
Apple delivers a new redesigned Maps for users in the United States - chmaynard
https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2020/01/apple-delivers-a-new-redesigned-maps-for-all-users-in-the-united-states/
======
pauljonas
I'd been using Waze for a couple of years, and initially it was far superior
to Apple Maps. But a few months back, I got really frustrated with it because
it led me down some closed roads & ended up doubling my commute time home from
work that day. I'd also been noting how off it was on its estimates on when
I'd get to my destination. And I was also perturbed by it not knowing the back
street entrance to my work site, though I've "paved it" on multiple occasions,
it it remains uncorrected.

So I switched over to Apple Maps and started tracking how often it is off in
its estimates (& also trip duration) -- I have like a commute that can be
anywhere from 40 minutes to 90 minutes or more, depending on traffic -- and I
was pleasantly surprised that it got me to destination within +/-5 minutes of
when it said it would and that the journey was taking less time that with
Waze. It also knew about the back entrance of my work site and was able to
route better with some of the smaller side streets in the neighborhood too.

I've always preferred the Apple Maps UI -- it shows all the lanes at top,
stoplights are more prominently shown, though the speedometer on Waze was
nice, plus Waze alerted you to police presence too. It gives you a buffer when
wishing to change route (Waze frequently would change the route and instruct
me to take an exit that was 300 feet away when I was in the furthest lane from
the exit side) to check off and is totally ad-free, and incorporated into iOS
(yeah, Apple monopoly and all, true).

~~~
oflannabhra
I seem to remember someone posting their results of testing Google Maps, Apple
Maps, and Waze for ETA accuracy, and what you describe was also what they
found: Apple Maps was the most accurate, Google Maps was optimistic, but
accurate, Waze basically reported the best case scenario. Edit: found the
original [0]

I've long thought that Waze creates the illusion of saving massive amounts of
time, when its benefits are marginal (although real). I know I personally
prefer an active commute to one waiting in traffic, even if travel times are
identical. Waze seems to maximize for the latter.

[0] - [https://arturgrabow.ski/2018/02/19/navigation-
apps/amp/](https://arturgrabow.ski/2018/02/19/navigation-apps/amp/)

~~~
pauljonas
After using Waze for over a couple of years, I really started getting the
impression that I was just a data pawn in a bunch of A/B tests -- like send
this one down that route, send that one down the other way & see what happens.

~~~
mattkevan
Absolutely sure Google Maps A/B tests routes too.

Even when sitting next to each other in the same car, Google Maps suggests
radically different routes to the same destination on my wife’s phone than it
does on mine, often with a 15+ min difference in arrival time. It must be
testing different routing algorithms as otherwise they should be the same.

~~~
abandonliberty
I think routing is one of those computationally expensive problems (possibly
np-complete) to solve. As a result, there's a bunch of clever non-
deterministic approaches that get you "pretty good" answers, but depending on
the implementation can produce variable results.

~~~
widforss
A-to-B routing is simple and not very expensive. You can implement it without
very much graph theory knowledge. It's when visiting a number of destinations
in an arbitrary order that things get difficult.

~~~
Doxin
A-to-B routing is simple _in theory_. In practice implementing A* on a graph
of all the roads in the world is non-trivial. You'd need to figure out some
way to split the data up into chunks or to make neighbourhood lookups fast
enough to be workable. I'd imagine you'd end up with something of at least the
complexity of hierarchical A _, but depending on the size of your chunks you
'd need to still special-case the start and end chunks. And that's just the
first complexity I can come up with.

I imagine the distance is going to be _wildly* nontrivial as well. You'd need
to factor in traffic density, weather conditions, road works, _predicted_
traffic density, actual distance as well as traffic speed, not to mention
fuzzy human things like scenery. Just going for "shortest euclidian distance"
will end up with routing through every alley and side-street if it's even the
tiniest amount shorter.

I wouldn't be surprised if you end up with a distance metric that looks
essentially random unless you're deeply inspecting the graph at the time of
routing to see _why_ a certain route is shorter than another.

Of course that doesn't exclude A/B testing, but with google maps they clearly
have a routing graph that's updating all the time. It's no surprise that
asking for the same route twice can give you different answers. Not to mention
they probably include a random factor _on purpose_ so they don't route all the
cars through the same street. Of course you'd want the random factor big
enough to spread the load, but not so big that random people get shafted by a
significantly longer commute.

Seems like an interesting problem to tackle actually, I should look at
building an open street map based route planner sometime.

------
aresant
In the midst of the world (rightly) turning on big tech's abuses, efforts like
these make me optimistic about our industry on a whole and help me recover
some of the enthusiasm that led me into tech in the first place.

I love how this effort relies on & amplifies what were before relatively
obscure specialties

The mapping wars elevate cartographers, mapping specialists, GIS data nerds,
mobile computing / compression phds, GPS parsing engineers, ex-dod intertial
navigation specialists, etc.

