
TrailCam is an iPhone app that records your route with GPS, keeps video clips, photos and voice notes pinned to the spot where you took them, and exports the result as GPX 1.1 or CSV. It is free to download.