How Much Does an E-Scouting Service Cost in 2026?
E-scouting for an elk or deer hunt costs $39 to $1,600 in 2026, depending on who does it and how. Here is what each price gets you.
E-scouting is working out a hunt from maps before you leave home: where the public land is, which roads you can legally drive, where to park and camp, and where to sit at first and last light. You can do it yourself, pay for an app that helps, pay for a finished plan, or pay a person to do it by hand. In October 2026 those four options cost from nothing to about $1,600 for one unit.
This page lays out what each one costs and what you get, so you can decide before you spend anything.
The short answer
| How it is done | Typical price in 2026 | What you get |
|---|---|---|
| Do it yourself with free maps | $0, plus many evenings | Whatever you work out. No one checks it |
| A mapping app | about $40 to $150 a year | Land ownership, roads and layers. You still do the scouting |
| A finished written plan for your tag | $39 to $79 | Parking, camp, sits and routes for one hunt, as a report and map files |
| A person e-scouting your unit by hand | $500 to $600 | A pin-drop map report for one unit, often with a video call |
| Hand e-scouting plus scouting on the ground | $1,000 to $1,600 | The report, plus someone who has driven and walked the unit, sometimes more than once |
Prices for hand-built services are what we found published by Colorado scouting services and outfitters in October 2026. They change through the year, and some rise as the season gets closer.
Doing it yourself: free, and slow
Everything you need is public. The state publishes harvest numbers and season rules. The Forest Service publishes which roads are open to motor vehicles. Land ownership is on county and federal maps. The cost is time. A hunter new to a unit commonly spends many evenings on it and still arrives unsure where the private land starts.
It is the right choice if you enjoy it, if you hunt the same unit every year, or if you have someone local to ask.
Our unit pages are a free place to start. Each one gives the last two years of harvest and hunter numbers, whether the unit is over the counter in 2026, how much of it is national forest and BLM land, and the official boundary: https://www.filledtag.com/colorado/elk/
Mapping apps: about $40 to $150 a year
An app shows you who owns each parcel, where the roads and trails are, and layers such as burns and wilderness. Some add tools that suggest areas. They are worth having on any hunt, and a finished plan loads into them.
What an app does not do is make the decisions. You still choose where to leave the truck, where to camp, which openings to watch and how to walk between them without crossing private ground.
A finished plan for your tag: $39 to $79
This is the option between an app and a person. You say what tag you hold, where you drive from, how far you will drive and walk, and how you camp. You get one plan for that hunt: a legal place to park, a camp, morning and evening sits, the walking routes between them, and files for your map app.
A FilledTag plan is $39 for one hunt, or $79 for up to three plans in a season. It is built from data and published research, not from one person's memory of a few spots: public land and road records, terrain, cover and water for the whole unit, and what elk and deer studies show about where animals go once rifle season starts. The same work is done for every unit in the state. Every pin and route is checked against public land ownership records and Forest Service motor vehicle rules, and the plan lists what was checked and what was not. If no legal plan fits your limits, you get a refund.
What it is not: it does not track animals, it has not been walked by a person, and no plan can promise an elk. This is our first season, so the plans are not yet proven in the field.
See a real one before you decide: https://www.filledtag.com/sample/
A person doing it by hand: $500 and up
Several scouting services and outfitters will e-scout a unit for you. A typical basic package is about $500 and includes a video call and a map report with pins for access, camps, drainages, water and glassing points. Packages that add scouting on the ground run about $1,000, and the most complete ones, with repeated visits before the season, about $1,500 to $1,600.
What the money buys is a person's time: someone reads the maps for you, and at the higher prices drives and walks the unit before the season. It is one person's read of ground where elk move with pressure, weather and feed from week to week.
The limits are price, and coverage: most of these services work a small set of units they know.
How to choose
- Hunting a unit you know: do it yourself, with an app.
- A new unit, a week of leave and a long drive: a finished plan is the cheapest way to arrive knowing where to park and where to be at first light.
- A once-in-many-years tag: get a finished plan first. It costs less than a tank of fuel, and you can still add anything else on top of it.
A nonresident elk license alone costs $845.16 in 2026. Against that, and a week of time, the planning is the smallest cost of the trip. The real question is how much of the week you want to spend finding out where to go.
Check your hunt before you pay anything
Answer six quick questions and you will see whether your unit and start point are covered. It is free. Plans start at $39, with a full refund if no legal plan fits.
This is our first season, so the plans are unproven. Treat the plan as a starting point and verify everything on the ground, including access, closures and land ownership. No plan can promise an elk.
Sources
- Prices for hand-built e-scouting and scouting packages: published price lists of Colorado scouting services and outfitters, read in October 2026.
- Mapping app prices: published annual subscription prices, read in October 2026.
- Nonresident elk license price: Colorado Parks and Wildlife, 2026 Colorado Big Game Hunting brochure, license fees: https://cpw.state.co.us/big-game-brochure
- FilledTag prices and refund terms: https://www.filledtag.com/plans.html
Have a tag for this fall?
FilledTag builds one exact plan for it: where to park, camp and sit, with every pin checked against public land and road rules. Custom plans start at $39.