A decade after a disastrous launch, is Apple Maps finally good?

Archived version: archive.ph/hguLn

Excerpt (and context):

Apple Maps’ offering might surprise people who remember its disastrous launch in 2012, which the Guardian described as the company’s “first significant failure in years”. Users were more than furious – they were lost, sometimes dangerously so. In Australia, police had to rescue tourists from the huge Murray-Sunset national park, after Maps placed the city of Mildura in the wrong place by more than 40 miles. Some of the motorists located by police had been stranded for 24 hours without food or water. In Ireland, ministers had to complain directly to Apple after a cafe and gardens called “Airfield” was designated by the service as an actual airport.

But mostly the map was just glitchy and unhelpful, its directions always a little off kilter. Users revolted and Apple made a rare retreat, allowing Google Maps to be used as the default on many iPhone apps and apologizing for the product.

The_Mixer_Dude,

I’m an android user and Apple maps has become a real problem numerous times in the past for me. My daily work involves me and multiple people traveling from one place to another and meeting at odd places (event production). And people using Apple maps can go from something simple as them not being able to find a destination in a search to being sent to the wrong location way far away, tricked into going down over way streets, and the most annoying, directed straight into bumper to bumper traffic. Ugh, everyone learns the first time but still…

max,

It’s pretty good. Using it locally as well as internationally (to France and back). Haven’t faced any issues, really. The only thing that is, to me at least, pants on the head levels of stupid, is not having cycling directions in The Netherlands of all places. Come on!!

bermuda,

I deliver pizza and I’d say probably half my coworkers use it over Google. I’ve used both but I think I prefer Google maps.

I’ve actually really liked Bing Maps’ routing options online but they don’t have an app and don’t seem to be expanding in that direction

Ilandar,

In Australia, police had to rescue tourists from the huge Murray-Sunset national park, after Maps placed the city of Mildura in the wrong place by more than 40 miles. Some of the motorists located by police had been stranded for 24 hours without food or water.

I don’t remember this stuff at all, but it is quite amazing that a) Apple Maps was that bad and b) people blindly followed it’s directions to that extent without checking a real map or just applying some common sense based on the signage along major roads.

abhibeckert,

The official government maps that are that bad.

For example we used to have a road running along the edge of our property which didn’t exist. It was planned and budgeted 60 years ago but they never built it. The non-existent road was about 15km long and everyone who lived along it had no alternative. There was just a bush track which ran through private property (across a dozen properties).

Paradox,
@Paradox@lemdro.id avatar

I use OSMAnd whenever I can

okiokbar,

Frustratingly, the two are good at different things.

Apple Maps is mostly better at announcing driving routes. Routing quality is similar - they provide different, but similar-quality routes. Public transport routes are superior because - shockingly - they seem to have more accurate data than Google Maps. Google Maps is still superior in the specific location of a business within a narrow area. Apple Maps has more errors where the marker is on the building, but Google Maps has it at the entrance.

At the same time, local search is terrible. Their partners’ and their proprietary data is inadequate and it seems businesses don’t know they could/should care and don’t maintain listings. I’ve submitted several changes in my local area and while they are usually accepted, some of them ended up reverted a while later. They seem to be working on this and hopefully they’ll eventually catch up - but I’m not sure how, if businesses don’t maintain their listings!

upstream,

Here in Norway they had a solid regression last year.

I mean in some areas the maps are about as accurate as your 2004 sat-nav, if you ever had one.

Roads that where there are missing, outlines are suddenly grossly imprecise.

Find my shows meaningless address information with a random number at the end.

Honestly have no idea wtf is going on.

abhibeckert,

Probably one of the European mapping companies demanded more money than Apple was willing to pay. Report all the problems, they’ll get fixed one by one. Apple will also detect problems automatically by comparing traffic data collection to their map.

upstream,

Have seen zero improvements after the regression, but I think you overestimate people’s willingness to help improve something that has worse data quality than open street map.

If it’s broken and I have a better alternative I’m not using it.

okiokbar,

Ugh that sucks. That really shouldn’t happen

beefcat,
@beefcat@beehaw.org avatar

Ironically, my home address is more consistent in Apple Maps than Google Maps. There are multiple accepted spellings of my street name, and which one you use with my house number yields a different location on my street in Google maps. Apple Maps always gives the correct location.

It’s a problem when I order food to be delivered because sometimes their system will auto correct the address I provide to one of the spellings that Google Maps thinks is way down the street from where I actually live.

boonhet,

Do we live on the same street? I have the exact same issue with Google vs Apple maps

snowbell,
@snowbell@beehaw.org avatar

My SO just upgraded to an iPhone and she keeps talking about how much better the voice directions from CarPlay with Maps are. Sitting outside a fitting room right now, she said “Now these are my kind of directions” on the way here.

upstream,

Personally I’m a huge fan of TomTom Go. It’s free to try out, but costs money if you want to use it for anything but a negligible amount.

