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1. Open Stepper Pro and grant Motion & Fitness access the first time you're asked — without it the App cannot count steps
2. Put your iPhone in a trouser pocket, or in an armband or belt pouch. Any orientation works
3. Tap Start and begin walking
4. The big number counts your steps live, with elapsed time and cadence underneath
5. Tap Finish when you're done, then choose Save to keep the walk in your history or Discard to throw it away

Keep the App in the foreground while you walk. If you switch to another app, iOS suspends access to the motion sensors, so Stepper Pro pauses the walk instead of quietly counting nothing.

1. The first time you're asked, allow Location — While Using the App. This is optional; without it the App still counts your steps
2. Tap Start and walk as usual, with the phone on your body
3. You don't need to tell the App where you are. After a short stretch of walking it works out on its own whether your steps are moving you (outdoors) or not (treadmill)
4. Outdoors, the App measures the distance you cover in addition to your steps
5. Tap Finish and Save. Open the walk from History to see its route drawn on a map

The route and distance are saved only on your iPhone. The map background comes from Apple Maps, so it needs an internet connection to load; the route itself is recorded and saved with or without one.

1. Tap Pause when you step off the belt — for water, a towel, or a break
2. The step count and elapsed time freeze where they are
3. Tap Resume to continue the same walk

Paused time is excluded from the walk's duration, so your average cadence reflects the time you actually spent walking.

Stepper Pro detects steps from the overall magnitude of your movement, not from a single axis, so it doesn't care which way the phone is turned. What matters is that the phone moves with your body:

• Best trouser pocket, armband, or belt pouch
• Good jacket pocket, if it isn't loose enough to swing on its own
• Avoid resting on the treadmill console or handrail — the phone isn't moving with you, so there is no gait to read
• Avoid holding it still in a hand gripping the handrail, for the same reason

1. Open the History screen
2. Each saved walk shows its step count, the day it happened, its duration, and its average cadence
3. Walks you took outdoors with Location allowed also show the distance covered and, when you open them, the route on a map
4. Walks you discarded at the end of a session were never saved and won't appear here

1. Open the History screen
2. Swipe left on the walk you want to remove
3. Tap Delete

Deleting a walk removes it from your device permanently, including its route and distance if it had them. This cannot be undone.

If you denied the permission, or turned it off later, Stepper Pro will tell you that counting is unavailable. To restore it:

1. Open the iOS Settings app
2. Go to Privacy & Security → Motion & Fitness
3. Turn on Fitness Tracking, then enable Stepper Pro
4. Return to the App and start a walk

You can also reach this screen from the button the App shows on its error state.

Location is optional, and you can change your mind at any time:

1. Open the iOS Settings app
2. Go to Privacy & Security → Location Services
3. Tap Stepper Pro
4. Choose While Using the App to allow it, or Never to turn it off

With Location off, Stepper Pro keeps working as a step counter. It simply stops measuring outdoor distance and drawing routes. Walks you already saved keep the routes they had until you delete them.

Stepper Pro is available in English, Español, and Português (Brasil). Change it from the App's settings. The change applies immediately and persists across sessions.

They measure different things. A treadmill console estimates steps from belt speed and a preset stride length — it assumes everybody walks the same way. Stepper Pro reads the actual rhythm of your stride from the phone on your body. Neither number is "official"; use whichever you prefer, but compare each one against itself over time rather than against the other.

Because on a treadmill your body barely moves through space — the belt goes backward and you stay put. General-purpose step counters are deliberately conservative so they don't count fidgeting as walking, and the steady, uniform gait of a treadmill is exactly the pattern those filters tend to reject. Stepper Pro takes the opposite approach: when you press Start, it assumes you are walking and counts your gait faithfully.

Never. Your walk history — steps, distances, and routes — stays on your iPhone. Stepper Pro has no backend, no cloud sync, no account, no analytics, and makes no network requests of its own, so there is nowhere for your data to go. The only thing that touches the network is Apple's own map: when you open a saved outdoor walk, iOS loads the map background from Apple Maps. The App does not send your route to Apple or to anyone else. See our Privacy Policy.

