How to make an elevation profile video of your climb
Updated November 6, 2026 · 4 min read · By Joao Silva
Some efforts are about the route; others are about the climb. When the story of your day is the vertical, an elevation profile video says it better than a map. It builds your ascent frame by frame, every steep ramp and false flat drawn out in order. Here is how to make one from an activity you already recorded.
A real example: 51.1 km and 2,481 m of climbing
The video above is a trail race made in the app as a 3D Elevation Video. The route is drawn on shaded relief, so each climb is easy to read, the photos from the course appear where they were taken, and the distance, time and elevation gain count up as the marker moves. Nothing was edited after the app made it.
When an elevation video beats a route video
Choose an elevation profile video when the climbing is the point: a long mountain pass, a hilly trail run, a hike with serious gain. It strips away the map and shows the one thing you want to brag about, how much you went up. A GPS route video, by contrast, shines on a loop or a route with shape.
If your activity has both a great route and a brutal climb, make both and post whichever fits the platform. Reels and TikTok love the building motion of an elevation video.
| Video | Best when | Tier |
|---|---|---|
| GPS route video | Loops and routes with shape on the map | Free |
| Elevation Video | A single big climb or sustained ascent | Free |
| 3D Elevation Video | A mountain day you want to feel cinematic | Free |
What you need
An activity with elevation data. ActivArt reads activities from Strava, Intervals.icu, Apple Health, and Health Connect, so as long as your watch or phone recorded the climb, the profile is there.
Photos are optional. You can place your activity photos along the profile for context, or render a clean climb with no photos at all.
Step by step
Open the activity in ActivArt and choose Elevation Video. ActivArt lifts your route by its altitude and draws it from start to finish, so every ramp rises as the climb builds.
If you took photos during the activity, they are placed along the profile at the point they were taken, so a shot from the summit lands at the top of the climb, not the bottom.
The output is vertical, framed for Stories, Reels, and TikTok. Preview it, then share. The MP4 stays on your device until you choose to share it.
Go 3D
The 3D Elevation Video puts your climb on the real terrain, drawn like a relief map with height tints and contour lines, and flies the camera along your route while the stats you picked count up at the bottom. For a big mountain day, it is the difference between a graph and a highlight reel.
Tips for a climb worth posting
The steeper and more sustained the climb, the more dramatic the build. A single big col reads better than rolling terrain.
Pair the video with a stats photo from the summit so your feed has both the moment and the effort behind it.
Turn your next climb into a video