How to open a GPX file on a Mac

A GPX file is a text file of GPS points: a track you recorded, a route someone planned, a few waypoints, or all three. Watches, bike computers, Strava, Komoot, Garmin Connect and most mapping apps can export one. The Mac has no built-in way to look at it, so a downloaded .gpx opens in a text editor and shows you XML. Here are the three ways that work.

1. A GPX viewer from the Mac App Store

The quickest. Install GPX Explore from the Mac App Store, then double-click the file. You get the track on a map coloured by how steep each stretch is, the elevation profile underneath, and a card with the numbers: distance, moving time, pace or speed, climb and descent. If the file came from a watch it also carries heart rate, cadence, power and temperature, and those chart too.

A GPX file open in GPX Explore on the Mac, with the route card and the heart-rate chart

Press space on a .gpx in Finder and Quick Look draws the track without opening anything. It is free, there is no account, and the file never leaves the Mac.

2. Google Earth or a web map

Google Earth (the desktop app or earth.google.com) imports GPX through File → Import and draws the track in 3D. Sites like gpx.studio and the Strava route builder accept an upload and show the line. Good for a look; you upload the file to do it, and the numbers are thin.

3. A text editor

Any editor opens it, because GPX is XML. Useful for one thing: checking what a file contains when an app refuses it. Look for <trk> (a recorded track), <rte> (a planned route) and <wpt> (waypoints). A file with only <rte> or only <wpt> is valid GPX that some viewers will not open; GPX Explore opens both.

Make one app the default for .gpx files

Right-click any .gpx file, choose Get Info, open Open With, pick the app, and click Change All. From then on every GPX file double-clicks into it. If Xcode is installed it often claims .gpx files (it uses them for location simulation), which is why a fresh download sometimes opens in Xcode.

Try it with a real file

No GPX handy? These are real tracks, free to use: a hike in the Blue Hills, a run with heart rate, a ride along the Brittany coast. Download one, then open it.