Stop seeing challenges in Strava feed

andy69

Hey folks! Would any of you know if it's possible to block/hide challenges from your Strava activity feed?
Especially at this time of year I get pages of 'x joined a running challenge' or 'y joined a so-many-miles in 2021 challenge'.
Not to sound like a grumpy old man, but I've literally zero interest in other people joining some challenge or other, and I would prefer to hide them from my feed altogether.

I'd half understand it if I was using the feebie version but I'm a subsciption payer and I think I should have the choice to block or allow what's in my activity feed.

Anyone managed to hide/block from their feed?

uphillonly

I'm with you there. Today I had 14 'fascinating' Challenge announcements & 2 actual rides in my feed's first 16 items....

I've just submitted a request through the website:
https://support.strava.com/hc/en-us/requests/new

I don't think it's unreasonable that paying subcribers should be able to filter them out so it doesn't clutter up the feed. Commutes would be another one but then I'm probably straying into Grumpy old man territory there.

andy69

uphillonly wrote: »

I'm with you there. Today I had 14 'fascinating' Challenge announcements & 2 actual rides in my feed's first 16 items....

I've just submitted a request through the website:
https://support.strava.com/hc/en-us/requests/new

I don't think it's unreasonable that paying subcribers should be able to filter them out so it doesn't clutter up the feed. Commutes would be another one but then I'm probably straying into Grumpy old man territory there.

Good thinking that - if I had the functionality then I'd filter out commutes, and then also people doing Yoga or walking or weight sessions etc.
I think I'll submit a request too - for the Challenges thing, but then also to be able to filter our Activity Feeds to only include activities that would interest me (e.g. not people walking their dogs)

bingobars

I’m not the only one with this wish. I have no issue with paying for a Strava subscription but am somewhat disgusted that even with that I have to see Strava littered with these ‘advert’ challenges.

bingobars

uphillonly wrote: »

Commutes would be another one but then I'm probably straying into Grumpy old man territory there.

Somewhat fair game here as you’re at the mercy of those you follow not being avid commuters and marking them as such

andy69

just an update: got a response back from Strava support a few mins ago and they said it is not an option to filter out Challenges at the moment (but they take all feedback on board etc etc...)

so unless we start a mini uprising, I think that the powers-that-be in Strava Dev Labs will be patting themselves on the back at how great everyone's Activity Feed looks with all the lovely Sneaky Ads Challenges etc.

py

andy69 wrote: »

just an update: got a response back from Strava support a few mins ago and they said it is not an option to filter out Challenges at the moment (but they take all feedback on board etc etc...)

so unless we start a mini uprising, I think that the powers-that-be in Strava Dev Labs will be patting themselves on the back at how great everyone's Activity Feed looks with all the lovely Sneaky Ads Challenges etc.

Took them years to implement the elevation goals. Considering these "challenges" are a source of income, I don't think they'll be removed from the feed any time soon.

Wishbone Ash

uphillonly wrote: »

... Commutes would be another one but then I'm probably straying into Grumpy old man territory there.

andy69 wrote: »

... and then also people doing Yoga or walking or weight sessions etc.

.... to only include activities that would interest me (e.g. not people walking their dogs)

I presume you have chosen to follow these people? Why not simply 'unfollow' them if you don't wish to see their activities?

If someone chooses to follow me, they are going to see my rides, walks, dog walks etc. If they don't like it, tough, don't follow me.

andy69

py wrote: »

Took them years to implement the elevation goals. Considering these "challenges" are a source of income, I don't think they'll be removed from the feed any time soon.

You're not wrong there

You can mute people as far as I recall should be as simple as them adding the same option to challenges. FWIT if you google it you'll see people asking for this around this time of year as far back as 2016.

There's like some social media rubbish I don't understand as to why they haven't implemented this.

andy69

Wishbone Ash wrote: »

I presume you have chosen to follow these people? Why not simply 'unfollow' them if you don't wish to see their activities?

If someone chooses to follow me, they are going to see my rides, walks, dog walks etc. If they don't like it, tough, don't follow me.

no it's not so much the walks etc., that's just a secondary point* - it's these endless Challenges that fill up the Activity Feed.


*and even that could be 'solved' handy enough by allowing people to select to view only 'cycling' or 'yoga' or whatever in their Feed, or allow everything in their Feed if they wished

Wishbone Ash

andy69 wrote: »

no it's not so much the walks etc., that's just a secondary point* - it's these endless Challenges that fill up the Activity Feed.


*and even that could be 'solved' handy enough by allowing people to select to view only 'cycling' or 'yoga' or whatever in their Feed, or allow everything in their Feed if they wished

To me that would be like contacting the owner of a newspaper, and saying that, as you have paid for the newspaper, you should be able to choose the advertisements which appear in it. If Strava did what you are requesting, there probably wouldn't be a Strava.

De Bhál

andy69 wrote: »

Hey folks! Would any of you know if it's possible to block/hide challenges from your Strava activity feed?
Especially at this time of year I get pages of 'x joined a running challenge' or 'y joined a so-many-miles in 2021 challenge'.
Not to sound like a grumpy old man, but I've literally zero interest in other people joining some challenge or other, and I would prefer to hide them from my feed altogether.

I'd half understand it if I was using the feebie version but I'm a subsciption payer and I think I should have the choice to block or allow what's in my activity feed.

Anyone managed to hide/block from their feed?

This would be great.
I'd even push it out to having the option to block indoor rides.

andy69

De Bhál wrote: »

This would be great.
I'd even push it out to having the option to block indoor rides.

