Carv

Your digital ski coach with real-time audio

4 followers

Your digital ski coach with real-time audio

4 followers

Carv is a digital ski coach that provides real-time audio instruction as you ski, powered by pressure and motion sensing inserts that retrofit to any ski boot. After 5 years of development, 10k skiers and 30m recorded turns, I'm pleased to announce Carv 4.0.

The Best Carv Alternatives

The best Carv alternatives are snoww, PeakVisor, NEU, Whympr, and SkiBuds.

snoww

Choose snoww if...

✓you want social ski tracking over technique coaching
✓sharing stats and runs with friends matters most
✓you prefer phone-only GPS, no boot inserts

See details ↓

PeakVisor

Choose PeakVisor if...

✓you need AR peak identification on the mountain
✓offline 3D maps matter more than coaching
✓you want broader hiking and backcountry navigation tools

See details ↓

NEU

Choose NEU if...

✓you want AR resort maps on Apple devices
✓real-time weather and resort info are priority
✓you ski mainly in Andorra, Spain, or Portugal

See details ↓

Whympr

Choose Whympr if...

✓you plan ski touring with weather and bulletins
✓GPX routes and community beta matter most
✓you want one app for multiple mountain sports

See details ↓

SkiBuds

Choose SkiBuds if...

✓finding ski buddies is more important than analytics
✓you want to coordinate carpools to the mountain
✓you’re looking for après channels and community chat

See details ↓

What to Consider

Carv has become one of the best-known ways to get on-slope technique coaching, pairing boot-insert sensors with real-time audio feedback and post-run analytics to help skiers improve faster. But “ski improvement” tools span a much wider spectrum: some alternatives focus on tracking and social motivation (logging days and sharing stats), others prioritize navigation with 3D/AR resort mapping, and others help you plan mountain days with route, conditions, or community coordination rather than turn-by-turn technique cues.

To evaluate the alternatives, we looked at how closely they map to Carv’s core job (improving skiing), the clarity of each product’s differentiators (coaching vs tracking vs navigation vs planning), and practical adoption factors like platform support, geographic coverage, and whether the experience is built for solo use or community connection. Where user-review detail was limited in the available sources, we leaned more heavily on products with concrete, verifiable positioning and constraints described by the makers.

snoww

The social ski tracking app

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If your main goal is to remember every ski day and share it with friends, snoww is a stronger fit than Carv’s technique-first coaching approach. It’s built around GPS-based tracking and social features, so you can log your runs, compare stats, and keep a season-long record without adding sensors to your boots.

snoww shines when motivation comes from community: seeing what others skied, swapping days-on-snow, and turning your resort time into something you can easily share. For skiers who don’t want real-time instruction in their ear, a tracking-first app can feel lighter weight and more “set it and forget it.”

The trade-off is that snoww won’t replace Carv’s pressure-based technique insights or structured skill coaching. But if you primarily want a clean activity log and a social layer around skiing, it’s a practical alternative that keeps the focus on the day itself, not drills and scoring.

Best for

Best for skiers who want social tracking and simple performance stats without hardware.

Standout features

✓GPS run tracking
✓Social feed and friend comparisons
✓Ski-day and season logging
✓Shareable activity summaries

PeakVisor

3D Maps & Peaks Identification

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PeakVisor is the pick when mountain awareness matters more than turn-by-turn technique coaching. Instead of focusing on how you pressure your skis (Carv’s specialty), it helps you understand the terrain around you with AR peak identification and 3D mapping.

It’s particularly compelling for mixed days—resort laps, sidecountry exploration, or summer hikes—where you want to identify ridgelines, confirm what you’re looking at, and plan routes with offline maps. That broader, all-mountain utility makes it a versatile “always on your phone” companion in a way boot-insert coaching systems typically aren’t.

One practical consideration is platform parity: PeakVisor’s maker notes the iOS app is ahead, and that the web viewer currently lacks peak labeling while iOS includes it (the web version doesn't label the peaks). If you’re choosing between Carv and PeakVisor, the decision is straightforward: PeakVisor optimizes navigation and identification, not technique improvement.

Best for

Ideal for hikers and skiers who want AR peak ID and offline 3D maps.

Standout features

✓AR peak identification
✓Offline 3D terrain maps
✓Compass and altitude tools
✓Photo peak labeling
✓Resort lift and piste info

NEU

AR ski resorts maps for Apple Vision Pro and iOS

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NEU takes a navigation-first approach to ski days, using AR and 3D resort maps rather than coaching your technique like Carv. It’s designed for Apple devices—including Vision Pro—so it leans into immersive resort exploration, planning, and at-a-glance understanding of where you are.

Where Carv is about improving how you ski, NEU is about improving how you move through a resort: better orientation, easier planning, and quick access to context like weather and resort details. That makes it a strong alternative for travelers who already feel confident in their technique, but routinely lose time to confusing trail connections.

The biggest trade-off is coverage: NEU currently focuses on resorts in Andorra, Spain, and Portugal, with plans to expand beyond those regions (NEU focuses on… Andorra, Spain, and Portugal). Expansion to larger markets is explicitly on the roadmap, but will take time given the scope (it will take some time to cover everything).

Best for

Best for Apple-centric skiers who want AR resort navigation and planning.

Standout features

✓AR-powered 3D resort maps
✓GPS-enabled 2D maps
✓Real-time weather updates
✓Detailed resort information
✓Vision Pro support

Whympr

The app to plan, enjoy and share your mountain activities

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Whympr is a better alternative to Carv when your priority is planning and safety for mountain days, especially ski touring. Rather than coaching technique with boot sensors, it concentrates on the information you need to choose objectives, understand conditions, and follow routes.

For skiers who split time between resort and backcountry, Whympr’s route planning, GPS tools, and community-shared beta can be more useful than real-time audio cues. It’s also naturally broader than a ski-only coach, supporting multiple mountain activities in one place.

Another advantage over coaching hardware is simplicity: you can plan at home, reference data on the go, and export routes to GPX workflows without committing to a training system. The trade-off is that it won’t tell you how to refine edge control or pressure timing—so it complements technique coaching rather than replacing it for skill development.

Best for

Ideal for mountain athletes who need route planning, conditions, and GPX workflows.

Standout features

✓Route planning and GPS tracking
✓Weather and avalanche bulletins
✓Community trip info and sharing
✓GPX export for navigation
✓Multi-activity mountain support

SkiBuds

Find friends to ski and snowboard with

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SkiBuds is the alternative to pick when the biggest barrier to skiing more isn’t technique—it’s having people to go with. Instead of real-time coaching like Carv, it focuses on connecting skiers and snowboarders based on skill level so you can find compatible partners.

It’s also built for the logistics that make ski days happen: organizing carpools, coordinating meetups, and keeping the social side alive through après channels. For newcomers to a resort or anyone relocating to a new mountain town, that “built-in community” angle can be more valuable than another set of performance metrics.

The trade-off is that SkiBuds won’t give you sensor-driven feedback or structured drills. But if you’re choosing between improving form versus making it easier to get on snow with others, SkiBuds is purpose-built for the latter.