Roadbuds
Roadbuds

You already pass a thousand cars a week. Start keeping them.

Roadbuds turns the drive itself into a collection. Pass another driver on a real road and their car unlocks in your CarDex — the commute you were doing anyway, made into something worth paying attention to.

In development · iOS & Android

The loop

Three things happen, in this order.

There is no feed to farm and nothing to post before the game starts. You drive, and the app does the rest in the background.

  1. 01

    Add your car

    Pick your vehicle from a catalogue of more than 1,700 real makes and models. That car is your identity on the road — it is what other drivers unlock when they pass you.

  2. 02

    Drive like you already do

    When you and another Roadbuds driver are on the same stretch of road, the app registers the pass. No pulling over, no phone in your hand, nothing to tap.

  3. 03

    Collect what you passed

    Their car lands in your CarDex and you earn XP for it. Rarer cars are worth more — and a car you have never seen before is worth the most.

Location, handled properly

A driving app that cannot show anyone where you parked.

Roadbuds needs to know you are moving. It does not need to know where you live, and it is built so that it cannot tell anyone. These are behaviours of the product, not promises in a policy.

  • Your position freezes when you stop Location only updates while you are actually driving. Slow down and your last position freezes in place, so the map never resolves to a driveway, an office or a school.
  • The map is off until you turn it on Sharing your position is off by default for every new account. When you do enable it, you choose between all of your friends or a list you pick by hand.
  • Private zones blank you out entirely Draw a circle around anywhere that matters — home, work, a parent's house — and you simply do not appear on the map inside it.
  • Strangers only see you from far away People outside your friends cannot see you unless they are at least 50 miles off, and the wider network at least 200. Distance makes you ambient activity, never someone who can be found.

The CarDex

Every car you have ever passed, in one book.

The CarDex is the record of your driving. It fills in slowly and only from real roads — there is no way to buy an entry and no way to unlock one from your couch. A Miata on the school run and a Countach at a meet are the same kind of discovery; they are just worth very different amounts.

Cars are graded by how hard they are to come across, and the app keeps a running tally of your streaks, your medals and the drivers you keep crossing paths with.