Can Your iPhone Increase Your Gas Mileage?
July 11, 2010
While there have been a lot of amazing claims about the abilities of the iPhone, never have we seen one quite like this. Can your iPhone actually increase your gas mileage?
DriveGain, a recent addition to the App Store, promises just that. DriveGain uses your iPhone's GPS and accelerometer to detect information about your car such as your location, speed, acceleration and braking. The app combines these statistics with information on your car's make and model to coach you on your driving.
According to a recent writeup on CNET, DriveGain will take all of this data and recommend the best speed and gear to get you the best gas mileage. The app will even show your estimated gas mileage, cost of fuel and CO2 emissions while you drive. The developers of DriveGain claim the app can save you $205 annually, if used properly.
There are a few limitations; the most obvious being that you need to run it from an iDevice with a GPS. iPod touch, original iPhone and iPhone 3G users will need to use a GPS add-on such, as the Tom-Tom car kit, for the application to work properly. A second major limitation is the current version of the app only works with manual transmission vehicles. The developer promises this will be corrected in a future update.
While a promised $205 annual savings seems pretty large, if it saves you more than the $7 cost of the app, it might be worth it.