And rallied them around a massive, insanely big problem of mapping and
organizing the entire physical world in real time and relying on consumer
grade hardware to drive incredible fidelity.

It's humbling and really cool to see people that have dedicated their lives to
these disciplines that were somewhat relegated to specialized use cases enter
the "rockstar" stadium to deliver something that legitimately changes the way
that billions of humans interact with the world

~~~
theboat
As much as I agree with your general sentiment, Apple Maps, like many of
Apple's mobile apps, gets a boost from Apple's anti-competitive practices.
It's utterly ridiculous that we can remove default apps from iOS, including
Maps and Safari, but we can't set new default apps to replace them.

If we ever get serious about increasing competition in the tech sector, an
easy place to start is letting users set default browsers, maps, and email
clients on their devices.

~~~
skizm
One specific thing that bothers me is that Microsoft got in trouble for
bundling IE with Windows, but apple doesn't get in trouble when they block all
browser apps that don't use Safari under the hood. How is this different? I
want Google and Mozilla (and anyone else) to be able to make iOS browser apps
from scratch if they want. It wouldn't be an issue if you could sideload apps
easily, but the app store is really the only legit way to get apps on your
non-jailbroken iPhone.

~~~
taywrobel
Apple doesn’t have sufficient market share to be considered a monopoly. That’s
generally how they’ve skirted around the issue, and by positioning themselves
as a premium brand, they can raise prices on their hardware to the point that
market share remains sufficiently small to not be subject to monopoly laws.

At the time of the MS/IE lawsuit (2001), Microsoft Windows had well over 95%
of desktop operating system market share.

~~~
skizm
Fair point.

------
azinman2
Congrats to the teams who did this! It’s been a long time coming.. and a lot
of people said along the way that Apple should just give up it was too far
behind. Perseverance (and a lot of resources) can go a long way!

It reminds me of some advice given to me by a heavily successful industrialist
friend — never dismiss your competition, for the world is not static.

~~~
doodlebugging
The teams are mostly 1099 contract workers through a third party with no
benefits and no hope of advancement or future employment as full-time employee
of Apple since their contract specifically expires in one year. They make
around $20/hour usually right out of college in a town (Austin) with one of
the fastest growing cost of living due to the influx of all the tech companies
who got tired of the California scene and decided to move to Texas for the
sweet tax cuts and business-friendly environment.

I'm sure the contract company siphons most of the contract value from Apple
and the dedicated workers doing all the GIS work, the turn-by-turn
descriptions, business identifications, etc. updating all the things that made
the original Apple Maps such a delicious joke are left with an income that
barely meets expenses in a town where those expenses are steadily rising. This
job for them is just a resume filler though they aren't even allowed, due to
NDA, to specify exactly what they do (what software or skills they use) or who
they do it for when they update their resumes so that before the end of their
one year contracts they can find a real career-type job.

It is a great update to a product that did originally suck though. It isn't
Apple employees who are doing the actual work. They're the supervisors.

~~~
kevindong
Your phrasing is ambiguous about what those teams actually do.

If it's just a data entry or "look at this picture and type down the name of
the restaurant" job, then I'd say $20 is pretty good. If it's actual software
engineering then yeah it's pretty terrible pay.

~~~
doodlebugging
It looks ambiguous to me too. Sorry. I should've read it more closely before
posting as some of those sentences really get leggy.

------
Ididntdothis
If they only could provide offline maps like google maps. That feature is
fantastic in the desert areas in the west where you have no connectivity. Even
the search function works great when offline.

Also search still works better in google maps. Apple Maps doesn’t find the
Office Depot near me but one 100 miles away for example.

~~~
Nextgrid
It’s sad that technology has actually regressed despite exponential increments
in processing power and storage capacity.

It used to be that you could buy a mapping software and install it on your
PDA/Pocket PC and it would run fine despite a CPU speed in the _mega_ hertz.

Nowadays offline maps is some niche advanced feature despite even low-end
devices have enough processing power to come preinstalled with an offline map.

~~~
shaftway
Have you used offline maps in Google Maps? And compared it to the old mapping
software you're talking about? It's kind of amazing, and frankly I often don't
notice the difference between online and offline.

The maps sync on a regular basis, it's got detailed information about
businesses including hours open, and it will route you different ways based on
anticipated traffic at that time of day. It's also surprisingly not niche, as
the app automatically sets up zones for places you visit frequently; odds are
the majority of people use it without even realizing it.

I used that PDA software back in the day, and frankly it was pretty lacking.
Route finding never took that much CPU. We moved to the cloud because the
benefits of serving the data vastly outweighs the drawbacks for most people.

~~~
globular-toast
What's amazing about it? It just has a local copy of the data. Big deal.

~~~
Ididntdothis
Not true. Search works pretty well offline too. Much better than any other
offline mapping app.

