They seem pretty determined not to fix the minimap or elevation graph, which is a shame as both are pretty disappointing in their current form.
See also Make the course gradient graph much more visible (only 500+ votes)⊠I suppose most of us have resigned to it being what it is, but at least for me, after the summer mostly off the platform, it was one of many things in the UI that I noticed as âoh yeah, still not fixedâ.
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Thatâs not quite right. Sometimes Zwift is right to left, sometimes itâs left to right.
As youâre riding around, whether sticking to a preset route or manually navigating, it will change. A LOT.
I think that Zwift has specific profiles assigned to each section of road, regardless of what route youâre doing or what direction youâre going. Often in intersections, itâll change to a very short, flat âprofileâ that your marker just zips thru. And if youâre doing a route like Roule Ma Poule in France, that starts at the base of Ventoux before turning away, it shows the full Ventoux profile, not the mostly flat route youâre doing, then changes when you descend away from that climb.
Yes, the profile points a certain way regardless of which way you are riding, there is a tiny arrow in the position marker indicating which way you are heading. And indeed the graph only matches your route up to the next intersection, after that it can be whatever. Really so bad that I canât even.
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Well - as Iâm new I have not experienced that it can go either right to left - or left to right. Itâs almost like a UI / UX prank to confuse users on the 1st of April 
And it gets amazingly little screen spaceâŠ
To be constructive I attached a real life view of what we users see of Zwift. Yes, itâs very hard to find and see that minescule height profile in the very bottom of the map. And understanding that the tiny orange dot in the right part of that mini profile is actually you? And that there is a small arrow to show that you are moving left?
I marked some places with green on the image where I think that the slope data would work. How about having a zoomed in colour coded graph for the next 500 meters right below the Watt meter in the top left corner? Move the big screen estate box with âLondon Loopâ in the top a bit down. And have the current slope very clear and large next to that graph. Not some small -2 in the map in the corner please. As we have a hard time feeling and seeing the slope in our garages and gyms, what we look at is the current Watt, the slope and what to expect the next few minutes. And how far we have left on the whole course naturally. Look at the image from my pain cave⊠Is that street going up or down? You sure would be able to say that without thinking IRL. And naturally itâs fun to see the social parts as well - but they get 80% of the screen space now.
And then add a profile of the whole route to the center of the screen - either top or bottom, and give it space. Make it like the 2D ones from Veloviewer. And always left to right please.
Just my thoughts, there are many ways to do it. But I think that many would appreciate the option to get this data more visible if we want it that way. We will continue to search for unicorns and give thumbs up anyway 
And why does sites like Veloviewer exist? Because many of us love graphs and detailed metrics. With Veloviewer we get them before or after a ride. Now we sit with a big screen in front of us in real time. We have the possibility to show it while riding. That would not be possible on a small bike computer screen or Garmin Fenix⊠Especially not as we also want to make sure to stay on the road
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Yeah, itâs not rocket surgery, even my IRL head unit can do better on a random piece of road (provided the OSM altitude data is correct which is a big if).
One easy UI solution would be making the G key (and the graph icons) cycle through three states (nothing and power/HR graph as now plus the RGT/FulGaz-style incline graph) instead of the current two.
I learned this while doing my first route with the Epic KOM climb with the surprise that follows the finish banner⊠I wonât spoil it but if you know, you know⊠
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hahaha
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The most baffling thing (to me at least) is that there is no mention whatsoever of gradient on the companion app! nowhere, not even current gradient.
They could easily add an elevation page to it, have the zoomed in view at the top and the wider view underneath.
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In my opinion this the most critical issue with the current solution. Always left to right would solve a lot, and it also should be relatively trivial to implement. I think there are many good proposals in the current âmore visibleâ thread (not allowed to link to: make-the-course-gradient-graph-much-more-visible/13507), but a total refurbishing of the UI is not likely to be rolled out in the near future. For starters, several topics there are debatable/ a matter of taste. This proposal canât be controversial. And should it be it can always be supplemented with something ala adding a user configurable setting for it (l->r or r->l or as is)
I see there is another thread discussing a larger direction marker (not allowed to link to: /arrow-to-show-direction-across-topo-map/15928). Fine, but what is the value of alternating directions in the first place?
I am not sure about forum policies, overlapping topics/ threads, (how to link to other posts/ threads,) or if and how suggestions here actually find a way over to the Zwift development roadmap. Given the near anti-pattern UI solution today and assuming it should be low-hanging fruit on the development side, do you think it could be worthwhile raising âAlways left to rightâ as a standalone votable proposal?
Too late, I guess. Sorry!
Just found at least three posts dating back to January '22 on the L->R topic embedded in the main thread (âMake the course gradient graph much more visibleâ). Except for the user configuration point, those posts fully cover what I intended to raise.
Although I canât retrieve where, I also mean to have seen that the umbrella topic - or a âsiblingâ topic - is on a list of feature requests that Zwift currently is working on.
Therefore, probably no point in raising this as a standalone feature (or change) request now. Maybe revisit if and when they get it wrong.
For what itâs worth, it was only the latest Makuri extension that made me notice that sometimes the direction even changes at particular intersections while staying on the same route. Of course this makes âsenseâ (using the term very looselyâŠ) the way it is designed now â that every stretch of road has a canonical direction for which way is left-to-right and vice versa â but it was still a bit of a surprise, Iâm not sure if it is a feature of these particular routes or if I just havenât been paying that much attention (no wonder considering the graphâs general uselessness, of course).
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Canonical directions may have made sense in the early days. Nowadays I think there are far too many stretch permutations for that to work.
The cognitive load for understanding the elevation profile should be close to zero. The direction flipping raises it. As it is, I sometimes need to watch the graph/ plot for a while to figure out what is going on, direction vise. Not much of a load, perhaps, but in races ⊠
Still, and as mentioned, it might be an option to have this as a user preference toggle, e.g. "L->R | âR->Lâ | âcanonical/ dynamicâ.
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I stand by my earlier statement:
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Yes, itâs an absolute nonsense! -it took me reaching level 50 to develop an intuitive reading of the graph! LOL
Note: thatâs the problem when you got developers writing code about something they know nothing about it⊠a cyclist would never put such a thing!
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⊠and nobody has mentioned here that there are times for me where the whole profile graph disappears below the bottom of the mini-map and I cant see it at all
Does it really disappear though? In some areas (e.g. the NYC transverse roads = the shortcuts on ground level) it changes to cover only a short section of almost flat road which stretches out the little there is over such a distance that it means there isnât much to see but itâs still thereâŠ
What would be nice would be the ability to toggle what you see in that upper right hand corner, so have one toggle for as it is now, one map only or one profile elevation only.
Most of the time you donât actually need the map (or i donât) as the map is open in the companion app
I find it annoying too as if you select a route to ride how hard is it to show that on the mini map rather than random roads you donât use. Especially in a race or big ride where I hold onto a feather for ages expecting a large hill then the map goes dead flat
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It would be awesome if the empty space at the bottom could be used for the route elevation/position profile as youâve described. The current map in the top right is hard to see and hard to interpret.