What happened to Tomtom?

[Barnoe]

Tomtom used to be huge, over the years they have been in a steady decline.

The last Tomtom device I bought was a Tomtom 550 Premium in 2013, i used it until 2020 when i got a GS with a Nav6.
A telling sign is that in 2026 i use neither Garmin or Tomtom for my bike navigation, instead using a Carpuride unit.

No Tomtom devices are sold in America or Canada anymore, all users have been pointed to Apps
Non of my biker mates have Tomtoms either in the UK

at one time it was 50/50 Tomtom and Garmin, in cars i would say more Tomtom.

 

[Wapping]

I think they now dedicate themselves to ‘in car’ services.

Having never owned one, I did not boost their coffers. I always saw them as a poor cousin to Garmin devices; possibly unfairly.

 

[Gloop]

I do recall the TomTom rider being released at £400. A non waterproof version (garmin or Tomtom) cost about £80 to £100 and if placed behind the screen Jin the right place, hardly got wet, even in a downpour.
I went with the cheaper option which was a garmin.

 

[L2RKE]

Quite happy with my Tomtom Rider I bought 2 years ago. I really didn’t fancy going down the overpriced, but unreliable Nav5 again.
It updates via WiFi, so no faffing about with PCs.

 

[Barnoe]

The 550 premium i bought back in 2013 was fully waterproof and came with a car mount that had a speaker in it, very odd.
So when in the car instruction came from the unit rather than through car speakers lol

obviously the unit didn't have a speaker as it would leak on the bike.

TBF i was happy with it at the time.

 

[glenn2926]

I used a Tom Tom just once. It was a very poor relation to the early Garmin devices. When it said to take the next right we were already past the turning it meant. This kind of put me off, that and there was no route planning with Tom Tom.
Now you mention it I haven’t seen a tom tom device for a good while.

 

[Twotter]

I've still got a Rider 550 but prefer Google Maps on my phone. Ultimate Addons case keeps it dry when (if) it rains.

 

[L2RKE]

The 550 premium i bought back in 2013 was fully waterproof and came with a car mount that had a speaker in it, very odd.
So when in the car instruction came from the unit rather than through car speakers lol

obviously the unit didn't have a speaker as it would leak on the bike.

TBF i was happy with it at the time.

Mine has a speaker in the main unit. So presumably it’s waterproof.

 

[OnHellas]

I’ve just been away on a short trip to the Pyrenees with a mate.
My TomTom 550 was perfect the whole time.
My mate with his myriad of Apps was a bit of a disappointment.
Numerous resets and non available maps etc…mind you, he’s always been a shit navigator so….

He’s just ordered a new TomTom from Sports Bike Shop for £285. Let’s see how lost he can get with it.

 

[Mzokk]

Interesting story.

 

[Burridge01]

I've had my Tomtom 550 premium for a good few years.Never an issue,always gets me where I want to go,has more features than I care to use.Did take me a while to sort out navigation from what it wanted me to do to what I wanted to do.When I was in Helmet City(Tatsfield)they did say they no longer stocked Tomtom and they were under the impression Tomtom had pulled out of the bike market,went home and had a nose around.Appears that Tomtom are now only manufacturing the higher end bike nav-the 550.No problem for me,life time updates(free at the moment)cover everywhere I wish to gne feature I really like(and came in bloody handy touring with the VFR1200) its tells you where and how far the petrol station are,another matter altogether if they are still open selling fuel

 

[ThreeDawg]

I use DMD2 (DMD Next) and offline Google maps on an old 'rugged' phone. Cost? Zilch.

Their 7 and 8" tablets look awsome - quite a few serious looking bikes we saw last year in Morocco had them, but a bit spendy for me...

I ditched the Garmin 590 after that trip, it just wasn't routing as well as DMD or Google.

 

[walkingpictures]

I still use my Tom Tom 550 rider on my bike,works just fine for me,can plan routes on Plan.TomTom.com and they transfer to the rider as soon as it connects to a wifi.I prefer a stand alone unit rather than one that needs a mobile to hook up to but that's just my preference.I also have a TomTom Go for the car,nice 7'' screen and works fine.

 

[Rasher]

MRA Navigation is pretty slick now, got trip with bikermates who are getting just a one month subscription for the cost of half a pint, so been busy checking routes for trip, putting them on the XT, showing track and then seeing if route matches....

....typically not, so go back, add waypoints until it does, the MRA Navigation more reliably follows the WYSIWYG generally, anyway in theory we will all be going the same way across the devices.

A bit of side by side road testing shows very similar performance, the XT is faster at auto-skipping a missed shaping point,



This is my test, when short-cutting to bypass shape point 4, the Garmin very quickly just skips number 4 before the junction, MRA wants to do a left back towards the main road, but if I ignore it and turn right it very quickly jumps to auto-skip, everything else seems pretty much the same functionally.

The Garmin is still slightly better, and the track + route method still wins for me, and it is a lot easier to operate on the move, and compared to the phone has a larger screen....

...But the MRA navigation app is now bloody good, not sure if I will buy another Garmin ever again or just get one of those big screens that mirrors the phone?

Although the phone battery drains real quick, so would need permenant power for it.

 

[Robbo1200ADV]

Have the Tom Tom 550 on my T Max and it’s good . Used an old one in the USA after In downloaded the USA. MAPS and again it was great .

 

[Hann]

I used to use older TomTom satnavs and got on well with them, they were easy to use, intuitive when planning routes/waypoints and the routes generated made sense.
The update website was a complete nightmare, though...
Since going over to Garmin i have on quite a few occasions wondered where they get their mapping from, they have some very odd ways of directing you that just do not make sense, and inputting waypoints is a bit more involved.

Maybe we should stick to the old ways....
I`ve just noticed - this was page 7 on his back!

 

[Redboots]

Maybe we should stick to the old ways....
I`ve just noticed - this was page 7 on his back!


View attachment 536518

Long slog on motorways...

 

[Hann]

Long slog an motorways...

Yep, it wasn`t a scenic tour it was just to get to a destination (bike rally) in Hungary.

 

[Steve398]

I’ve been using Tomtom on the bike since their V1Rider model, and in my cars for years. I did try Garmins when I first bought the RTLC and just couldn’t get on with them at all.

 

[adventuredon]

I use software called TripManager to transfer routes to the Zumo XT2 after creating them in basecamp or other software. It helps massively and most routes do not differ from original. Its free and well supported/documented on zumo user forums