~~~
Nextgrid
My point was that offline isn’t the default, which means most people don’t
even know about it or wouldn’t have it enabled for the times they actually
need it.

~~~
Ididntdothis
That makes sense. It's well hidden and a little awkward to use.

------
pgm8705
Apple Maps has come a long way since its disastrous initial release. For about
a year now, I have rarely used Google Maps. I typically find Apple Map's
routing to be just as effective, even for avoiding traffic, accidents, etc.

~~~
mason55
Yup I switched about a year ago because I liked the CarPlay interface the best
out of [Apple Maps, Google Maps, Waze, Subaru Built In Maps]. And the privacy
over Google Maps is a huge bonus.

~~~
tcbasche
My favourite feature on iPhone is it telling me where my car is parked.
Sometimes I go to a meetup at a local university, which is also a rats nest of
roads and alleyways, and this has saved my hide multiple times

~~~
judge2020
Google Maps has this now as well.

------
taylorlapeyre
If Apple could bring bicycle directions into the app, I would probably never
use Google Maps again.

~~~
ed312
Any idea why they haven't / are there plans to add cycle routes in the future?
It seems like a glaring hole in functionality (more than "street view")

~~~
graeme
I suspect it may be california-centrism. Bikes are a vital mode in Europe and
many other parts of the road. In california car is king, bikes are either
recreational or for hardcore commutes.

You can see similar assumptions in how Siri is designed. (“Users only speak
one language at a time”) or the effectiveness of multilanguage support in
autocorrect. Most people outside north america use their own language +
english fairly frequently. At least those in apple’s customer demographic.

~~~
chapium
Counterpoint: google has bike directions and exists in California.

~~~
PascLeRasc
Google Maps' icon is also a location pin, while Apple Maps' is a highway.
Google also has 21% of its local staff bike to work [1]. Apple's campus is so
far that you can't realistically live in SF proper, you mostly have to drive.
These kind of different motivations and cultures bleed through to their
products.

[1] [https://www.businessinsider.com/this-heat-map-shows-a-
fundam...](https://www.businessinsider.com/this-heat-map-shows-a-fundamental-
problem-of-working-at-google-2015-6)

------
dsalzman
Shout out to all of Justin O’Beirne' amazing analysis on all things maps.
[https://www.justinobeirne.com/](https://www.justinobeirne.com/) -he's even
got an updated post related to this press release.

~~~
pgodzin
direct link: [https://www.justinobeirne.com/new-apple-maps-continental-
uni...](https://www.justinobeirne.com/new-apple-maps-continental-united-
states)

~~~
noelsusman
It makes me sad that Apple followed Google with the idea of coloring maps
green based on satellite photos of trees rather than actual parks. Why anyone
in Silicon Valley thinks I give a shit where trees are is beyond me. I used to
be able to pull up maps and instantly see any parks around me. Now they're
practically invisible.

~~~
tomaskafka
What? You aren't interested in forests unless they are in a park?

~~~
noelsusman
Why would I be? Where I live virtually everywhere is a forest, so the entire
map is painted green. When I open a map I'm generally looking to go somewhere,
so knowing that my neighbor Bob has a lot of trees in his yard isn't very
helpful.

------
bhahn
I just switched to an iPhone after being a long time Android user, and I've
found Apple Maps directions not to be as good as Google Maps'. I live in
central LA, and it regularly routes me through long and congested
intersections.

Does anyone else feel this as well? Is it just my small sample size? I would
like to continue using Apple Maps over Google Maps because of the integration
with Apple Watch, but it's getting harder and harder each day to justify.

~~~
ptasci67
As some one who exclusively uses Apple Maps on the west side of LA, I have
found the routing to be similar or the same. The killer function for me is the
HUD when I have it mounted on my dash. Light-years better. Also...the lane
accuracy is unparalleled.

~~~
chrisjc
> The killer function for me is the HUD when I have it mounted on my dash.

What do you mean? That the phone's screen provides turn by turn instructions,
while the car's screen provides more a trip/map perspective?

edit: i just realized that I can use the phone's screen for turn by turn, and
have the car's screen display music, or whatever else!!!

~~~
judge2020
> edit

That was just improved in iOS 13, shame it took so long.

------
skrause
What I hate most about Apple Maps is that reports about incorrect data never
seem to go anywhere. Apple Maps thinks that the road that leads to my house is
a one-way street. It's not. But because of this error Apple Maps always wants
to send me on a 5 minutes detour if I try to use it to navigate home.

I've reported the problem twice but never got an answer or a correction. In
fact _all_ problems I've ever reported in the Maps app were completely
ignored.

This is why I don't use Apple Maps.

~~~
zippergz
This is absolutely true, but it's not unique to Apple Maps. I've had an issue
with the major road near my house in Google Maps for over three years, where
it thinks a certain stretch is either absent or impassible. It shows it on the
visual map, but it will go to astounding lengths to route you around that one-
block stretch of (perfectly fine) road. I have reported it MANY times, and
nothing has ever changed.

~~~
chipperyman573
I report things on GMaps all the time and it usually updates the maps within
minutes (I get an email)

I'm also a local guide though so that might have something to do with it

~~~
icebraining
Same here, though it's usually a few hours, not minutes. I'm not in the US,
tough, it may be that there are different review teams for different areas.

