When the mobile app Charity Miles (free) first became available, some people wondered, "Is Charity Miles a scam?" The app, available for iOS and Android, donates money to a charitable cause on your behalf for every mile that you run, walk, or ride your bicycle. You don't have to solicit donations at all. You just launch the app, pick a charity from a list, and hit the pavement. It sounds too good to be true.

Luckily, Charity Miles is legit, and I'll explain how it works in a moment. Charity Miles makes earning money for a cause a simple and rewarding experience. The app could stand a few improvements that would make it easier to understand, but overall it's a wonderful fitness app that's well worth using.

How Charity Miles Works

When Charity Miles first launched, its developers created an initial pool of $1 million to donate to charities as people used the app. Once that pool of money ran out (and it has), the developers said they would find corporate sponsors to continue making donations on the user's behalf (and they have).

Running and walking earns 25 cents per mile, while bicycling earns 10 cents per mile. As the end-user, you don't have to do anything at all to make sure that money reaches your charity. Charity Miles handles that part.

When you launch the app, you have a few options for creating an account. You can enter your name and email address, or you can authenticate via Facebook. You also have the option to choose Quick Start and get going without telling the app anything about yourself at all. The app does require Location Services to be enabled to work, however, so it does need to collect data about where you are.

Before you start running, walking, or bicycling, you select a charity from a list. These charities include the World Wildlife Foundation, Alzheimer's Association, Wounded Warrior Project, Stand Up to Cancer, and many others. You can choose a different charity each time you log more miles, or you can stick with just one. It's entirely up to you.

When you're ready to go, you select which activity you'll be doing, and a new page loads. Here's where I sometimes felt confused. While standing still, it's hard to tell if the app is recording you yet, or whether you need to press another button, the way you do with most fitness apps. Strava, Endomondo, Map My Run and other activity-tracking apps set up the start screen and then have you press a Go button to start recording.

Charity Miles just starts automatically, but it's difficult to tell. There isn't a big green Play button or any other indicator that it's started. A small red button appears at the top right, but it looks like a pause/finish button (it is just that, but the first few times I saw it, I was confused whether it was also a Go button). When you press that red button to finish, it remains visible and doesn't change color or shape. I just wish the app had clearer indicators of when it was recording your run, and when it was paused or stopped.

As you start to move, you see your speed and total miles add up. Behind these basic stats is a backdrop image that's also an advertisement from the sponsoring organization. For example, you might see Johnson & Johnson written behind your miles and time counter. If you scroll down, you'll see more information from the company. During one of my testing runs, Lifeway, a company that makes the yogurt drink kefir, was the sponsor. When I scrolled down the app brought up more information about its kefir.

When you finish your run, walk, or ride, you press the red button to complete the activity. The app shows you a summary of how far you traveled and how much money you earned for your organization of choice.

One minor problem I had with the app is that it did not record all of my history of activities. In my profile area, I could see how many total miles I had logged over time: 10 miles. But when I looked in the history, all I could see was one run that only equaled a little over 3 miles. The other 7 miles didn't show up in my history. I'm hoping those 7 miles did count! When I recorded them, they seemed to have no problem. I'll be happy if the charities get the money that was promised to them, but I wouldn't use Charity Miles to keep track of my weekly runs.

There are a few other features in the app, such as the ability to join a team or form your own team so that you can collectively raise money for charities with friends.

Doing Good

Raising money for charity by entering marathons takes a lot of time and effort, and not everyone has it. The Charity Miles app lets anyone earn a little bit of money for a charity of their choice, and it can really add up over time. Purpose-wise, Charity Miles is an admirable app, though it could stand some usability improvements.