Leave the house
Train after
Weather
That's all for today
First train is early tomorrow.
Live map
LEGEND
LEGEND
TRAINS
Express
On time (0โ5 min)
Slow (6โ14 min)
Late (15+ min)
No GPS · shown from the timetable
LINES
Track ahead of train
Your route to the station
Rest of the line
AREAS
Trouble expected · trains slowing
Trouble expected · a train stopped
Construction or work area
Roughly where a no-GPS train is
โ
SERVICE ALERT
Upcoming trains
WiMi is not sponsored, affiliated, or operated by Metra.
ยท
Service alerts
Notification
Privacy Policy
How WiMi works
THE CARD
Your trip
Tap either station to change it; swaps them. Save home and work under Commute and WiMi opens the right way round each day.
When to leave
The big time is when to walk out the door, for the way you get there: Drive, Bike or Walk. With location on it counts you down, says Leave now, or moves you to the next train you can still make.
START and STOP
Tap START when you set off. STOP ends the trip on the way there; at the station it clears the trip instead, and asks twice.
Weather
Conditions at the station you are heading to, not the one you are standing in.
THE MAP
Reading it
Tap the map to fill the screen; drag the handle on the panel to resize it. Blue is the track ahead of your train, green is your own way to the station, marks an express. Tap any train to follow it. Tap your own to say you are aboard.
The little map
Top left says WHOLE TRIP until your train is live, then the signal light takes that corner and the map follows the train. Top right is the line health bar until you board, then AHEAD. Tap anything in its corners and a sheet opens on the home screen; SEE ON MAP in the sheet goes to the big map.
Line health
The bar cut into five grades your trip today, from before you leave until you board. Five green: trains have been reaching your stop within about 6 min of the timetable and nothing is in the way. Sections drop as recent trains run later, a train stops or slows on your way (more the sooner your train gets there), Metra posts a notice like a signal problem or weather, or trains are canceled. Two is amber, one is red. Trains stuck on your way, or Metra saying service is halted, drops it straight to one. One very late train dents it but doesnโt sink it. It drops at once and comes back one section at a time. Tap it for why. Your leave-by time is never changed by it. The bar shows on the big map too, and the morning alert says it in words.
The signal and the circles
One light for what is about to affect your train: in the top-left corner of the little map once your train is live, and beside the next stop on any train card you open on the big map, each train with its own reading next to its time status. It says why. Tap it and a sheet opens right there on the home screen; SEE ON MAP takes you to the spot. Dashed circles sit where the trouble is: trains running slow, a train stopped, construction or a closed station. Circles of the same colour that touch are drawn as one, covering the whole area, and tapping it lists everything there, in Metra’s own words where Metra has said something. The light covers the next 5 miles, 2 for a train coming the other way: what reaches you soon or now. Beyond that the map and Track ahead still show it.
Track ahead
On the big map, AHEAD floats at the top, left of your trainโs GPS status. Its bar takes the colour of the worst trouble; work areas and closed stations are listed but never change it. Tap it and the map jumps to the first trouble spot and holds still: PREV and NEXT step through each one with its card open, DONE lets you move the map again. With nothing ahead it shows the list instead. Only what is happening now is listed. The signal and Track ahead are two different things: the signal is what is about to affect you, Track ahead is the rest of your trip.
GETTING ON AND OFF
Board and get off
WiMi usually notices. If not, swipe the train left and tap Join; swipe left again to get off. Stand at a boarding train long enough and a reminder shows the swipe.
Your stops
Once you are aboard, the card shows the stops left to yours in the line’s colour. The pulsing dot is your train and it glides between stops as it goes. A long run folds the middle into a + count that drops as you pass each stop. It runs the same way your train heads on the map.
Arriving
At your stop a goodbye card takes over. Tap it to set up the next trip.
If yours slips away
Later trains are listed under the card, the next 5 first; Show more opens the rest of today, and after that tomorrowโs. Tap one to follow it. EXPRESS beside the heading hides everything that is not an express. Trains that have left go under Departed.
RIDER REPORTS
Report from your train
Once aboard, sits on the card and on the map. Pick what you see: stopped train, signal or track problem, police or medical, traffic, bad weather, something else. Add a note or a photo. Reports always sit on the train’s spot on the line, never on your phone’s; with no GPS from the train yet, the timetable places it (at the station before departure). On the map each report is an icon on its spot. REPORTS at the top of the map lists the ones still ahead of you, nearest first, and empties as you pass them; tap one to go there.
