Am I trail ready? Reading the sync icon

Elk country eats cell signal for breakfast. ElkNut is built to keep working without it — but only for the content that actually made it onto your phone before you left. The cloud icon beside your name, at the top of every screen, tells you where you stand at a glance.

Tap it any time to jump straight to Offline Content.

The four states

Green cloud with a check — trail ready

The full content catalog is saved on your phone. Calls, sequences, and tactics will all browse normally with no signal, and anything you downloaded will play.

This is where you want to be before you leave the trailhead.

Amber cloud — partly ready

Only the content you happened to open while you had signal is saved. You can still get back to those pages offline, but anything you never opened won’t be there.

To fix it, tap the icon and use Download data & images on the Full Catalog tab.

Grey cloud with a line through it — nothing saved yet

Nothing has been saved for offline use. Browsing without signal won’t work yet.

Nothing is broken here — it just means you’re new, or you’ve cleared your offline data. Tap the icon and download the catalog.

Blue cloud with a down arrow — syncing now

ElkNut is downloading in the background. The icon pulses while it works and settles on green when it’s done. You don’t have to wait on this screen; it keeps going while you use the app.

When you lose signal

Once you’re out of service, a struck-through signal bars icon appears to the left of the cloud. That’s expected in the backcountry, not an error.

The important part is the cloud beside it — it keeps its colour, so you can still tell at a glance whether your content is there. Struck-through bars plus a green cloud is exactly what a good morning looks like: no signal, everything saved.

Two different things get saved

This trips up almost everyone, so it’s worth being clear:

• The catalog — the content database plus artwork. Small (well under the size of one video). This is what makes the Calls, Sequences, and Tactics tabs browse with no signal.
• The media — the actual video and audio files. Large. This is what plays.

You need both. A green icon with no media downloaded means you can browse the library offline but the videos won’t play. Media downloaded with no catalog means the files are on your phone but you can’t navigate to them — which is exactly the problem this update fixed.

Getting trail ready before a hunt

Do this at home on Wi-Fi, the night before. Open Account → Offline Content (or just tap the cloud icon at the top of any screen).

At the top you’ll see whether you’re ready. If something’s missing, there’s a Make trail ready button that fetches it in one tap — that’s the shortcut if you don’t want to think about the rest of this page.

1. Download the catalog (data and images)

Tap the Full catalog tile to expand it, then:

• Download data and images — first time. Saves the content database and mirrors every thumbnail so the library looks right offline.
• Re-sync data and images — you’ve done it before and want the latest content and artwork.
• Update data only — refreshes just the database, skipping the image download. Quicker, and useful on a weak connection.

The panel shows what’s saved, for example “512 items · 480 images”, along with when it last synced.

ElkNut also keeps this database quietly up to date in the background, so it usually stays current on its own. The buttons are there for when you want to force it, or when you want the images too.

2. Download the calls (audio)

Tap the Calls tile to open the picker, select the calls you want, and download. These are small — most people take everything.

3. Download the videos

Tap the Videos tile and pick what you want. These are the big files, so choose the sequences and tactics you actually plan to study rather than the whole library, and do it on Wi-Fi.

You can also save any individual video from its own page using the save button under the player.

4. Favorites shortcut

The Favorites tile shows how many of your favourited items aren’t saved yet, and downloads the missing ones in one tap. If you favourite as you browse, this is the fastest way to get exactly what you care about.

5. Check your storage

Storage on this device breaks down how much space your calls, videos, and practice recordings are using, so you can see what’s worth keeping. Swipe any saved item to remove it.

6. Test it

Turn on Airplane Mode, open the Calls tab, and play something you saved. Ten seconds, and it’s the only way to be certain before you’re standing on a mountain.

Dark mode

The same colours are used in dark mode, brightened so they stay readable on a dark screen — useful when you’re checking your phone before first light.

Frequently asked

The icon is green but a video won’t play offline. The catalog being saved isn’t the same as the video files being saved. Green means you can browse offline; each video or audio file still needs its own download. Open the call and use its save button, or download in bulk from Offline Content.

Does ElkNut download things on its own? It keeps the small browsing catalog up to date in the background so your saved content stays reachable. Video and audio files are never downloaded automatically — those are always your choice.

I cleared my offline data and the icon went grey. That’s correct, and it will stay that way until you download again. Clearing is respected — ElkNut won’t quietly re-download the catalog behind your back.

Do I need PRO for this? Downloading the full catalog and bulk media downloads are PRO features. The icon itself, and offline access to whatever you’ve already saved, work for everyone.

Still stuck?

If the icon says you’re ready but content isn’t there in the field, contact support with your ElkNut version (Account → Settings, at the bottom) and roughly what you downloaded — that’s usually enough for us to pin it down.