Australia | Smartphones Could Revolutionize Road Maintenance by Detecting Potholes in Real Time

Potholes may soon become a problem of the past thanks to new research from Monash University engineers, who have developed a way to use smartphones to monitor road conditions.

The approach could offer a faster and more affordable alternative to Australia’s current road survey systems.

Unlike traditional methods, which rely on costly survey trucks, the smartphone system records road surface bumps and sends the data to an app. This information is then used to build a live map of road conditions across an entire city.

The project, led by Dr. Yihai Fang at the ARC Smart Pavements Australia Research Collaboration (SPARC) Hub, has already been tested with 22 student drivers sharing data from their smartphones. The researchers are now looking to scale up the initiative in partnership with road authorities. Their findings have been published in the IEEE Internet of Things Journal.

“The more information we collect from different cars, phones, and conditions, the more accurate the system becomes,” Dr. Fang explained. “This could eventually lead to a city-wide road health map built by everyday drivers.”

In their trial, about 25 vehicles equipped with smartphones were driven around Melbourne for two months. By testing different car types and phone placements, the team showed that smartphones paired with deep learning models can consistently track road roughness.

Currently, road authorities rely on laser-equipped survey trucks to check pavement conditions. While highly accurate, these vehicles are expensive to operate and are typically deployed only once or twice each year. With climate change and extreme weather increasingly damaging roads, more frequent monitoring is urgently needed.

Smartphone-based monitoring could help fill this gap by providing real-time updates between official surveys. With Australia spending roughly $15.8 billion annually on its road network—about half of which goes to maintenance and repairs—earlier detection of road damage could lead to more efficient use of public funds.

“Using vehicles that are already out on the roads makes the monitoring process more continuous and responsive,” Dr. Fang said. “That means issues can be addressed earlier, before they develop into costly repairs.”