Private travel trackers: no account, no data collected

Store pages read on 4 October 2026 · by Aki Takashima, Shiori Studio

Six travel trackers carry the App Store privacy label Data Not Collected: Driftlog, Rond, Mapsake, Photo Map, Fog of World and OwnTracks. Five say in their App Store descriptions that they need no account: Driftlog, Mapsake, Rond, Fog of World and Arc Timeline 4. That is from the twenty apps I compared on 4 October 2026.

Where I stand. I make Driftlog, one of the apps on this page, so weigh what follows accordingly. I have tried to say where the other apps are the better choice.

No account, on the device, or no data collected

The account and storage columns are what each app's own US App Store description says. Where a description says nothing, the cell says so.

App	How it records	Account	Where the data is kept	App Store privacy label	Android
Driftlog (mine)	Countries, regions, cities and dates, in the background. No routes	None	On the phone. No developer server	Data Not Collected	Yes
Rond	The places you visit, in the background, as a timeline and journal	No sign-in required	Its description says all processing and storage happen on your device	Data Not Collected	No listing found
Mapsake	Countries, cities and airports found in your photo library	None	Its description says photo dates and locations are processed on your device	Data Not Collected	No listing found
Fog of World	Your tracks, in the background	None	Its description says your data is saved on your device. Sync goes to your own iCloud, Dropbox or OneDrive	Data Not Collected	Yes
Arc Timeline 4	Where you go and how you get there, in the background	None	Its description says all data is stored on your device, with an optional backup to your own iCloud	Data Not Linked to You	No listing found
OwnTracks	An open-source location logger	Not stated	Its documentation says you provide the server it reports to	Data Not Collected	Yes
Photo Map	Scans your photo library and groups photos into trips	Not stated	Not stated	Data Not Collected	No listing found
Apple Maps Visited Places	Places you stopped at. iOS 26 and later, 32 countries and regions	Not stated in Apple's guide	Your synced devices. Apple says it is end-to-end encrypted and that it cannot read it	Built in	No
Google Maps Timeline	Visits and routes, once you turn it on	Your Google Account	Each signed-in device, with an optional encrypted backup on Google's servers	Built in	Yes

The table scrolls sideways on a phone.

What the label does and does not tell you

It is declared by the developer. Apple shows it under App Privacy on the store page. It is not an audit.
Data Not Collected means the developer says it collects no data from the app.
Data Linked to You and Data Not Linked to You say whether what is collected is tied to your identity.
Data Used to Track You is Apple's term for linking data from the app with data from other companies for advertising, or sharing it with data brokers.
A label says what kind of data, not how well it is looked after. An app with accounts, a feed and sharing has to collect more than a map that lives on one phone. That is the product, not a flaw.

The other fourteen

Trip journals such as Polarsteps, FindPenguins and Journi are made for sharing a trip with other people, and their labels list data linked to you. Among the manual maps, Stampie and Mark O'Travel list only data not linked to you; been, Pin Traveler, Skratch, Places Been and Countries Been list data used to track you. Countries Been lets you continue as a guest. The full column is in the comparison table.

What Driftlog sends, since I am asking you to trust it

Your records stay on the phone. There is no account and no server of mine for them to go to. On iPhone, they are also kept out of device backups unless you turn that on.
Two things do leave the phone. A coordinate is sent to the map service to get a place name, and a city name you type when adding a trip by hand is sent to find where it is. I do not claim that nothing ever leaves the phone.
It needs Always location permission. That is a real thing to grant. If you will not grant it, a manual map or a photo importer such as Mapsake asks for less.
On Android the Google Play Data safety section lists Location as a data type the app may collect, and says no data is shared with third parties.

See Driftlog on the App Store See it on Google Play

Questions people ask

Which travel tracker apps do not need an account?

Five say so in their US App Store descriptions: Driftlog, Mapsake, Rond, Fog of World and Arc Timeline 4. Countries Been lets you continue as a guest. Most other descriptions do not say either way.

Which travel tracker apps keep my data on my phone?

By their own App Store descriptions: Driftlog keeps records on the phone with no server, Rond says all processing and storage happen on your device, Fog of World says your data is saved on your device, and Arc Timeline 4 says all data is stored on your device with an optional iCloud backup.

What does Data Not Collected mean on the App Store?

It is a privacy label the developer declares, shown under App Privacy on the store page. It means the developer says it collects no data from the app. Apple displays the label but does not audit it.

Which travel trackers have the Data Not Collected label?

Of the twenty I compared on 4 October 2026, six: Driftlog, Rond, Mapsake, Photo Map, Fog of World and OwnTracks.

What does Driftlog send off the phone?

Two things: a coordinate sent to the map service to look up a place name, and a city name you type when adding a trip by hand. Your travel history and your photos are not sent anywhere, and there is no account.

Is Google Maps Timeline private?

Since Google moved Timeline onto the phone, visits and routes are saved on each signed-in device, and a backup, if you turn it on, is an encrypted copy on Google's servers. It still needs a Google Account.

Is Apple Maps Visited Places private?

Apple says Visited Places are end-to-end encrypted and cannot be read by Apple. The feature needs iOS 26 or later and is offered in 32 countries and regions.