goTenna Mesh is the first 100% off-grid, mobile, long-range consumer-ready mesh network. The device pairs with your smartphone to enable communication even when you don’t have service. Absolutely no towers, routers and satellites required! Create people-powered connectivity absolutely anytime, anywhere.

Send text messages and share GPS locations on offline maps with others. Chat privately in 1-to-1 or group conversations, or broadcast to any other goTenna Mesh device up to several miles or kilometers away all without using towers, routers or satellites.

Each tiny-but-mighty device is powered by game-changing networking protocols which intelligently — and privately! — relay messages through other users. You can potentially double or triple any device's effective range and create a network that gets stronger the more people join it!

Whether you're traveling overseas, spending time outdoors, attending a crowded event, or preparing for an emergency, goTenna Mesh is useful in any situation where cell service or wifi is unavailable, unreliable or unaffordable by empowering you to create essential connectivity during any adventure.

Pair wirelessly to your phone

goTenna Mesh pairs seamlessly to smartphones via Bluetooth-LE (Low Energy, 4.2), with minimal smartphone battery usage. (In fact, you can even turn your phone into Airplane Mode to preserve its battery, as goTenna Mesh will still work. Just remember to toggle Bluetooth on!)

Super-smart protocols enhance functionality & make it easy for you to use

goTenna Mesh's protocols do all the hard work behind the scenes so you can use the messaging app the way you’d use any other. Except, of course, goTenna Mesh will work when others won't!

Using the goTenna app, send private 1-to-1 and group chats as well as broadcast to anyone within range. Count on delivery confirmation receipts, and easily download free, detailed offline maps of the entire world before you go off-grid. You’ll never have to worry about interference or channel-switching, the way you do with analog walkie-talkies. Radio + smartphone = intelligence!

The freedom to communicate over great distances, no service required

goTenna Mesh sends messages via a 1-watt UHF radio transmitter without relying on towers, routers or satellites. The range will usually be up to 3 miles (4.8 km) in open terrain, and up to a mile (1.6 km) in congested terrain. You can get much more in certain environments but we like to under-promise and over-deliver. (Plus... you can mesh! And the goTenna Plus app upgrade enables a network relay feature, so you can reach people beyond your off-grid network. If a goTenna Mesh user nearby has cell service, they can transmit your message via SMS to your intended recipient.)

(goTenna Mesh uses publicly available spectrum, intelligently selecting frequencies & power levels that are permissible in your region.)

Revolutionary mesh networking technology (the future is now!)

goTenna Mesh's first-of-its-kind mobile ad hoc networking (MANET) protocol enables you to intelligently relay your messages through other users to get to your recipient(s) when they are out of point-to-point range of you. This makes it more likely your messages will get through in difficult situations, and creates a network that gets stronger the more people join it. And not to worry: this all happens automatically and privately.

Here's a demo that helps explain how meshing works, using prototypes & phones in Airplane Mode. Because transmissions between goTenna Mesh devices are literally invisible, we've added voice-over to explain what's happening:

(Fun fact: Our mesh protocol is called Aspen Grove, named after aspen tree colonies which share a common root structure that can expand over huge areas, and is resilient enough to survive harsh forest fires. Like a mesh network, aspen trees find strength in numbers and grow from the bottom-up.)

If you’d like to learn more about goTenna Mesh and how it works from a hardware and RF perspective, we recommend checking out the latest episode of Adafruit’s Ask An Engineer, which features goTenna’s hardware engineers:

Outdoors

Keep in touch with those you spend time outdoors with, from hiking to skiing to fishing, and just about anything in between.

Travel

No more expensive roaming fees or international SIM cards — simply use goTenna to stay connected with your travel-mates on trips abroad.

Crowded Events

Enjoy the crowd without getting lost in it — avoid overwhelmed cell towers at packed festivals and crowded events and stay in touch with your group.

Emergency Situations

Exchange critical communications with friends and family as well as others nearby during emergencies, even when the power is out and cell towers are down.

• 1-watt UHF radio (tunes to frequencies & power permissible in your region)

• Flash memory good for 100's of messages

• Rechargeable Lithium-polymer battery (24+ hour battery life on standby)

• Micro-USB connector

• Bluetooth-LE data interface (BT 4.2)

• LED indicator light

• Thermoplastic elastomer attachment strap

• Weather-proof (fine in all kinds of rain & grime!)

• 4.2" x .9" x 1.3" (106.5 x 18 x 33 mm)

• Weight: 1.7 oz (48 g)

• Compatible with iOS and Android devices

• Open SDK — build any other application atop goTenna Mesh (e.g. turn a goTenna Mesh device into a relay device unpaired to a phone to extend range even when there's no one around!)

We're honored to partner with Telecom Without Borders (Télécoms Sans Frontières - TSF) for this Kickstarter campaign.

TSF is often first on the scene in places as wide-ranging as Syria and Haiti, from Nepal to Burkina Faso, setting up emergency communications for disaster response at the heart of crises, in refugee camps and emergency medical facilities. In addition, TSF works on development programs aimed at delivering communications technology to isolated communities as a way of preventing emergencies or mitigating their impact, as well as bridging inequalities inherent in the digital divide.

Every reward level in this campaign leaves room for you to donate toward a group contribution that provides goTenna Mesh to this incredible nonprofit organization.

Help us get to $600,000 in pledges and we’ll develop a new mesh statistics feature for the goTenna app. This feature will enable users to view specific information about their transmissions, including how many total messages are relayed through your device, and how many times your messages have relayed through others’ devices. Mesh Statistics will be stored locally, and securely, until a user decides to share them via imeshyou.com. Check out our latest Campaign Update for more details.

PLUS: For backers who already pledged at least $129 (the sold-out “early bird” price for a pair of goTenna Mesh devices), or a reward level that includes at least one pair of units, increasing your pledge by $79 allows you to add a third (or fifth, seventh, ninth!) goTenna Mesh device to your reward. Give another goTenna Mesh to a friend or use it as a phone-less relay node between you and other users to extend range and the power of your mesh network!

Help us get to $400,000 in pledges and unlock the ability to choose our limited-edition Black goTenna Mesh – perfect for hunting, or maintaining a low profile while traveling.

goTenna Mesh is people-powered connectivity, so we've created imeshyou.com to build community around it!

After supporting this campaign, please register your goTenna Mesh "node" on the map at imeshyou.com. You can register as anonymously as you'd like, and place a pin for your main location as well as other places you plan to use goTenna Mesh.

Search for other mesh founders, and use the hashtag #imeshyou on social media to engage in ongoing conversation. Invite friends to join goTenna Mesh! More people = more possibility, for both off-grid and on-grid uses!

Our team

goTenna is a startup building next-generation communication technology but we're really the friendly nerds you see here:

It all started when founders (and siblings) Daniela and J Perdomo recognized that people need to be able to communicate without centralized communications infrastructure, and sought to address that need by leveraging the smartphones everyone already has in their pockets to create a resilient and scalable parallel network created from the bottom-up by people instead of top-down heavy infrastructure.