OneBusAway Reviews

OneBusAway does sensible, useful things, and has a vastly better interface the other transit apps I've seen. It has a developer that apparently cares about making it better, which is practically unheard of. It even has good iPad functionality, and takes advantage of the larger format! I'm from San Diego; when I visited LA recently, I sorely missed OneBusAway. Trust me, the alternatives are all much worse. Sure, it's sometimes a little off on the timing estimates between stops. It doesn't handle layovers well, assuming the bus will leave early because it's present before the time it's scheduled to leave. And when a bus stops at the same stop when going in two different directions, I wish it would separate them out into different listings. But if you want to find, with reasonable accuracy, when a bus will be somewhere, and even filter by routes or bookmark frequently used stops, this is a solid and functional app, and if your local transit company makes use of it, believe me, it's way better than anything they would've come out with themselves. I use it often and am frequently pleased at how not-impossible it is to use, which is high praise for an app of this nature. I rarely encounter bugs, and updates actually bring useful improvements. It's a rare thing: a free app I'd actually be willing to pay for.

The new UI gives a lot less information than the old one.

*Buses arriving at a stop take up more space on the screen, so you have to scroll to see more than a couple minutes at busier stops.

*App no longer displays a lot of useful information, such as how long ago a bus checked in at the location it is showing. A bus four stops away two minutes ago is very different than a bus four stops away right now. It also doesn’t show the maps for through routes. My bus turns into a different route a couple stops from my house, and I used to be able to scroll down to that link (“continues as…”) to see the map, but the maps are no longer available. Now I have to back out to the home page and search for the route to bring it up.

*Data doesn’t reliably refresh. In the old UI, the data for what buses are arriving at a stop, where a bus is on its route, etc, would automatically refresh so if you looked at it after a couple of minutes, it would pull a new location or new predicted times. On the new version, you have to manually refresh on those pages that even have a refresh option. On a lot of pages, you have to exit out of the page and reenter it in order to get new data.

I used to love OneBusAway to death and it saved me a lot of time and stress when I first started tracking my buses with it. However, with this latest update, I’ve found that all the buses I’ve taken tend to be running multiple minutes earlier or later than what OneBusAway says. The algorithm has gotten altogether inaccurate over the last year or so. This wouldn’t be as frustrating to me, except that with the latest update the dev team removed the in-app reporting system for issues with bus arrival. I don’t know about you, but I neither want to write an email every time I ride a bus because it was ten or more minutes off OBA’s schedule, nor do I want to continue using an app that’s inaccurate where there’s nothing being done to fix it. Sad to say I’ll be moving to a different transit app.

The update actually improved a lot about OneBusAway and I’m glad about that. Most of my issues now stem from king country transit themselves and there constant effort to always arrive late. One thing I miss is the live bus tracker. Is the old version it was a little buggy but it did help to see how long you actually have to get the bus and where the driver is, writing this as I’m currently waiting for a late bus without having any clue where they’re at tithed than a constantly changing arrival number that seems to be tied to nothing and jumps from 10 mins to 2 and back. Just bring back the live bus tracker on the map thank you.

OneBusAway is harder to use over the years with voiceover. The nearby stops is harder to find than it used to be. We can’t just hit a button as we used to. And furthermore we are cluttered with service alerts that don’t interest you when you’re not traveling in that city. As this system is mainly to give you the stops you need, there’s no reason to worry about the Seattle tunnel on the bus route 28 in Tacoma. And if I was looking for a trip in Seattle, it would make sense. But there’sIf there’s no tunnel in Tacoma. If I’m going to see that, I would like to have a preference to not see that. But the geo-fence a little farther around your service alert, so we can get those. Or at least let us know how to customize OneBusAway so we don’t get the Seattle alerts for Tacoma.

OneBusAway time predictions are highly inaccurate. I literally mean 95% of the time wrong. You could be 200ft from your bus stop and OneBusAway says that you still have 6 minutes until your bus arrives because it’s “running 7 minutes late” and then you watch that exact same bus drive by 10 seconds later. Incredibly infuriating whenever I choose to trust the “reported” bus times. Always give a 10 minute window to arrive early. It could come 10 minutes earlier than the reported time. It could (extremely occasionally) come at the reported time. Or, it could come 15 minutes later and then you’re left waiting 25 minutes for a bus. You never really know. Usually ~5-10 minutes earlier or later

So I have recently noticed that OneBusAway has not been updated in over a year and that makes it really hard for me to use it, being that OneBusAway I use for my Transit Needs whenever I need to go somewhere! The accurate info and real-time is way off and needs major improvement. You can't even use Trip-Planner in OneBusAway like you used to be able to do without it bugging out and giving you the error message of ”sorry about that but we can't use this feature as Google has not renewed there certificate license for us to use this, please try again” haha yeah no that's a big-time error because Google doesn't own this app! Get real and update OneBusAway!

Often my bus line is not tracked accurately.
In my living room it stated the bus was on time 10 minutes away
When I got to the stop it said on time and 23 minutes away but showed up 3 minutes later.
If a bus is truly 23 minutes away I would choose to walk the 15 minutes it takes me to wait for the second bus I need to take. When decisions are made based on inaccurate information it can be frustrating to watch a bus drive by you didn’t expect to be coming on time. However it’s the only app available and still better than nothing.

