How to ride with friends?

I’ve tried to follow the instructions to ride with other members in my cycling club, and we follow each other, get pop-up notifications saying that they’re starting rides, but there’s no way to ride with them and no way to see what course they’re on, or see them riding on zwift like it shows in the instructions where it says your friends, (riders you’re following), will be listed on top when they’re cycling.

Just in my trial period now and considering signing up for membership, but not if I can’t ride with other members in our cycling team. It’s stupid… This should be a no brainier obvious feature for a cycling simulation and training program.

The instructions at zwift-dot-com/news/5082-zwift-how-to-joining-a-zwifter-on-a-ride? Don’t work at all and should be removed from the web.

There are a number of ways to ride together, my club have organised group rides on Zwift three times a week, they work very well.

However, I think you’re talking about joining another rider who is already riding, that has also always worked for me, but I haven’t used it for a while. When you are on the screen where you select your route there will be a list of people you follow who are riding in the bottom central box. You simply select which one you want to join and Zwift will take you to wherever they are.

It might not be an option for people on the free trial, might be worth checking that.

Good luck,
Paul.

You create a meet-up through Zwift Companion App, pick a route, send invitation to your friends, and then you all ride together (and Zwift holds all of you in the same group even if you ride at different power).

I do it with a couple of friends every other week.

There may also be options for club-level events, but I am not a member of any club so I do not know…

I just read those instructions, and they are spot-on.

First, make sure you are following your friends. If you are getting the notifications that they are Zwifting, I am guessing you have already done this part.

Second, when you are starting up the game, stop on the world selection screen. On this screen there is a big area in the bottom-middle (just like is shown at the link you referenced) that will show anyone you follow who is presently Zwifting. (You may need to select a different world from the tabs on the top if you don’t see the person you’re looking for.)

Once you find that person, select their name and then click the big ‘Ride With’ button.

Alternatively, as has been mentioned, you can create a Meetup with your friends, for a specific course, start time, and duration/distance, and then all show up and start together.

I hope you’re able to figure it out, because it can be a lot of fun.

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Thanks for the info. One of the club members found the meet up feature somehow clicking around and we will try that to see if it works. There’s several hundred in the club and 189 of us are online, not sure how many zwift, (there’s no club designation by the names unless you think to edit your profile with team info in your name)… Dumb.

The riding with others definitely is not working unfortunately. I’ve read in other forum posts that’s been broken for awhile. The riders that are on Zwift cycling and are you’re connected to / following, don’t appear in the list, not at the top like the instructions read and nowhere that I’ve seen scrolling through 100’s of riders in the 3 various worlds.

Also the push notifications that says someone you’re following is riding are useless, since the riders don’t actually appear in the list on Zwift, (especially not at the top), and although the push notification and their activity shows that they’re zwifting, it doesn’t say where at, which seems like an obvious thing to include. If the push notification or their activity at least showed what world they were in, we could go into that world and ride around until we found them, or group together on the side of the road and wait for others to spot us.

We’re trialing Rouvy too. They have a group riding feature and it’s a more realistic cycling environment with better feedback to the trainer and it shows the elevation and the trainer respond to it which is awesome. Unfortunately, they too make it nearly impossible to find out how to do a group ride so it’s not been tried. Not a very intuitive GUI either, but overall seems like it might be geared, (no pun intended), for cyclists who are looking for a more realistic simulation and resistance / feedback Vs the gaming style look and feel of Zwift.

In regards the your followed riders not appearing at the top of the “riding now” list (on the world/route selection screen). It looks like zwift pushed out a change in the last week or so that has bumped anyone with a “pro” tag to the top of the list. If you scroll past them your followed/favourite riders should be next in line (bit of an odd UI choice there in my opinion, I’d prefer it the other way around with friends/fabs on top).

If you fire open the companion app, you can select “X zwifting now” and then “zwifters I follow”, one that loads (after a rather long pause on the “no one you follow if zwifting now” screen) the each person you follow will be grouped by their current world. As far as I know the main app has no easy way of showing this information.

You seem very angry about something that you don’t know how to use. Chill a little and just get used to the software. Setting up group rides is very easy.

I figured out what the problem was. The people you follow have to also follow you, otherwise the connection isn’t there. I don’t recall seeing that in any instructions. I guess it’s like Facebook or linked in where you can request a friend, but nothing happens unless they friend you back. That being said, now that I can see them and select to ride with them it’s a pain though, because you have like 2 seconds to go from zero to catch their wheel and if you don’t there’s no way to see where they’re at. The name will roll into off the screen and there’s no way to tell who’s who on the map. Seems like common sense stuff that would be considered, but I’m not a programmer just a user.

Give them a call and ask them to stop for you…

There’s nothing to stop you spinning up before you select their name.