TomTom has really dialed in the turn by turn directions over the years, and of all the navigation software I’ve tried over the years they still reign on top.

And in a country littered with speed cameras I’m more than happy to cough up $20 a year for a family subscription.

daq,

I haven’t tried their app, but my car, unfortunately, has TT built in. Still looks and works as bad as it did 15 years ago on my Windows phone. I accidentally started it once when I didn’t notice that my phone didn’t connect via Android Auto. I’d rather Mitsubishi just included nothing when negotiations with Google failed.

upstream,

I’ve used TomTom on iPhone since 2010. Improvement is huge.

I do suspect your complaint is more likely to be directed towards the hardware and touch interface of your infotainment than the software, but a satnav with outdated maps is not worth much IMO.

If you’re looking for something for free I can also recommend Here. Also great for when you are traveling where roaming is expensive as it allows offline search and routing.

daq,

I’ve been spoiled by free roaming with T-mobile so I just use Google maps everywhere. It also let’s you download areas where you expect to travel in case there’s no reception.

upstream,

Download yes, but you can’t plan routes offline.

daq,

Not sure what you mean by plan routes but you can definitely find destinations in downloaded maps and navigate to them offline.

upstream,

Apparently we’re both half right.

Not sure if I just never tried driving routes in offline Google Maps, but I see that it works now.

However, other types of routes are unavailable.

imgur.com/a/FANmMOr

daq,

Interesting. I guess I’ve only ever used driving directions offline.

In their defense, Google does clearly say this on their website:

Tip: Transit, bicycling, or walking directions are unavailable offline. In your offline driving directions, you can’t get traffic info, alternate routes, or lane guidance.

abhibeckert,

Apple Maps reports speed cameras - fixed and temporary (if drivers report the temporary ones).

upstream,

Not where I live. Instead of new stuff we got regressions (see my other comment).

Do you also get audible alerts when approaching a speed camera? TomTom also has a feature for average speed measurements where it calculates your average speed between the two cameras. Great feature if you are unsure of where you are instead of dropping your speed to be “safe” (and annoy everyone behind you).

Sleestak_Chaka,

I recently purchased a car with CarPlay and use Apple Maps daily. I feel like I’m the only one that finds Apple Maps ok in my city and don’t have issues. I do keep Waze on the phone as a backup though because I’m sure one day I will experience what everyone talks about. :D

george,

I was on vacation recently and Apple Maps gave a weirdly circuitous route from our hotel to a restaurant. I checked Google Maps and it showed the direct route I expected, so I went with that.

Google Maps routed me on to a street that was closed due to construction, Apple Maps was smart enough to route around the construction.

I expect general parity between Apple and Google Maps, I had not expected Apple to have better data.

NattyNatty2x4,

Something like that is usually because of users reporting the road being closed, not Apple or Google actively doing something better than the other

rozwud,

Totally anecdotal, but I’ve reported a couple of non-existant roads to Google. I occasionally check because I’m curious if they ever updated them, but Google still tells me to drive through a walking path and walk through a fenced off private property. It’s been years at this point. I don’t have an iPhone so I don’t have any experience with Apple maps, but maybe they’re better at taking user reports into account?

QuinceDaPence,

My work phone is an iPhone and Apple maps has, more than once, put me.on the opposite side of the city from where I'm supposed to be.

Slitted,

It’s pretty impressive in my use across the US. Listings are not as good as Google Maps, but the directions are as good yet it looks much nicer.

However I spent a lot of time in West/South Asia. It’s functional here, but Google Maps takes a big leap here since user suggestions and corrections are implemented much quicker.
The Apple Maps team is very slow to react, which is unfortunate as many roads are places are way off.

deepthaw,

I’ve been using it in lieu of google maps for quite some time now and it seems to work fine. It no longer assumes I’m The Blues Brothers and direct me to drive straight through shopping malls.

Thalestr,
@Thalestr@beehaw.org avatar

I find it works great for navigation and the map quality is so much better than Google Maps. My only complaints are that it lacks extra features such as business information, reviews, etc. It’s better than it used to be but they still use things like Yelp (ugh) at least in my area.

MagicShel,

I use Apple maps almost exclusively because it’s easier with my car. Works great. The only thing I’ve noticed is when someone warns me there’s a crash on my route, Google generally is already routing me around it while apple is sending me through it.

davehtaylor,

It’s better than it used to be, but still sometimes takes me on ridiculously circuitous routes.

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