Answers to the most asked questions

Vehicle-based travel into places most vehicles don't go. Dirt roads, national forest, BLM land, desert, coast. You drive out, you camp, you drive further. Some people leave for six months. Some leave after work on Friday and are home Sunday night. Both count.

Off-roading is the driving. The obstacle is the point. Overlanding is the travel, and the driving is how you get there. Plenty of overland trips include hard trail sections and plenty are graded dirt the whole way. The difference is what you came for.

No. Stock 4WD, a built rig on 35s, a Subaru on a fire road, a van on a graded forest road. What matters is that the vehicle can do the trip you picked, not that it fits a category. It doesn't matter what you drive.

No. Recovery gear, water, a way to air down and air back up, and a full size spare will get you further than a lift kit. Most builds happen after somebody has been out a few times and knows what they keep reaching for.

Pick somewhere two hours from home on graded dirt with coverage most of the way. Go Saturday, sleep in your own bed. That trip teaches you what you forgot to pack, and you learn it forty minutes from pavement instead of two hundred miles in. Then find a Rally Point near you and go out with people who have done it.

Field Map layers USFS, BLM, and BIA boundaries so you can see which agency manages the ground you're looking at. Rules vary by district and by season, and closures happen. The agency for that district is the final word. The map tells you who to ask.

Trails on Field Map use a 1 to 10 scale. Low numbers are graded dirt and gravel that most stock vehicles handle. High numbers mean rock, off camber sections, and a real chance of body damage or a winch. A rating is a starting point. Conditions change with weather and with whatever happened out there last week.

Both are fine. Alone, the whole trip is yours. With people, somebody has a strap when you're stuck and somebody has a spare when yours is flat. If you go alone, tell someone where you're headed and when you'll be back.

A membership community for people who travel by vehicle into the outdoors, and the software they use to do it. Forums, a trail and POI map, trip planning, and a home base for your crew, all under one membership.

All three, connected. The forums are where people ask and answer. Field Map, Rally Point, and Crews are the tools you use to plan and go. Overland Bound One puts the same membership on your phone. One login covers everything.

The forums opened in 2013 and have been running ever since. Thirteen years of gear questions, build threads, trip reports, and regional knowledge, all still searchable.

A permanent number assigned to you when you purchase a membership. It's sequential, it's yours for life, and it's the number laser etched into your emblems. It shows on your forum profile.

A solid metal emblem, 2-3/8 inches, bronze finish, laser etched with your member number. Automotive grade with a permanent adhesive back and a lifetime warranty. Member Kits and Ultimate Kits ship with two.

The map, the forums, Rally Point, and Crews work anywhere. The land management layers are US agency data, so USFS, BLM, and BIA boundaries only appear in the States. POI coverage is deepest in North America and grows wherever members are traveling.

The map. Trails with difficulty ratings, community POIs, public land management boundaries, Rally Points, and dots showing where other members are. It runs in any modern browser and in Overland Bound One.

How trips and meetups get organized. Set a start location, upload or plan your route, mark your waypoints, tag terrain and required equipment, list your radio channel, then invite people or open it up for anyone to find. RSVPs and the discussion thread live on the Rally Point itself.

A permanent home base for the group you go out with. Crew Chat, shared files and photos, the crew's own POIs, and every Rally Point the crew has taken, all in one place that's still there between trips. Crews are created by members and can be private or open to join.

A Rally Point is a trip. It has a date, a route, and a list of who's coming. A Crew is the group itself, and it's there the other fifty weekends of the year. Trips come and go. The crew stays.

Topic-based discussion going back to 2013. Gear reviews, build threads, trip reports, recovery questions, regional groups, and direct messaging between members. No ads.

No. Field Map, Rally Point, Crews, and the forums all run in a browser. You'll want Overland Bound One once you leave pavement, because that's where offline map tiles and GPX navigation live.

Downloaded map tiles do. Before you go, download the area you're headed to in Overland Bound One, up to 64 by 64 kilometers per download. Out there, GPS puts you on the map and you follow your GPX line. POI details and anything else that pulls from the platform need signal.

Yes. Import GPX from Gaia, onX, or anywhere else into Field Map and Overland Bound One. Your route library comes with you.

Every three meter square on Earth has a unique three word address. Every POI and marked location on Field Map carries one. You can say it over the radio, put it in a text that barely sends, or give it to a dispatcher without reading off coordinates.

You can see that members are in an area, not where they're parked. Dots are offset randomly within about five miles of the location in a member's profile. It's enough to know somebody is out your way. It isn't enough to find their camp.

Yes. Select a dot, or draw a radius on Field Map and message everyone inside it who has opted in. That's how people check conditions before a trip or find somebody to go with in an unfamiliar area. Direct messaging also runs through the forums.

USFS, BLM, and BIA management boundaries, plus fire perimeters. These show which agency manages the ground, not who owns it. Rules and closures come from the district office, so check with them before you commit to a spot.

Yes. Members can create private Rally Points that are invite only and don't appear in discovery. Crews can be private too, which keeps the crew and everything in it out of search.

No. A free account gets you the forums, a look at Field Map, and the ability to RSVP to Rally Points. You'll see trails, POIs, and member dots, but you can't open them or message anyone. Membership opens the rest.

Full access to Field Map, Rally Point, Crews, the forums, and Overland Bound One, plus your member number. One membership, $39.99 a year, covers all of it. Kit tiers add physical goods that ship once.

It's assigned automatically at purchase. You'll get it by email with your activation link within a few minutes of checkout. If you ordered a kit, your emblems and patch are etched and numbered before they ship.

Yes. Overland Bound One is in the App Store and Google Play, and a subscription purchased there works the same as one purchased on the web. Kits are ordered separately through the store.

Yes, any time from your account. Your access runs through the end of the period you've already paid for.

Absolutely. Email us at info@overlandbound.com and we'll coordinate from there.