Shot Scope sells hardware with no subscription. Its alternatives are either other wearables or phone-only apps. Seven options compared on price, hardware, strokes gained and platforms, with prices checked on each vendor site.
Five phone-based Arccos alternatives, compared on what they cost, what hardware they need, and how much strokes gained they give you. Prices checked on each vendor site, and the trade-off of tracking without sensors spelled out.
Strokes gained looks complicated because the answers come back as decimals. The calculation underneath is a single subtraction applied to every shot, using a lookup table of expected strokes built from tour data.
Most golfers spend their putting practice inside six feet because those misses hurt the most. The strokes gained math says the money is somewhere else entirely, and it is not close.
Two golfers hit the same number of greens and take the same number of putts, yet one shoots seven strokes better. The gap usually lives in a stat almost nobody tracks: how far away the first putt was.
Expected strokes describes where your ball is. Strokes gained describes what you did with it. Confusing the two leads to bad conclusions about your own game, and bad decisions on the course.