Who sees it
Riders on your line going your way. Signal, police and weather reports reach both directions. The same thing reported near the same spot shows as one pin, with a count on track pins.
A quick check first
Report a stopped train while your phone is doing 40 mph and WiMi asks first. Post anyway sends it.
Clearing one
Tap an icon or pin and answer Still there or Gone. A few Gone answers clear it for everyone at once; your own you can remove any time. Most reports fade on their own within the hour. Settings, BEHAVIOR, Rider reports turns the whole thing off.
READING A TRAIN
A train marked ≈
Metra sometimes sends a train’s position without saying which train it is. When an unnamed unit is on the line, moving the right way, where the timetable says a run should be, WiMi shows it as that run with an ≈ before the number. The moment Metra names it, the mark goes.
The two lines
Departure and train number on top. Underneath: when it gets in and how busy it usually is. These are the timetable’s times and they never change, so you can call a train by its time. How late it is running goes in the middle.
How it’s running
The bubble in the middle of each train. The countdown on the right turns green when the train is at your station, and grey once it has gone.
How busy the train is
How full that train usually runs, from Metra’s counts. Blue means the same level, less certain.
LIGHT
Light. Plenty of seats.
SOME
Some. Seats still open.
BUSY
Busy. Most seats taken.
FULL
Full. Standing room.
SOME
Blue. The same level, less certain.
The meter shows on trains you can still catch. No meter means Metra has not published a count.
ALERTS, SOUNDS AND NOTICES
The ticker
Service alerts for your line run above the card; tap for the whole notice. Every notice Metra has posted stays under Settings, ALERTS, Service alerts.
The bell
belongs to a train. Tap it and that train reaches your lock screen: when to leave and how the line is running, delays, cancels, back on time, pulling in, almost there, GPS live. Green means it is on. Your usual trains arm themselves on the days you ride; a bell you tap by hand is watched today even on an off day. On iPhone, add WiMi to your Home Screen first.
Choose what reaches you
Settings, ALERTS: the chips pick the kinds, DAYS picks the days. Only armed trains send anything.
Chimes
Sounds mark the moment to leave, a delay, back on time, your train pulling in, a canceled run and a red signal ahead. They play over your music without pausing it, stay quiet on silent, and never play for something that happened while WiMi was closed. The speaker beside the gear turns them off.
When WiMi itself has a problem
If a feed or the app breaks, a notice at the top of the card says what it affects and how long outages like it have taken to clear, and your phone gets a notification when it starts and when it is fixed. These are always on.
YOUR DATA
What WiMi saves
Your stations, commute, settings and learned timings stay on this phone. No account. What leaves the phone: an anonymous ping for the rider count while WiMi is open, any report you choose to post, and, while you are boarded and your phone places the train more accurately than Metra, that train's position so other riders can see it (off in Settings). Reset clears it.
Getting better as you ride
WiMi times your own trips to the station and your own rides, and uses them for the next one. A drive ends when you reach the station area, so waiting in the car doesnโt count as driving, and one odd trip doesnโt throw it off. With Pool learning with other riders on (Settings, BEHAVIOR) it also swaps timings with other riders on your line, never a location, and uses theirs as a head start until it has its own.
Reset WiMi
At the bottom of Settings, ABOUT. Clears saved stations, commute, sound choice and saved data. WiMi opens like a first install. Your location permission is kept.
Settings
REPORT FROM #1206
Riders on this line and direction will see it on their map.
WHERE IS MY TRAIN?
TRACK AHEAD
LINE HEALTH
REPORTS AHEAD
SIGNAL KEY
Diagnostics
Choose station
SETTINGS · TRIP
Your commute
HOME STATIONSTap the days for each
YOUR COMMUTE
Set it up once?
Your stations, the days you ride and the trains you usually take. WiMi opens the right way round each day.
WELCOME // WIMI
HOME SCREEN
Add WiMi to your Home Screen
Full screen, its own icon, and on iPhone the only way alerts can reach you.
1Tap Share in the Safari toolbar
2Scroll down, tap Add to Home Screen
3Tap Add. WiMi opens from its own icon
Notifications already work right here in the browser. Installing WiMi also gives you an icon to open it from and a full-screen app with no address bar.
SWITCHING TO
LOADING TRAINS