No. Stepper Pro does not read from or write to HealthKit, and it does not request health permissions. Your walks are visible only inside Stepper Pro.

That permission is what lets the App read your iPhone's accelerometer and gyroscope, which is how it detects each step. It's the one permission Stepper Pro cannot work without: the readings are processed on the device and never stored raw, and nothing is transmitted anywhere. Without it the App has no way to count. (Location, the other permission the App asks for, is optional — see the next questions.)

For two things, both of which happen on your iPhone. First, to tell on its own whether you are on a treadmill or outdoors, so you never have to pick a mode. Second, when you are outdoors, to measure the distance you cover and draw your route on a map inside the App.

The App asks for While Using the App only — never "Always". It reads your location only while a walk is in progress and the App is on screen, never in the background and never when no walk is running. Your route and distance are saved only on your device, like the rest of your history, and are never sent to us or to anyone else.

Yes. Location is optional. If you tap Don't Allow, or turn it off later in Settings, Stepper Pro works exactly as a treadmill step counter: live steps, time, cadence, and history, all the same. The only things you give up are outdoor distance and the route map.

To the motion sensors, both look identical — a stride is a stride. What tells them apart is whether your steps take you anywhere. If you are taking steps and your position is changing, you are outdoors. If you are taking steps and your position stays put — or there is no usable GPS signal, as is normal inside a gym — you are on a treadmill. Stepper Pro makes that call by itself a short while into the walk, entirely on your device. If Location is off, it simply treats every walk as a treadmill walk.

No. The App has no background location access and never asks for it. Location is read only while a walk is in progress and the App is in the foreground. When you aren't recording a walk, the App doesn't read your location at all.

Keep Stepper Pro in the foreground while a walk is running. When the App leaves the foreground, iOS suspends its access to the motion sensors, so Stepper Pro pauses the walk rather than showing a number that silently stopped growing. Resume when you come back.

Both. The step detector is tuned for the uniform gait of a treadmill, which is the case other counters handle worst, and the same detector counts your steps on a sidewalk or a track. If you allow Location, outdoor walks also get a distance and a route map.

Yes. Step counting needs no connection at all, so it works in a basement gym or in airplane mode. Outdoor distance and route recording don't need the internet either. The one thing that does is the map background behind a saved route, which iOS loads from Apple Maps.

Step accuracy depends on where you carry the phone, your gait, and your walking speed. Carried in a pocket or an armband at a steady walking pace, the count is reliable for everyday use. Very slow shuffling, an unusually irregular gait, or a phone that isn't moving with your body will reduce accuracy.

Outdoor distance and routes depend on GPS reception. Tall buildings, dense tree cover, tunnels, and the first moments of a walk can make the route wobble or the distance read a little high or low. Both numbers are estimates for your own reference, not clinical or survey-grade measurements.

The detector is tuned for walking cadence. Running may be counted less reliably, especially at high cadence. Support for running is on the roadmap — if it matters to you, email us and say so.

No. Stepper Pro is free, with no In-App Purchases, no subscription, no ads, and no paywall. If you enjoy the App and want to support the work, email [email protected] — that's enough.

Not yet in v1.0. Because Stepper Pro is local-only, exporting is on the roadmap as a share-sheet option. If you need this sooner, please email the team.

Currently iPhone only. The App reads the iPhone's own motion sensors, so it needs the phone on your body while you walk.

Any iPhone running iOS 26 or later with motion sensors — that is, every current iPhone model. The App cannot count steps in the iOS Simulator, which has no motion hardware.

Email [email protected] and include:

• iPhone model and iOS version
• App version (Settings → About)
• Where you were carrying the phone and what you were walking on
• Steps to reproduce the issue
• A screenshot or screen recording, if the issue is visible

Yes — we love hearing ideas. Email [email protected] with your proposal. We review every suggestion.