Triathlon packing list apps
Four ways people pack for a race, and what actually goes wrong with each.
A triathlon is not one bag, it is several, and they are handed in at different times to different places. That single fact is what breaks a general packing app: it gives you one long list, and a long list cannot tell you that the thing you need at seven in the morning has already been sealed in a bag you handed over the night before.
Splitting kit across the race bags
Taperly
A list per bag, named the way the race names them.
Generic checklist apps
One list, or a list you have to build and name yourself.
Knowing what people forget
Taperly
Built from what athletes told us they forgot, and the counter is public.
Generic checklist apps
Whatever the template author remembered.
Race morning items
Taperly
Kept apart, so they cannot be packed into a bag you already handed in.
Generic checklist apps
Nothing stops you ticking them off the night before.
Working with no signal
Taperly
Everything works offline, at the venue.
Generic checklist apps
Depends on the app.
Reuse for the next race
Taperly
Pick the next race and the week rebuilds around it.
Generic checklist apps
Copy the list and edit it.
The notes app
The most common tool by far, and it is not a bad one. It is free, it is already on the phone, and it survives losing signal. What it does not do is know anything about the race, so every line is one you had to think of yourself, and the things you forget are exactly the things you would not think to write.
The spreadsheet
Popular with people on their third or fourth race, because it accumulates. It is genuinely good at getting better every season. It is bad on a phone at a venue, and it is bad the first time, when there is nothing in it yet.
The printed athlete guide
The organiser's own document is the authority on what the race requires, and nothing here replaces it: if the guide and an app disagree, the guide wins. It is a document to read rather than a list to tick, though, and the part that matters to you is four pages in.
When the other one is the right choice
If you have raced enough times to have a list that already works, keep it. A list you trust and have used before beats a new one, and we would rather you finished your race than tried our app.
Try it without downloading anything
Three of these run in the browser with no account, and the fourth is the race catalogue the app is built on.