------
andrewljohnson
Shameless plug, but we just shipped our huge Gaia Topo update too.

Gaia Topo focuses on the backcountry, and specifically downloading for offline
use: [https://blog.gaiagps.com/easy-to-read-tiny-to-download-
the-a...](https://blog.gaiagps.com/easy-to-read-tiny-to-download-the-all-new-
gaia-topo/)

~~~
xoa
Interesting, I do a lot of backcountry with no cell and have mostly relied on
old style maps turned to PDFs and downloaded or various OSM apps, this looks
up my alley. One question though I often have for membership programs: how
does it apply to families? I very much value all 4 of us in my household
having the ability to share key apps and data, particularly for something that
has safety applications. I see you have a Teams program but that looks
commercially oriented. Apple has "Family Sharing" but for paid apps. How does
that scenario work with Gaia Topo? If I grabbed a 5 year premium sub, would
the kids be able to run off that too (at least while they're living at home)
or does each individual need a separate membership?

Not trying to single you out or anything, I think a lot of the current app
sales models and sub models are fairly individual focused at the present stage
of things. More explicitly addressing couples/families (including what happens
as they grow up/split) might be worth considering though, I think a lot of
people will spend significantly more if it benefits links with household
members.

~~~
andrewljohnson
You can share a Membership as long as you don't mind sharing the
username/password combo. You'll all end up recording your data to the same
account, if you record tracks, photos, etc.

Your family might not need a Membership at all though - that's only if you
need to download maps for offline use, or if you want to use different map
sources... Gaia Topo and all the features besides mass-downloading are free.

~~~
xoa
> _that 's only if you need to download maps for offline use_

Well yeah that's pretty critical (particularly as a differentiator vs Apple
Maps). I'm in northern New England, huge portions of north NY and VT/NH/ME
have no cell coverage at all. Let alone Canada. Online maps are nearly useless
not just for hiking and general backcountry work but even regular driving to
job sites. My own town has no cell at all downtown, not just "no LTE", no cell
coverage period. If you've ever looked at coverage maps the phone companies
put out showing huge areas all nicely lit, know that they are flagrant lies
that are finally even getting government attention. If you're interested,
first search result article that came up is one from last year on VT going
ahead and actually spending 6 weeks driving around the whole state testing
themselves:

[https://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/story/news/local/vermont...](https://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/story/news/local/vermont/2019/01/24/vermont-
cell-phone-coverage-maps-dead-zone-verizon-att/2467205002/)

A touch different then what the cell companies claimed :).

Thank you very much for the reply though! It's good to know that, with the
caveat of no individual profiles, an account could be shared around a bit
without getting auto banned; I know some services do track that. FWIW, might
be worth considering as a some-day feature to have a cut-down version of your
Teams offering or a bundle as an official Family Plan, for a bit more money
than standard with "up to 6" (or 5 or whatever) profiles. At any rate though,
good to have more options to consider in mapping.

------
JohnJamesRambo
I enjoy how they keep saying private as a f you to Google Maps. I’ll give Maps
a try again, the privacy is a good enticement for me.

~~~
lotsofpulp
Google maps near me is riddled with advertisements now. Promoted pins or
whatever they call it. Of course, it’s for stores that I won’t ever have a
need to visit.

~~~
unlinked_dll
The final straw that got me to ditch android was Google sending me push
notifications asking me to review places I've been to, via maps.

If you want reviews, pay secret shoppers. And if you want me to use your app,
don't make it painfully obvious you're spying on exactly where I go and when
to do what.

~~~
soylentcola
I think it was more a way to crowdsource reviews and recommendation engine.
It's certainly worth questioning the use of "unpaid labor" to improve a
service, but I don't know if I'd call it "spying".

Use of the service essentially boils down to "I tell it where I am/where I
want to go. It tells me how best to get there/how to find the thing I want to
find."

I'm not sure how you would do that if you didn't share your location and
destination/search terms with it.

But yeah, I disabled that thing too. Not because I considered a request for
reviews a terrible overreach, but because it wasn't just in the Maps app, but
rather a notification. I disable notifications on most non-messaging apps
because they're annoying and naggy.

~~~
unlinked_dll
The issue for me is that it would ask me to review places I didn't ask for
directions to. It would notice I had gone through a drive through and ask me
to review the restaurant. It would ask me to review a furniture store I walked
past on my way to work.

I don't want an app passively collecting data on me while I'm not using it.

------
ianwalter
Ahhhh so sick of companies featuring San Fran. The whole point is that it has
better coverage Nation-wide. Pick literally anywhere else in the country!

