The best motovlog camera app for iPhone (free, with live GPS speed)

Your iPhone is already a real motovlog rig

Most riders assume a motovlog needs a dedicated action cam clamped to the helmet and a second camera for the face cam, then an evening of syncing the two in an editor. The iPhone in your jacket pocket can do the whole job in one take. It has two cameras, a GPS chip, and a stabilization stack good enough for the road. What the job needs is an app that drives both cameras at once and bakes your speed into the frame.

That is the gap SplitRig fills. It records the front and rear cameras simultaneously into a single synced video file, overlays your live GPS speed, and gives you triggers you can hit with gloves on and AirPods you can press under a helmet. It is free, runs entirely on-device, and works on every iPhone from iPhone 11 on. If you want the broader walkthrough first, here is how to record both cameras on iPhone.

The motovlog dual-cam shot: your face and the road in one file

The signature motovlog frame is your reaction over the road ahead. SplitRig builds that exact shot natively. Point the rear camera forward over the bars, and put yourself in the front camera. Two layouts carry most motovlog content:

• Picture in Picture. The road fills the frame and your face sits in a movable, resizable bubble in a corner. Drag it once to clear your mirrors or the tank, and it stays put. This is the classic motovlog look.
• Split Screen. Face and road share the frame with an adjustable 30 to 70 percent ratio. Use it when your reaction matters as much as what is in front of you.

Both feeds come out of one recording, so the face and the road are composited into one video, ready to post. There is no recording time limit, which matters on a long ride where a freemium app's recording cap would cut you off mid-canyon. There is also Face Mode, which removes your background and places you over the road; with a helmet on, Picture in Picture is the classic motovlog frame.

Action Cam mode for the road footage

The road shot is where motorcycle footage lives or dies, and it is harder than a bicycle's. You are faster, the engine vibrates the chassis, and wind buffets the mount. Switch SplitRig to Action Cam mode and three things change at once:

1. The ultra-wide 0.5x lens engages. A wider field of view takes in more of the road and makes lean angle read on camera.
2. The steadiest stabilization level turns on, on supported iPhones, to smooth out road buzz and pavement chatter.
3. It records at 60 fps. Smoother fast pans past scenery, cleaner slow-motion in the edit, less blur when you whip your head to check a corner.

Outside Action Cam, you choose the back camera's stabilization yourself (Off, Standard, or Stable), and a 16:9 front camera is always stabilized. For a higher-speed, higher-vibration road shot, Action Cam is the mode you want under the Picture in Picture face bubble.

The live speed overlay, baked into the ride

The speedometer is the overlay that makes a motovlog feel like a motovlog. SplitRig reads your speed from the iPhone's built-in GPS and writes it straight into the recording, not added in an editor afterward, but baked into the video at the same instant as the frame. It updates twice a second and shows km/h or mph, following your iPhone's measurement system.

You are not limited to one number. There are eight overlay widgets (seven live metrics plus the SplitRig logo), each draggable, resizable, and remembered per orientation:

• Speedometer. Current speed, the motovlog hero overlay.
• Distance. Total covered, for a ride recap.
• Altitude. Elevation, which earns its place on a mountain pass.
• Duration, Pace, Goal Gauge, Sound Level, and the optional SplitRig Logo, which comes off free in one tap.

GPS runs on-device and works offline, so a backroad with no cell signal still shows your speed. It only needs a view of the sky, which a bike always has. If you mostly care about the speed-overlay workflow itself, the deeper dive is in the iPhone dashcam app with a speed overlay guide.

Controlling it with gloves on and a helmet on

A touchscreen is useless at 80 km/h in textile gloves. SplitRig is built so you never have to touch the glass once you are rolling. Four hardware triggers cover every rider:

• Volume buttons. Volume Down starts and stops recording, Volume Up grabs a screenshot. Physical buttons work straight through gloves.
• Camera Control button (iPhone 16 and later). A full press starts and stops recording. A firm, dedicated button that is easy to find by feel at a stop.
• AirPods stem. On iOS 26 with the H2 chip (AirPods Pro 2, AirPods 4, AirPods Pro 3), a stem press is a wireless shutter. It works with the AirPods tucked under a full-face helmet.
• Apple Watch. Start and stop, switch layout, change zoom, and grab a screenshot, all from your wrist without reaching for a bar-mounted phone.

There is one motorcycle-specific detail worth calling out. By default a single tap stops recording, but when you set your activity to Driving (or Cycling, Skiing, Skating), SplitRig switches to a 0.6-second hold-to-stop that survives motion: handlebar vibration jittering your finger on the stop button will not cancel the action. Lift your finger off to cancel on purpose. On a running engine, that is the difference between cleanly ending a clip and accidentally killing it on a bump. There is also Smart Pause, which lets you pause your recording for a short time when you need to leave the app: come back soon and it goes on by itself in the same file. Stay away longer and SplitRig saves the whole recording.

Mounting the iPhone for motovlogging

SplitRig handles the capture; the mount handles the physics. Two positions work well for the road-plus-face shot:

• Tank or handlebar mount. The most common setup. The rear camera sees the road and your mirrors, the front camera catches your visor. Use a clamp with a vibration-damping interface.
• Helmet chin mount. A true point-of-view road shot. The front camera is less useful here since it faces your chin, so this leans toward a road-only clip in Single Camera mode.

A motorcycle produces sustained, high-frequency vibration, so the mount matters as much as the app. If you ride hard or mount to the bars, pair SplitRig's Action Cam with a high-torque gimbal that has the motor strength for sustained vibration. The trade-offs are laid out in the best gimbal for iPhone dual-camera recording guide.

Audio: clear narration at speed

At motorcycle speeds, wind reaches any phone's built-in mic, so for clear narration record to an external mic: a wireless lavalier under your jacket collar, with its receiver plugged into your iPhone. SplitRig records it into the same file as your video, at 48 kHz. The full rundown is in the best microphones for iPhone dual-camera recording guide.

Battery and settings on long rides

A long ride is a long recording, and SplitRig is built for it: a smart recording engine, tuned with Apple's native camera features, gives you pro-grade performance, and your video is saved as you record. Two habits stretch a ride further:

• Pick the Long Recording preset in Camera Settings. It is built for long shoots.
• Enable Eco Mode, which dims the screen ten seconds into recording. You are watching the road, not the phone. Tap to wake it anytime; the recording carries on.

Most riders run a USB power lead to a bar-mounted phone anyway, and the iPhone records happily while charging.

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