A clearer start to your next trip
Starting a free trip now responds immediately, opens a lighter builder, and gives you a way to retry if loading takes too long.
What’s new
Built in the open, one better trip at a time.
Every useful addition, thoughtful polish, and real-world fix since The Dirt Brief began. This is the product story, without the behind-the-scenes noise.
Help decide what comes nextThe trail so far
From a waitlist to a complete trip briefing tool.
Fixed Fixed Resume trip setup without the wait
Returning to an unfinished trip now responds immediately and opens the right setup experience with less loading.
New Meet the person behind The Dirt Brief
A new About page shares founder Brad Perkins’s Maze District story and the real trip-planning problem that led him to build The Dirt Brief.
Improved An easier way to plan your next trip
People viewing a shared trip now have a simple invitation to build a trip brief for their own crew, with the first trip free.
Fixed Daily mileage totals stay in sync
Multi-day trips now calculate total route mileage from the same recorded legs shown for each day, without counting gaps between separate GPX tracks.
New A home for every improvement
The new What’s New page tells the story of The Dirt Brief from its first day and gives everyone a direct place to request features or report problems.
Improved Light and dark modes everywhere
The site now follows your device appearance, with carefully matched surfaces across shared trips, weather, trip editing, login, and signup.
Improved Shared-trip identity is clearer
People opening a trip are now prompted to choose their name so leaders can tell who has reviewed the brief, while guest viewing remains available.
Fixed More reliable dashboard and AI helper
Sign-in initialization no longer interrupts trip loading or the AI helper, especially in Safari and during fresh deployments.
Improved A field-journal design for every trip
Trip details, GPX stats, maps, controls, and navigation now share one warm outdoor visual language with a custom compass and real icons.
New Cover photos and better sharing
Leaders can give each trip its own cover image, and refreshed share cards make trip links feel more useful and personal.
Improved Simpler trip setup
The setup flow now asks clearer questions, uses more natural writing, and keeps the path from an idea to a shareable trip focused.
Improved A redesigned public and shared-trip experience
The public site, trip planner, editor, and crew-facing trip pages were rebuilt around a cleaner, more cohesive experience.
Fixed Elevation for more GPX files
Routes exported from onX and other apps can recover missing elevation data, so distance profiles and climbing totals stay useful.
Improved A familiar AI trip check
The AI review inside the trip editor became an open chat where leaders can ask questions and improve any part of a trip.
Fixed Shared trips load more reliably
Crew links no longer get stuck on “Checking the trail conditions…” when a request takes longer than expected.
New Trip-aware planning from the first question
The builder now starts with the kind of adventure and adapts its guidance for overlanding, hiking, bikepacking, trail running, and moto trips.
Fixed AI setup works better on iPhone
The guided builder was reworked for small screens, with a more usable composer, layout, and navigation.
New The AI guide can build the whole trip
The guide can now work across crew, itinerary, maps, GPX routes, weather, polls, meals, permits, and costs, then run a final trip check.
Improved A complete live preview
Weather, maps, polls, permits, costs, and trip details now appear while a leader builds, making the finished crew view easier to understand.
Improved Better meeting places and AI conversations
Meeting points now keep a crew-friendly label and full address, while the setup chat supports rich formatting and a growing multi-line composer.
New Survey-style polls
Polls grew into flexible question cards, giving leaders more useful ways to ask the crew and see responses.
Improved A better date picker
Two separate date fields were replaced with a hotel-style range calendar that makes multi-day trip dates easier to choose.
Improved A major mobile trip-editor pass
Sharing, headers, form fields, bottom sheets, scrolling, and hidden controls were reworked so leaders can comfortably edit trips on a phone.
New Build a trip before creating an account
Anyone can now begin planning immediately and save the trip when it is ready, without an account wall at the first step.
New Trail groups and trips you’re attending
Feedback from early users added better group organization and made trips you are attending easier to find from the dashboard.
Improved Faster guided setup
The setup wizard gained clearer save states, a direct path to sharing, better mobile behavior, and a celebratory finish.
New Instant route previews and track splitting
GPX files can be previewed immediately, assigned to a day with one tap, and split into useful route sections.
Improved A clearer content block picker
Trip leaders can browse a visual gallery of information blocks with plain descriptions and examples of when to use each one.
New Guided setup and trip logistics
A step-by-step setup flow arrived alongside carpool planning, permits, and shared trip costs.
New Weather forecasts built for camp
Trips gained daily forecasts, hourly detail, overnight sleeping temperatures, and practical sleeping-bag guidance.
Improved Faster name selection
The participant picker now sorts the crew alphabetically so people can identify themselves quickly.
Fixed Better elevation and accurate party counts
GPX files can recover elevation from more sources, and RSVP totals now include each person’s full party size.
New Plan with multiple trip leaders
Organizers can invite co-leaders so more than one person can keep the plan current.
New Invites and RSVP status throughout the trip
Participants can invite others, respond per trip, and see clear going, maybe, and can’t-make-it counts throughout the experience.
Improved More control over crew conversations
Trip leaders can remove questions, replies, and concerns, while map links produce richer previews for the crew.
Improved Easier GPX cleanup
Route files can be removed directly or deleted in bulk from the GPS overview.
New Videos play inside the trip brief
Shared video links can now play inline, keeping important route, safety, and destination context in one place.
New Account recovery and settings
Leaders gained reliable forgot-password, reset-password, and account settings flows.
New Packing, emergency contacts, and contributor access
The app added reusable packing templates, participant emergency contacts, co-contributor editing, party sizes, and organizer controls for GPX downloads.
Improved More useful maps, gear, polls, and Q&A
Crew members can see and claim shared gear, filter routes by day, add itinerary days, view poll voters, and respond in Q&A.
Improved Smarter trip dates and richer waypoints
Changing trip dates became safer and route waypoints gained more useful detail, alongside a broad round of early beta fixes.
Fixed Reliable controls on iPhone
Buttons inside mobile bottom sheets were fixed so crew and leaders could use them consistently in iOS Safari.
New The full trip brief arrives
The early idea became a working product with organizers, crew-facing trip pages, itineraries, maps, gear, meals, polls, Q&A, rich text, countdowns, and gear claiming.
New Feedback becomes part of the product
Organizers and participants gained a direct way to share feedback, report bugs, and request features during the beta.
New The Dirt Brief begins
The first waitlist page introduced a simple idea: one clear briefing for an outdoor trip, shared with the whole crew.