~~~
toomim
They did. The example map is from Abilene, TX.

~~~
0xffff2
I count 6 images in the link. 3 are SF, one is SJC, one is New York, and one
is (presumably) Abilene.

------
frankus
This morning I noticed stop signs and traffic lights indicated on the map in
CarPlay. Hadn’t seen that until today (to be fair I’m not in a major city by
any stretch).

~~~
drunken-serval
Same here. I'm in a major city and they just showed up this morning.

------
protomyth
At this point, I absolutely hate when people use Apple Maps to find our
community college. Apple just plain refuses to acknowledge the town we are
located in exists. It also ignores all businesses on the reservation and
points to the local Coca-Cola bottling location as the closest grocery store.
I've filed bugs going back years and no changes.

Privacy and UI cannot overcome really poor data.

~~~
tclancy
Is this still true after the update?

~~~
koolba
Why would you expect a UI update to change the underlying server data?

~~~
jolux
It's not just a UI update, they went through and captured all the data
themselves as well so they won't have to supplement with TomTom anymore.

------
gingericha
This reminds me of the individual who was doing an in-depth comparison of the
history of Google Maps, Apple Maps, and how far ahead Google Maps was. They
dove into comparisons for walking paths, "activity hot spots", green spaces,
3D mapping of buildings, etc. Does anyone remember the post and maybe has a
link?

~~~
londons_explore
This is what you were thinking of:

[https://www.justinobeirne.com/google-maps-
moat](https://www.justinobeirne.com/google-maps-moat)

~~~
gingericha
Yes, this was the one! Would be interesting to see an update here as it looks
like this was from 2017

~~~
ribosometronome
He did another write up when the data updates started:
[https://www.justinobeirne.com/new-apple-
maps](https://www.justinobeirne.com/new-apple-maps)

------
wmeredith
Not sure Maps needs a redesign. It certainly needs better search. I just
opened up maps, searched the name of my company, and it gave me the London
Office. I'm sitting in our office in Kansas City.

~~~
scep12
Did you read the article? It's mostly about the new features and data they've
added, and less about a reskin.

------
mrfusion
I wish they’d fix the issue where if I click on reviews it prompts me to
install the yelp app. I don’t want that nonsense.

~~~
ntdb
This is the biggest reason I can't completely switch... lack of bicycle
directions is the other.

------
matt-attack
The only thing I detest about Apple Maps is that during navigation they got
rid of the North up view. I feel that anything but north up is complete
gibberish. I literally can’t recognize my own neighborhood if the map is
originated beyond 10 or so degrees off north.

I don’t believe anyone ever holds up an actual paper map and ever rotates it
to any orientation other than north up. So why are digital maps so obsessed
with non-north up.

~~~
Quasimoto3000
Because when you're navigating, you generally want to orient to whats in front
of you.

I definitely agree with you if you are just "studying" a map... But nobody
wants to perform a mental re-orientation while driving.

------
leokennis
I’m looking forward to using the similarly updated maps of Europe, somewhere
between our first contact with aliens and the heat death of the universe.

~~~
shd4
From the PR: "Apple completed the rollout of this new Maps experience in the
United States and will begin rolling it out across Europe in the coming
months."

------
city41
I really hope this new Maps updates with new addresses better. The place I am
living in now is about 18 months old. Google added the address in about 8
months ago, Apple still has not. People who use Apple maps and put in my
address end up with an address clear on the other side of town. Pretty much
everyone just trusts map apps, so this has been pretty annoying. I now have to
give out my address and warn people to not use Apple Maps. Many still do
despite my warning :-/

I submitted a correction inside the app a couple times over the course of
several months to no avail. So I tweeted at AppleSupport. They assigned a
support representative to my case and he's been calling me about once a week
for weeks now. It's almost comical at this point.

So here's hoping this new map app avoids this kind of headache.

~~~
wh1t3n01s3
In this case I would send the actual GPS coordinates of my home.

------
ChuckMcM
Something I still miss in Apple Maps is any way to plot out and measure
distances. I like to take walks to keep my step count up on my fitness tracker
and I use Google Maps to plan a route using their distance measuring feature.
Would love to do that on my iPad but alas, no such luck.

------
zkms
i have been using Apple Maps exclusively for the past year (in Los Angeles and
Denver/Boulder areas) with no issue/problems. Google Maps is cluttered with an
ugly phantasmagoria of adverts and after a while of not needing to use it, i
just deleted it from all my devices. The only feature i find myself wanting
that Google Maps has that Apple Maps lacks is an "offline maps" feature.

------
jwagenet
I want to use Apple Maps more, but they still dont offer cycling directions. I
used to use Apple Maps exclusively until I needed cycling directions because
of the better lock screen integration and otherwise acceptable results, but I
am still waiting...

------
bdcravens
Google Maps appears to do a better job of mixed mode (for instance, I have to
drive about 15 minutes to get to the Park and Ride to hop on the Houston
Metro; Apple Maps says no route available, whereas Google calculates that
first leg)

------
overcast
As small as it sounds, the collections feature is a big deal for me.
Particularly in my line of work marketing food and drinks.

Unfortunately sharing your collection with someone is a point in time. If you
update your list, the link doesn't update to reflect that, nor does it update
their collection if they've imported yours.

What I would LOVE to see is Apple Maps developing it's own little social
circle of recommendations with your contacts and or other Apple Maps users,
instead of shitty Yelp integration. Sharing collections, keeps a pointer to
your collection as manage it. I suspect this is where it's going to
go(hopefully).

