Frequently asked questions

No. The compass runs entirely in your browser. Open the page, tap Enable Compass, and it works. You can optionally add it to your home screen so it opens full-screen like a native app.

Yes. It runs in Safari on iOS and Chrome on Android, plus most other modern mobile browsers. iOS requires you to grant motion access explicitly; Android grants it automatically over HTTPS.

Yes. Once the page has loaded, the compass needs no network connection at all — the heading is computed from your device sensor locally. Add it to your home screen for the best offline experience.

You can open it, but most laptops have no magnetometer, so there is no real heading to read. The compass detects this and tells you rather than showing a meaningless number. You can run a preview animation to see the interface.

A heading in degrees is measured clockwise from north. North is 0°, east 90°, south 180°, west 270°. The letter shown alongside is the matching cardinal or intercardinal direction.

Magnetic north — the direction the sensor physically measures, and the direction a compass needle swings to. The compass deliberately applies no declination correction, because correcting to true north means knowing where you are and this compass never asks. If you are taking a bearing off a paper map, look up your local declination and add it to the reading yourself.

Declination is the angle between magnetic north and true north at your location, and it changes depending on where you are on Earth. National geophysical agencies publish world declination maps. It is applied by hand here rather than by the compass, for the same reason the compass does not ask for your location.

Small errors are normal. A well-calibrated phone magnetometer is typically accurate to 2–5 degrees. Larger errors almost always come from nearby metal or magnets rather than the sensor itself.

No. A confidence percentage is a number almost nobody can act on, so the compass says nothing rather than saying something vague. When a reading starts to drift it tells you in the one way that is useful: the Calibrate control under the dial highlights itself, and a figure-8 motion clears it in a few seconds.

It freezes your current heading as a target bearing. The compass then shows your deviation — how many degrees off that bearing you are, and whether to turn left or right. It is useful for following a trail bearing or steering a fixed course.

Yes. Tap Share and your device's native share sheet opens with your current heading as text. If your browser has no share support, the text is copied to your clipboard instead.

Yes. Turn on "Spoken heading" under the dial and the compass announces your direction as it changes, in 15-degree steps. It is designed for accessibility and for use when you cannot look at the screen.

Tap Calibrate under the dial and move the phone in a figure-8 pattern. The guide fills as the compass collects enough movement, then tells you it is done. It takes about ten seconds, and the Calibrate control also highlights itself whenever the reading starts to drift.

No. The compass does not request your location and has no access to it. The only sensor it reads is the magnetometer and orientation sensor, and that data stays in your browser.

No heading data is transmitted. The page is served as static files, and the compass calculations happen entirely on your device. There is no analytics or advertising profiling on this site.

Yes, completely. There is no account, no premium tier and no paywall.