I love OneBusAway a ton, helps me figure out "when" to catch my bus, where to find my bus, etc. But there is one major problem: OneBusAway will say the bus is 4 minutes away when it really arrives in 15 minutes. If there was a way for me to see where exactly my bus is located, I would appreciate that. The Uber app let's you see where exactly your driver is on the map, and it is pretty accurate. I am sick and tired if waiting for way longer than I should be! I hope to see this problem being fixed in the future to better my experience with this app, Thank you.

I used to love OneBusAway because it was the only transit app I could rely on to consistently provide accurate information about when a bus was coming (even if the bus was late or early). Now, not so much. OneBusAway will tell me a bus is coming, came and went, all while I was waiting at the bus stop and saw no bus. I hope they continue working on OneBusAway to maintain the standard they initially set.

Thank you for providing this free app. I take 3 buses on 3 bus systems each way to/from work (Pierce, ST, Metro). OneBusAway helps me get to my stops on time and figure out which buses to catch according to if and how late the buses are running during the evening commute. Every person I meet at the bus stops use OneBusAway and if they don’t we tell them about it! The only bus that is not accurate at times is Sound Transit Express 574, but I can live with that. Thank you; you make public transit manageable :)

Its not often I go out of my way to leave a review but OneBusAway warrants it. As a relatively new public transit commuter, its easy to get confused about which bus and when and all that. “Am i late? Did i miss my bus or is it just running late?” Etc. OneBusAway takes away the guesswork and allows you to feel confident while commuting on the public transit. Thank you to the developers for making this intuitive, incredibly helpful app for us commuters.

Before updating OneBusAway , it used to show the stops that I was searching for. But now after updating to the latest version, whenever I searched up some stops, they would not show up. It seems like OneBusAway shows some of the bus stops but not all of them like it only shows the F or A line but when I search up the D line, it doesn’t show up at all. Also sometimes, the time for the bus stops are inaccurate. Please fix it!!! Thanks!!

this app is the best bus app, hands down! It’s so easy to use because all the functionalities are intuitive and user-friendly. I use OneBusAway multiple times a day and very rarely have issues. On the off chance that I do have an issue, their customer service is super speedy to respond and will fix the issue ASAP. OneBusAway is a must-have on any smartphone! Now, I’m off to catch my bus…thanks to OneBusAway!! *wink*

OneBusAway is pretty reliable overall, but it needs a way to track busses that are truly missed. For instance, this morning there were two bus routes that are about 1/4 mile apart leaving at about the same time to where I needed to go. I decided to wait for the closer one, but it never showed so I was stuck waiting another 30 min before either were scheduled again.

easy to use, intuitive. just remember that the location and times come from the transit company. OneBusAway merely displays them, albeit in a useful way. don't blame OneBusAway if they are wrong. at least OneBusAway tells you if the times are from real time data or from the schedule (if no real time data is available.
btw i am a Seattle Metro user. how well OneBusAway works might vary from place to place,

OneBusAway will let me know if a bus is coming late or early, but it will let me know at the last minute. I have a life. I have to go to school. I stay in my house in the mornings until 4 minutes before the bus comes because it’s cold. But then it will switch at the last minute and all of a sudden says it’s coming “NOW”. I don’t have that much time to get to the bus at that point, and in turn will miss it and have to wait another 30 minutes for the next bus, by which point my class will be over. Get your app together. These are people’s lives you're dealing with. I have an education to attend to. GET. YOUR. APP. TOGETHER.

My bus shows up at a different time every day, that’s why I got OneBusAway to help me out. Unfortunately, probably due to the pandemic + etc, there are buses that don’t exist that come and go at my stop. I’d like to be able to correct or note when these things happen so others aren’t as confused as I am. Especially when my route is supposed to show up 3 different times according to OneBusAway and I see nothing?? Lots of little issues but still better than nothing.

It was working fine on my old phone but on my newer phone the alarm will not work. I try setting an alarm but all I get is an infinite loading screen. I have no problem with OneBusAway and hate to give it a bad review but I can’t rely on a timer outside OneBusAway because the bus could randomly be early and I need the alarm that alerts 5 minutes away no matter what so I can be alerted in case I’m distracted. It’s really irritating not being able to use this feature, until it’s fixed.. two star.

I love using the One Bus away app a lot the only issue I’m having is the route reminder that alerts me 5 to 15 minutes before the bus comes and it doesn’t alert me that’s the only minor thing that needs to get fixed, other than that it’s a great App to use. I’ve been using the One Bus Away App for over 7yrs that’s how much I enjoy it.

I've been using this for daily bus commuting for about a month, and it's been super useful. I find it most effective to bookmark specific stops and routes, then check/refresh these to see my best options. Never had an issue with inaccurate times. Using the GPS to locate nearby stops/routes is also handy when I'm trying to seek different options.

I’m an international student living in Seattle and this is one of those must have apps if you are using the city transit system while being in the city. It helps me to get ready for classes and and when to wait for which buses right after classes as well. I would like to see Siri shortcut integration as it’s competitors are doing so. This would be a nice feature to have.

I love this app! It gives excellent, up-to-date *information*. Buses are like any other form of transportation, they gain and lose time in transit.

this app gives recent locations and estimates of bus arrival and departure times, which is just what I need, since using transit requires one to keep flexible, be a little early, and get to your destination.

It isn’t perfect, of course, but it is free. It does the job it was designed to do, and like any tool, does require some savvy to use it to its best potential.

When I have encountered issues, I have had good interactions with the developers. Thank you this app!