~~~
MikeKusold
The Yelp integration is so terrible because Yelp forces you to download the
app to see any information.

My flow is: Find place via Apple Maps, click the reviews, get sent to Yelp's
mobile website that says "We don't do mobile websites, download the app", then
I say screw it and open up Google Maps.

------
binthere
Reading so many positive things about Apple Maps here for sure looks like
astroturfing since I've had some really frustrating experiences with Apple
Maps in the past.

~~~
jalons
My experiences line up with yours. It was terrible then, it's not any better
now.

------
nikodunk
I jumped on this post, thinking "awesome! they've definitely added bike
routing! Now i can finally switch from Google Maps.". Unfortunately – still no
dice.

~~~
ogre_codes
This is the one feature Apple Maps lacks which I miss most. Generally not a
problem where I live, but occasionally I'd like a little help finding my way
on the bike.

------
pkaye
Is there an Apple Maps for the web browser?

~~~
fetus8
[https://duckduckgo.com/?q=maps&t=h_&ia=maps&iaxm=maps](https://duckduckgo.com/?q=maps&t=h_&ia=maps&iaxm=maps)

DDG has been using Apple Maps via browser for the last year or two IIRC.

------
mistrial9
it seems that OSM is a data pivot point -- Apple and Google are directly
competing with OSM (super-walled-garden-data) while Facebook, Microsoft and
who-knows-who-defense are augmenting OSM as fast as possible

~~~
rmc
> Apple and Google are directly competing with OSM

Apple Maps _is_ OpenStreetMap in many countries. In Denmark it's used for
turn-by-turn navigation even.

(Source: Talk by Apple employee at the OSM'a 'State of the Map' conference
2018
[https://2018.stateofthemap.org/2018/T081-Working_with_the_Co...](https://2018.stateofthemap.org/2018/T081-Working_with_the_Community/)
)

~~~
mistrial9
this is interesting of course - but, the topic post here is "Brand New Maps,
North America Only" ?

------
atourgates
They're taking their sweet time with the implementation of their "Look Around"
feature.

I passed an Apple Maps camera car in rural Idaho on a state highway in the
summer of 2018. If they were already in that much of an "out of the way" place
back then, it's surprising to see that they're just getting around to adding
major cities now.

------
johnwalkr
Apple maps has steadily improved over the years. About a year ago, I started
to use it for cycling Instead of google maps because it has good Apple Watch
integration (google maps had this but dropped it at some point). I noticed
transit directions were good enough around the same time.

But 2 things kept me from using it for most use cases: \- lack of direction
arrow, which I could only sometimes figure out how to enable. \- lack of
organization for saved places.

Those are fixed now and I use google maps only when needed for street view.
Apple’s version of this is much better and once it’s rolled out more widely I
can delete google maps.

------
spectramax
No one has mentioned this yet - Apple Maps provides a very accurate
representation of traffic:

RED - Actually red (unlike Google Maps)... its bumper to bumper or less than 5
mph (8 kph)

ORANGE - Slow moving, perhaps less than (25 mph or 40 kph)

Google just shows everything RED. Yellow doesn't necessarily mean slow down in
Google Maps. Its a mess.

Also, Apple maps is tremendously accurate in estimating how long it is going
to take.

Major feature missing in Apple maps: Time it takes at a user specified hour. I
use this to hunt for apartments, and test out how long it is going to take to
and from work everyday. Google has this built in for a while "Leave at ____
time).

------
jonplackett
I would love for Apple maps to be good. But it’s not. In the UK it is
terrible. Unusable. I’ve tried. I’ve tried hard. But it is useless. It doesn’t
know where things are. And that is a map’s core competency.

~~~
JackFr
My experience too. It's too annoying to use. And I know that's I highly
personal opinion that I can rationalize, but I am not ready to subject to some
analysis. It's taste.

And the last couple iOS updates have been really disappointing, functionality
has not improved and useless flourishes have been added. I feel its passed the
Microsoft Excel 2003 tipping point. (IMO MS Excel 2003 was peak MS Excel. It
was brilliant, robust, intuitive and made it possible to do amazing work, in
so far as a spreadsheet can. For the past 15 years all of the work on Excel
has made it less functional, less robust and far less intuitive, but I guess a
software product has gotta have new releases).