Seems like they generate revenue from it judging by one or two of the replies above. however, with probably well over 50 million members, surely there's enough subscription revenue coming in to maybe only bother* the non-subscription members with all the challenges...sort of like you might see with some Apps that are 'free but with Ads' or 'pay and see no Ads' kinda thing.

*I realise that some folk might like to see who's doing challenges, and that's totally fine... just I'd be happier if we had a setting to choose whether to see them in our feed (so I could disable challenges, and gym sessions or whatever, and only see my friends cycling activities as that's all I happen to be interested in)

nilhg

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/strava-enhancement-suite/egelalffpmicecakegglddmhlbdiemlg?hl=en-GB


It seems this chrome extension will let you hide loads of things including challenge feed entries, good if you usually access Strava through a browser, not so much if you use the app

andy69

nilhg wrote: »

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/strava-enhancement-suite/egelalffpmicecakegglddmhlbdiemlg?hl=en-GB


It seems this chrome extension will let you hide loads of things including challenge feed entries, good if you usually access Strava through a browser, not so much if you use the app

Ahh!! lovely! I'll deploy that extension - I see the necessary functionality is included (with their "Challenge feed entries: Hide challenge-related feed entries" option). Will check if there's one for Brave and Firefox as I use them more but I'd hapily switch to Chrome no bother.

thanks! :cool:

CantGetNoSleep

I've set my Strava activities automatically to private (no one wants to see my commutes or rides to the shops) and when I do a longer ride it takes 20 seconds to change it to public.

Wishbone Ash

CantGetNoSleep wrote: »

I've set my Strava activities automatically to private (no one wants to see my commutes or rides to the shops) and when I do a longer ride it takes 20 seconds to change it to public.

Many cyclists's only rides are commutes. Someone with a daily round trip commute of 50k may be regularly entering the Strava monthly challenges. If they set those commutes to private, they wouldn't be counted in the challenge.

Cee-Jay-Cee

I ‘unfollowed’ a mate of mine as he spent more time joining challenges than doing anything else. He rides maybe 1000-1500km a year yet enters 1000km a month and 10,000m climbed a month type challenges and obviously never succeeds in any.

monkeysnapper

As this seems to be a

"get it off your chest"

I set 2 challenges a year .....

1. 500 km for year run
2. 4000km cycle for year.

And I break them down as weekly targets.

Theres a load if people on my strava the past year putting on tiny work outs , it's as if they are getting up off couch to get the mail and putting it down as a workout and went for walk with Karen b0lloxs

With my commute twice a day plus maybe a run and cycle in same day I'd have 4 or 5 updates in a day ..... Il

I feel it's common sense to hide most of the day to day activities.

ratracer

If you only want to see/ record your own miles/ training, then turn your account to private, and don’t follow anybody...... Job done! You’re welcome .

Thud

Strava has been slow to implement updates where privacy was a genuine concern, they will be glacial to update with ‘nice to have’ requests especially when they are getting paid by sports companies to have their names on these challenges

andy69

That Chrome extension works a treat! I don't get any Challenges in my Activity Feed now - just people's activities which is great :cool:

It also let you filter out notifications of people joining Clubs - actually there's a heap of stuff you can select (would be better if I could filter out people walking to the shops or whatever but that wasn't my primary concern, it was just the endless Challenges stuff that was annoying me).

It works also on Chromium on Linux so I'm happy out .

here's the link from earlier:

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/d...iemlg?hl=en-GB

jimm

Thud wrote: »

Strava has been slow to implement updates where privacy was a genuine concern, they will be glacial to update with ‘nice to have’ requests especially when they are getting paid by sports companies to have their names on these challenges

Agree. It took them years to give users the option of turning off Flybys.

Wishbone Ash

jimm wrote: »

Agree. It took them years to give users the option of turning off Flybys.

As far as I recall there was always an option to turn it off. It took them years to make 'off' the default setting.

nilhg

jimm wrote: »

Agree. It took them years to give users the option of turning off Flybys.

Wishbone Ash wrote: »

As far as I recall there was always an option to turn it off. It took them years to make 'off' the default setting.

And removed one of the best features of Strava while they were at it.

magicbastarder

you can turn back on again?

Wishbone Ash

magicbastarder wrote: »

you can turn back on again?

Yes but 99% don't seem to have done so. If I go out for a 100km ride now, I'd perhaps have one other FlyBy.

magicbastarder

ah yeah, but my point was they didn't *remove* it; it's on the user, not strava, if they don't enable it.

nilhg

magicbastarder wrote: »

ah yeah, but my point was they didn't *remove* it; it's on the user, not strava, if they don't enable it.

True but it's one of those things which people who are concerned about it will turn off, rather than people who are not concerned about it will turn on.

nilhg

nilhg wrote: »

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/strava-enhancement-suite/egelalffpmicecakegglddmhlbdiemlg?hl=en-GB


It seems this chrome extension will let you hide loads of things including challenge feed entries, good if you usually access Strava through a browser, not so much if you use the app

andy69 wrote: »

That Chrome extension works a treat! I don't get any Challenges in my Activity Feed now - just people's activities which is great :cool:

It also let you filter out notifications of people joining Clubs - actually there's a heap of stuff you can select (would be better if I could filter out people walking to the shops or whatever but that wasn't my primary concern, it was just the endless Challenges stuff that was annoying me).

It works also on Chromium on Linux so I'm happy out .

here's the link from earlier:

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/d...iemlg?hl=en-GB

When I posted that extension link earlier, I had forgotten to check whether the Elevate for Strava extension, which I've used for yonks had the required functionality, I should have known it does, so another option, and a very useful addition to the strava experience is here:

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/elevate-for-strava/dhiaggccakkgdfcadnklkbljcgicpckn?hl=en