Rouvy reviews
What users love and hate, from real reviews
An indoor cycling app that rides real-world video routes from around the globe — people love the «real» look over Zwift's cartoon world, but routinely lose a workout to crashes and freezes.
What users love
Real video instead of a cartoon world — the main reason people leave Zwift
What they love: real footage of real roads from around the world feels far more immersive than Zwift's drawn universe; dozens switched from Zwift just for this and don't regret it — «doesn't feel like a game».
Just makes you want to ride! no cartoons or zwift freaks!
Big fan of the realism - much more engaging than Zwift's cartoon world for me
This is far better than Zwift. It doesn't feel like a game.
A huge worldwide route selection that motivates you to get on the bike
Hundreds of routes across dozens of countries — flat and fast to brutal climbs; the variety keeps it interesting and gets people pedalling for hours where 45 minutes used to be a struggle.
I like going all over the world and it's revolutionised my training. I couldn't ride 45 mins indoors now I'm doing 3.5 hours
love the ability to ride all over the world from your living room
There are almost limitless routes to ride if you want fast and flat or muscle testing climbs.
When it works, the ride is genuinely immersive and gets results
Long-time users say the app has improved markedly across updates, the global routes are addictive, drafting and Strava segments keep adding up, and it brings back the joy of cycling — some have had zero crashes over years.
Has been a game changer for me cycling indoors, fantastic routes and community! Realistic and fun!
I've used Rouvy since late 2021 and had ZERO crashes, bugs, dropouts, connectivity issues etc. That's nearly 3 years!
This app has greatly improved over the last couple years.
What users hate
Mid-ride crashes and freezes wipe the whole workout
The most common complaint by far: the picture freezes or the app crashes a few km in or near the end of a long ride, nothing is saved, and you start over — even on downloaded routes with strong hardware and a stable connection.
Echoing other users here, latest version crashes constantly less that 3 km into any ride, regardless of downloaded route or not.
Freezes constantly, 2-3km in to every ride
The last 10 rides the app crashed in the last 10% of the training duration. No way to resume where you were kicked out.
Routes take 5–10 minutes to load even on gigabit internet
The app is painfully slow: a route can take 7–10 minutes to load on fibre at minimum video quality, search lags, the UI hangs — warm-up eats more of your limited ride window than the ride itself.
the app takes about 10 min (literal) to load a route. All video quality settings set to minimum.
routes take forever to load (7 minutes to load for a 42 minute ride! On fiber gigabit internet
the app is very slow or unresponsive and needs a lot of work
Every update breaks what worked, and you can't skip it
Forced updates land constantly, weigh over 500 MB, and routinely break things that worked — the app won't open, sound disappears, virtual shifting dies; there's no way back to the old version, and without updating you can't use the app at all.
the latest update doesn't work....been working fine, finally for last 12months or so. As of today with new update not working
bring back the old version. I just want to get on the bike and ride.
apps been broken by an update.
Can't even log in: the email field won't activate, especially on Chromebook
Many are stopped at the login screen itself: the email box won't activate, the keyboard isn't recognised, splitting login and password across pages breaks Google's password manager; on Chromebook the app installs but lets no one log in.
On the login page the e-mail box wont activate and allow me to enter anything!
LIke others before me, the app will not allow me to log in on a Chromebook.
Cannot even log in - refuses to recognise the pixelbook keyboard so cannnot get past the log in screen
You must hand over a card and sign up on the website just to look around
The cold start drives people away: you can't create an account in the app — it sends you to the website, demands card details before the trial even starts, and won't show routes or features until you subscribe.
Force you to sign up on the website not app and start a trial and add credit card info before even seeing how it works.
this app does not allow you to see the routes or what workouts are there, or the app features until you enter your card details and take membership
The app doesn't let you create an account and just tells you to do it from their website.
Cancellation is hidden, money is taken after you cancel, and refunds are denied
Dark patterns around the subscription: you can't cancel in-app, cancellation is buried across many pages, after the trial it silently charges a full year with no warning, keeps charging after you cancel, and refunds are refused or hit with a 15 € fee.
Still charge you after you cancel. I spent a bunch of time canceling and they are still charging me.
They make it so hard to cancel you don't know if you did or not it's ridiculous
after 7 days trial will automatically charge you for entire year without chance to cancel it until the entire year expires. Forget about refund.
Support replies with AI boilerplate and then goes silent for weeks
When something breaks there's no help: the chatbot is useless, emails get slow copy-paste «ride on downloaded routes» replies, and after a positive word about a refund they ghost you — though a minority did get problems solved quickly by support.
zero customer support. just AI SLOP if you have an issue. don't bother
I received a positive response like I was going to be refunded, a little more information was requested and given and since then I've been ghosted.
they just simply copy/paste back to you the same answers: "We strongly recommend ride on downloaded routes."
Virtual shifting and trainer connection keep dropping out
Hardware connects unreliably: virtual shifting was promised for months and never fixed, the Wahoo Kickr drops over Bluetooth, sensors and heart-rate straps disconnect after updates — all while the same gear works fine in Zwift.
Virtual shifting is still not working, otherwise it is a fantastic app.
Abysmal Android experience. Wahoo Kickr connection is flaky.
Since last update the sensors keep disconnecting from my phone's app.
Avatars and UI lag behind: no dark skin tones, tiny stats, forced landscape
The presentation grates: the default avatar is a white man even when you set female, there's no dark skin tone to pick, on a phone the app is locked to landscape, the buttons are tiny and unreadable, and there's simply no in-app sound.
the avatars can only be "customized" to resemble white people, which I am NOT!
its default avatar is a man. Giving a default man avatar to someone who's already indicated they're a woman is lazy and sloppy.
this app forces my phone into landscape mode and the normal bottom of screen buttons can't be accessed. everything is way too small to read.