------
pizza
The only thing I use Google Maps for at this point is checking peak times (for
the gym) and, rarely, if I have to give someone else public transit route
information

~~~
krrrh
Transit app absolutely smokes Google Maps for transit directions in every city
I've tried it in, if you're looking to reduce your Google footprint further.
Depending on the city it also integrates with micomobility and car sharing and
offers intermodal directions based on preferences.

[https://transitapp.com/region/sf-bay-area#all-
regions](https://transitapp.com/region/sf-bay-area#all-regions)

------
giarc
I live in Canada and an Apple Street Maps car passed me sometime in
spring/summer of 2019. I suspect Canada will get a similar update in 2020 or
early 2021.

------
SalimoS
I know it’s unrelated but I can’t understand why Apple removed directions in
my country (I’m sorry not only mine but many countries)

I didn’t have real navigation but just directions (and the blue line in the
map) and that was enough to not use google maps But after the release of iOS
13 it’s not possible anymore « directions not available from this location »
And because of that i have to install google maps on my iPad ...

~~~
kiwijamo
Which country are you in? I’m in New Zealand and it’s working fine for me
here.

~~~
SalimoS
Tunisia but as you can see the list of supported countries is short for
directions (compared to standard ) [https://www.apple.com/ios/feature-
availability/#maps-directi...](https://www.apple.com/ios/feature-
availability/#maps-directions)

------
criley2
Really have to give kudos to Google for basically inventing this design
language, because this Maps update really looks like a "catch-up" to much of
the design language Google Maps has been using for a long time now. Honestly,
looking at these images, Apple Maps looks like a desaturated/less colorful
Google Maps (and that's not necessarily a good thing either).

------
let_var
Mapping is hard, really hard. Now I'm finding it first hand. So kudos to the
team for persisting with it and delivering a better result.

------
destitude
Still seems like there needs to be more context in rural USA areas where at
not too low of zoom levels it is only showing state highways which makes it
difficult to determine how to get to certain areas. When you zoom in enough
for the other "major" roads to show up you lose all context because you are
zoomed in too far now.

------
kevindong
The street view on Apple Maps (or whatever they call it) is shockingly good in
NYC. All of their imagery is super duper recent and in very crisp detail too.
They also managed to make it have a genuine 3D effect (by shifting the view
slightly without "moving positions", you can see slightly more detail around
corners and such).

------
lqs469
There is no perfect map application in the world because of realistic data
changes rapidly, especially the Indoor Map and Real-time transit. It's still a
problem today. More 3D and redesign maybe improve user experience in the Apple
Maps(they always good at it), but the accuracy and reliability are more
important points.

------
projektfu
It doesn't look like they added a way to set a route with several stops before
starting navigation. Any word there?

------
pier25
Apple Maps is still totally useless in Mexico. Even the most die hard Apple
fans still rely on Google Maps or Waze.

------
m0zg
There's no way for them to beat a decade+ of effort (and billions of dollars)
that Google has put into their maps unless they are prepared to really invest.
And they are stingy AF when it comes to multibillion-dollar investments that
aren't hardware. This is the reason why they suck at AI as well.

------
maelito
Open source alternative : [https://benmaps.fr](https://benmaps.fr)

------
pastor_elm
Their international maps still don't look that great unfortunately. And there
is still no ability to download offline maps like Google Maps, which is
essential for avoiding international roaming fees. C'mon Apple, you make a
billion dollars a day. Put a little more juice into this team.

------
bstar77
I was blown away this morning when I fired up maps. I use maps for traffic
data for my commute. The UI improvements are great and I love that there's
geometry now for just about everything. Looking forward to discovering new
features as I use it more.

------
duderific
I'm excited about the Share ETA feature. Every night after work, I get in the
car, open Google maps, get the ETA and text my wife my expected arrival time.
If this works out well it will be one less thing I have to remember to do.

~~~
jeromegv
You can also use Shortcuts to automate that process quite well, been using it
already. There's a few examples here:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/shortcuts/](https://www.reddit.com/r/shortcuts/)

------
wycy
I decided to give Apple Maps a shot for my drive home today. At first I
thought it discovered a clever new shortcut for my drive, but I quickly
realized it was going to have me drive on a bike path. And I live in a major
US city. Sigh.

------
OrgNet
I tried to access Apple Maps using Firefox on my Linux computer at
[https://maps.apple.com](https://maps.apple.com), but no luck at first
glance... do I need to install an app?

------
joewrong
the only thing stopping me from uninstalling google maps is setting the map
view to north-up during turn by turn navigation. I can't handle the map
turning while I am for some reason.

------
jaimex2
Another flower in the garden. It would be nice if Apple branched outside their
own devices. I'll never use this simply because its not available on the phone
I love, my OnePlus.

------
odysseus
Were stoplights and stop signs at intersections supposed to be part of the
redesign?

