Alright, so the other day I was kinda wondering, like, do phones actually track your altitude? You know, like how accurate is that stuff? So, I decided to mess around and see for myself.
First thing I did was grab my old Android phone – it’s got all the sensors and whatnot. I figured an older phone might actually be more interesting ’cause maybe the sensors aren’t as fancy-schmancy as the newer ones.
The Plan: I thought, “Okay, let’s just go up and down some stairs.” Real simple. My apartment building has, like, six floors, so I figured that’s enough to get some kind of reading.
- Step 1: Downloaded a bunch of those altitude measuring apps from the Play Store. I’m talking like five or six different ones. I wanted to see if they all gave the same readings, ya know?
- Step 2: Stood on the ground floor, opened all the apps, and let them calibrate for a minute or two. Made sure they were all starting from roughly the same point.
- Step 3: Walked up to the sixth floor, stopping on each floor for like 30 seconds to let the apps update their readings.
- Step 4: Wrote down all the numbers. Each app had its own way of displaying altitude – some were in feet, some in meters, some even had weird graphs.
- Step 5: Walked back down, repeating the process. More numbers!
The Results? Kinda Messy…
Okay, so here’s where it gets interesting. Not all the apps agreed with each other. Like, at all. Some were pretty close, giving me altitude changes that seemed reasonable for a floor, maybe 10-12 feet per floor. But others were way off, jumping around like crazy or showing completely unrealistic numbers.
One app, I swear, said I was 50 feet below ground level when I was on the ground floor. What the heck?
Then, I thought maybe it was the barometer. You know, that thing that measures air pressure to figure out altitude? So, I tried another thing. I took the phone outside and compared it to a proper GPS app and the results were still kinda inconsistent.
My Conclusion? Phones do try to track altitude, but it’s not an exact science. It seems like a combo of the barometer, GPS, and maybe even some Wi-Fi triangulation. But the sensors on phones aren’t perfect, and the software that translates that data into altitude readings can be wonky.
So, yeah, if you’re climbing Everest, don’t rely on your phone for your altitude. But for casual stuff like knowing what floor you’re on, it’s probably good enough. Just don’t expect pinpoint accuracy.
Next time, I’m gonna try this with a fancy new phone and see if the results are any better. Stay tuned!