Mostly because I like gadgets, I'm thinking of getting a separate phone to use on my handlebar to manage lights and accessories that don't connect to my wahoo element, as I don't want to expose my s26 on a handlebar mount?
Just curious if anyone else has a set up like this
No, at least not yet. I am glad that you posted this and happy that I found your post.
A bit of background on me and my hobbies. My wife and I had horses for years, but now we travel in our RV and ride both ATV/UTVs and e-bikes. I bought a Garmin Zumo XT several years ago for ATVing before we owned a UTV. The challenge is finding good trail maps for Garmin. However, after trying a few different things, I have found that the BBBike.com maps work very well for biking.
https://www.bbbike.org
I found recently that the following regional apps are available for download:
Garmin OpenTopoMap (Latin 1)
Garmin Ontrail (Latin 1)
Garmin BBBike (Latin 1) (This is the one I have liked the best.)
Garmin Openfietsmap Lite (Latin 1)
Fast forward to this spring. I got a wild notion that I wanted to try a smart motorcycle screen on my e-bike that works with Android Auto and Apple CarPlay. (I also wanted the ability to use T-Satellite, too.) I found out rather quickly that apps like Google Maps, which have a biking mode and also work with Android Auto and Apple CarPlay will NOT work with the
bike mode running Android Auto or Apple CarPlay. You can use the bike mode on your smartphone, but when you connect to Android Auto or Apple CarPlay, it switches to the Driving Mode.
My next challenge was to find an app that would work with BOTH, meaning in the bike mode on Android Auto or Apple CarPlay. The one that worked the best for me was
https://mapy.com It was still a little quirky because you had to set up your route on the smartphone and then switch back to Android Auto or Apple CarPlay. So, based on my mixed results using a motorcycle screen on my e-bike, I returned it to Amazon. The hardware wasn't that great and the bike maps are "not ready for prime time." Perhaps in the future they will improve.
Which brings me closer to your question. I am now looking for a suitable 1'' ball phone mount smartphone holder. I already have two of these 1" ball mounts on my fat tire bike and one on my skinny tire bike.
One of the key things when using a device outside in the direct sunlight is having a screen that is bright enough to see. The Google Pixel 6 has a manual brightness maximum of about 500 nits, but it automatically reaches a peak brightness of around 800 to 850 nits (High Brightness Mode) when viewing HDR content or under direct sunlight with Adaptive Brightness enabled. A brightness of 1000 NITS seems to be good from what I have read and experienced. I will likely buy the mount listed below next week during Amazon Prime Days 2026 whether it is on sale or not.
Once I receive the mount I plan on trying the Google Pixel 6 on the mount. If it is bright enough, then I should be good to go with it. If it is not bright enough, I will l try my Apple iPhone 15.
Google search/AI Overview
The Apple iPhone 15 features a Super Retina XDR OLED display with the following official brightness specifications:
- Typical Max Brightness: 1,000 nits (for standard indoor/outdoor use)
- HDR Peak Brightness: 1,600 nits (for viewing HDR content)
- Outdoor Peak Brightness: Up to 2,000 nits (for legibility in direct sunlight)
Note: To reach the 2,000-nit outdoor peak, your ambient light sensor must detect bright sunlight, or the Dynamic Island area must be exposed to direct, strong light.
If you do decide to get a separate phone to use on your handlebars to manage lights and accessories that don't connect to my Wahoo Element, you may want to look at how bright it is and if it bright enough to see outside. The two communities that I am seeing that discuss this a lot are drone operators and the motorcycle community. (My fellow UTVers typically go with a tablet and ATVers seem to be using a smartphone with a mount on the handlebars. A small minority of us use Garmins.)
If you want to read reviews of devices that have worked well on motorcycles, you may want to do a Google search or I can share what I have found. Needless to say, use on a motorcycle, particularly adventure motorcycles that go off-road, are going to be rougher on equipment than a bicycle. So, if it works well on a motorcycle, it should work well on a bicycle, too!
On a related note, when the wife and I are navigating in our RV, we are finding that "Two Is One And One Is None." By that I mean we use a Garmin GPS
and Google Maps at the same time. It has saved us more than once. Sometimes Garmin alerts us to something that Google doesn't and vice-versa. We are now leaning that way while ATV/UTVing, too. Sometimes Polaris Ride Command shows a trail that OnX doesn't and vice-versa. While I am not quite ready to suggest two devices for biking, yet, I will probably try two for a while once I get my smartphone holder. I will run the Garmin Zumo XT with BBBike (Open Street Maps) and whichever phone with whichever mapping apps I end up liking the best. Mapy looks very detailed and colorful on my computer screen. I do find that I sometimes need to select a pedestrian route instead of a biking route because the biking route will sometimes favor a street instead of a bike trail. Also, Mapy is "Euro-centric". The street address might populate with the street name and then the numbers. Measurements will need to be Imperial rather than Metric.