I still don’t see those except in certain areas of the country (some parts of
NYC/NJ, for example)

~~~
kube-system
I see them while navigating. I tried navigating to some rural US locations and
I see them all the way through the route.

~~~
odysseus
Hmm, as of now I see them when navigating too, even when in CarPlay. Thanks!

------
tomrod
Given their integration with DDG, I wonder if Apple would consider purchasing
DDG to have the best privacy mindset on the web.

Then... maybe purchasing Mozilla for networking suite?

~~~
londons_explore
DDG and Mozilla would loose a lot of users (and therefore value) if bought by
apple. There is only a partial overlap in 'cultures', and they're both
products where culture is very important.

------
bluenose69
I wonder when it's coming to Canada. Google maps (and openstreet maps) are
much better than apple maps in terms of buildings, at least on the east coast.

------
ChrisMarshallNY
I've used Apple Maps pretty much exclusively for the last couple of years.
It's worked fine for me.

However, I am in a very populated area (Long Island, NY), so YMMV.

------
sixstringtheory
Decent cosmetic upgrade. I just opened it to check out my home though and the
road names are shifted halfway across the screen. Some are duplicated: both a
name on the street, and then the name again out in the middle of nowhere.
Guess there are a few glitches but those should be quick to clear up.

Along with cycling directions like others are asking for, I would love for
them to add multi-destination navigation. It was really nice being able to
make a detour to an ad-hoc location while navigating in GMaps, or plan a route
with multiple stops ahead of time.

~~~
ilikehurdles
You can do so with Apple Maps. I do it regularly, but unfortunately you can
only add it as an intermediate destination when en route to a destination. You
can't pre-plan a multi-point trip which I feel like is a big oversight. I've
wanted to estimate multi-day road trips and it doesn't seem possible with
Apple Maps.

~~~
sixstringtheory
Wow, I didn't know this was possible. To anyone else who doesn't know this,
while you're navigating, tapping or dragging up on the toolbar on the bottom
of the screen causes it to expand and show a few options you can tap to add to
your route. Unfortunately it's just a few preselected destination types,
instead of a new search.

~~~
ilikehurdles
Hm, it seems different and more limited than the CarPlay UI. Yeah they really
need to expand this feature. I thought you could have arbitrary search, but
maybe that's on via CarPlay when stationary. Certainly there were more
categories of things on CarPlay.

------
Rapzid
Am I the only person that finds the "after" image in that article too visually
busy and the labels harder to read?

------
throw7
This is only for apple users/devices correct? The title makes it seem I can
use it from my web browser or android device?

~~~
foobiekr
DuckDuckGo seems to use Apple Maps for its mapping:
[https://duckduckgo.com/?q=duckduckgo.com&atb=v194-1&ia=web&i...](https://duckduckgo.com/?q=duckduckgo.com&atb=v194-1&ia=web&iaxm=maps)

... but I honestly can't tell if this has the new stuff or not.

------
fudged71
In this thread: everyone talking about the quality of the previous Apple Maps
rather than the update...

------
tpmx
So only 194 countries left. Go Apple! Also, we really love being considered
second priority to the US!

~~~
merpnderp
Someone has to be first, why not their biggest customer? How would you sort
the priority list?

~~~
tpmx
I'd maybe prioritize the UK over Alabama or Florida.

------
companyhen
Apple Maps got me lost 3 times in a row, put me at least 1 mile out of the
way. Never used it again.

~~~
reaperducer
_Apple Maps got me lost 3 times in a row, put me at least 1 mile out of the
way_

Unless you were on foot... that doesn't sound that bad.

 _Never used it again._

So you have no idea if it's improved since then.

------
kndjckt
Wait does Apple maps not having cycling directions??? Only just realised that.

------
toadkicker
I can't believe on this page "Users" exists. What happened to Apple's brand
language? "Now you can" would make more sense to the reader.

~~~
bobbyi_settv
This is a press release in their "Newsroom" section. They don't say "you"
because they are describing what users can do, not what reporters covering
this can do

------
mdb333
is it at all usable in Dark mode? that's what I really want to know...

------
aynyc
People don't use Waze anymore? I find Waze to be more accurate in terms of
time on longer drives.

~~~
asmosoinio
While the Waze app is still separate from Google Maps, I am sure Google is
using a ton of the previously Waze specific (mostly user sourced) data in
Google Maps since they acquired it in 2013.

[https://techcrunch.com/2013/06/11/its-official-google-
buys-w...](https://techcrunch.com/2013/06/11/its-official-google-buys-waze-
giving-a-social-data-boost-to-its-location-and-mapping-business/)

~~~
ilikehurdles
I occasionally see speed trap alerts in Google Maps, which I figure are
sourced from waze user reports.

------
stefan_
I suppose it is a sign of a mature app that Apple Maps is now in it's "Google
Maps" phase where the only "improvements" are frequent, unprompted redesigns
that cut functionality to the bone and change old interaction patterns for
little discernible reason.

