Description: My Cars is an Android application that’s built for those that either need to keep an eye on how much money their car – or multiple cars – are costing them as well as those that want to stick to a budget. My Cars is first and foremost a mileage tracker and expense calculator, but it does a lot more than just deal with how much fuel you put in for a trip. It can help you track services and their costs as well as repairs for each of your multiple vehicles stored in the app. For business users, this app will help save you headaches when you need to hand in a mileage report or declare your service costs and for those looking to save some money or reign in how much money their car is costing them, My Cars can be a real help.
How it Works: My Cars is a simple download from the Play Store, but getting everything set up can seem daunting at first. If this is your first time using something like this, then the below first few steps will help. If you have existing data and wish to port it from Excel or something similar, you can contact the developer for help. One of the first things you should do is to take a look at the menu on the left-hand side of the display.
Here, you’ll want to head into the Vehicles section and set up a profile of sorts your car. You can add more than one car, like a company vehicle as well as your personal car and you can input such data like the initial cost of the car and more.
Once you have your car set up, you can simply add a new trip using the gas handle icon. Here, you’ll be required to input what type of fuel it is, to choose the currency, the amount of fuel and how long your trip was. There’s lots of different fuel sub-types included in the app so it’s a safe bet that it’ll have the info you need.
Everything is really comprehensive here, and it’s up to you to fill in the data properly, otherwise you won’t get the same sort of results that you can when using an app like My Cars. It’s not just about Fuel though, as you can also add service data for your vehicles into My Cars, too. When inputting this info, you can choose from an array of different service types and bill types too, with some very granular options on hand.
The whole point of My Cars is to really stick with it, and if you don’t, then you sort of miss the overall point to the app. Once you get started, it might seem laborious, but after a month or two of logging your fuel, you’ll start to feel the benefit, and after a few thousand you’ll love how easy your mileage reports have gotten. You can easily export this data as well, making it even easier to create a report for your employer or your tax return.
All the information you store using MyCars is automatically saved to the SD card on your device and if you buy the Pro version of the app – either with the key from the Play Store or through an in-app purchase – you can back this data up to the cloud. The pro version is also great for international travelers as it features multiple currencies to manage.
Opinion: I don’t do a lot of driving, working from home will have that affect, but if you’re the type of person that spends oodles of time on the highways going to work or traveling to meetings and such, then you’ll no doubt need to file a mileage report on a yearly, and perhaps even a monthly basis. If that’s the case, the My Cars will be a real godsend, by putting in your data before you’ve even set off from the gas station, you can keep on top of your records and make sure that everything is in order for your next report. The ability to manage data for more than one vehicle is good as well, as it could help delivery drivers in a professional capacity and keep their cars in check at home, too.
Ratings
- Speed (4/5) – There wasn’t a time had to really wait for My Cars to load or anything like that, but filling in all that data can be time consuming at first.
- Features (5/5) – If you need to keep on top of your fuel and your mileage, for whatever reason, then My Cars is the Android app that you want by your side. It has pretty much everything you could want, and a little extra thrown in for good measure.
- Theme (4/5) – The UI has slowly gotten better over time, and it looks good, even if it does just channel the basic Android interface.
- Overall (5/5) – An excellent application that can save you headaches and a lot of time when filing reports or wondering why your car is costing you so much. My Cars is an app that you’ll definitely want to stick with.
Pros
- Great for business use as well as home use, making it easy to keep track of both your mileage and your fuel costs.
- Takes into account things like A/C, driving style and more to calculate costs.
- Has support for multiple vehicles as well as service reminders.
- Will keep on proving its worth over time as you log more and more trips using the fairly straightforward forms.
Cons
- UI is functional, but it can feel a little drab.
- An interactive introduction on why people should keep on using the app would be a nice feature to see.
Conclusion: No doubt about it, My Cars is the app that you should definitely keep installed if you’re interested in keeping an eye on your fuel usage. It might not be the best-looking app out there, but it’s got so much on offer that it’s hard to pass it up. The best thing about My Cars is that it leaves things up to you, there’s a lots of stuff going on here, but if you don’t put in the effort then you won’t see the benefit. After a month or so of use, My Cars will start to make sense and as it becomes a part of your routine you’ll wonder how you ever filed a report of your mileage without it.