Is the consensus that Apple Maps _still_ sucks? Sure, the launch was horrible, but it's seen years of progress and nowadays I find it perfectly usable. I use it over Google Maps without hesitation.
Now I'm scared they're gonna break it again by rebuilding it. If it ain't broke (any more), don't fix it.
One of the most frustrating things for me with Apple maps is having a view of the city I’m in and searching for something like ramen restaurant and it takes me to another country like Singapore and says there’s a restaurant named “the ramen restaurant “.
however google maps does this to me all the time too. But is happens in the opposite direction. I have the map opened to a place on the other side of the planet, and cant find the landmark I'm looking for manually, so I punt and search for the name of the land mark and it takes me back to a local map and shows me close (usually not very close) names locally.
My personal feeling is the extents of the map window should be immutable and sacrosanct.
I think some video games have this solved quite nicely: for an offscreen point of interest, show an indicator at the edge of the screen. That way someone knows that it's there, and they can click to jump to it (or pan all the way there if they'd like). Definitely, never take away control of the map.
Furthermore, Google insists on using the location of my VPN entrypoint onto the internet instead of my location (despite repeated attempts at telling it where I am). Apple Maps seems to get where I am regardless of the VPN.
At some point google maps did that too - it was especially bad if your partial string as you typed something in resolved somewhere else, then you would keep typing and be searching the complete string in some completely different region. I think it was fixed. But if you type fast, or always have a good connection, it might never be seen.
Makes me wonder how stuff like this makes it past QA. I bet there was a low-paid QA engineer or college intern who pointed this out to their supervisor and they were ignored.
I don't understand the point you're making. Are you saying that we have it all backwards, and that the wrong people get promoted, while the smart prolem-solvers get stuck in low level position and ignored?
Because in that case I have sympathy for your plight, but would still like to ask:
Are you actually trying to make that argument by pointing out how counter-intuitive a story is you just made up?
As to the actual problem: It is both well known and not as easy as some low-level interns think: Fundamentally, Maps only does this when it finds absolutely nothing relevant at the user's location–these are almost always (really bad) typos.
In that case, the only alternative is to completely ignore the far-away match, frustrating users' #1 expectation of how a search engine works. Or to present the user with some dialog "oh but that's far away!"
The latter doesn't help anybody, because the user can return with the back button, just as easily as by declining the notification. Yet the user who actually intended the search gets inconvenienced.
I'm just sharing how many times I've heard management dismiss issues raised by subordinates.
Let's hear you explain away Apple maps' 2012 snafu where they f-ed it up so badly that they dropped the NYC subway stops. Was that "not as easy as it sounded" to keep the product features that worked fine in a previous release? Could they just "hit the back button" and use the old maps that, you know, worked ?
The problem is with arrogant product managers that don't give 2 fucks about the UX. "Oh they don't need the subway stops, I mean come on, we have a release schedule to make or I won't get my bonus!" "Their time is ok to waste, they can just hit the back button!"
Users never care how easy - or not - something is.
They only care if a feature gives them a good experience, or distracts them with nonsense.
This should probably be the Number 1 rule in UX camp. No one cares if you're a wizard. No one cares if you've perfected the ultimate software moonshot, or if your architecture is a twinkling diamond of executable and perfectly maintainable perfection.
They only care that your product works and makes life easy for them.
If it doesn't, it's somewhere on a scale between irritating and crap. They either won't use it, or - if they have no choice - they'll use it and hate it.
>Are you actually trying to make that argument by pointing out how counter-intuitive a story is you just made up?
No, he is making what is called an "assumption" about what might have transpired.
He's not using the made up story as a chain in some larger argument.
Strangely, it's you who makes up a whole argument that the parent supposedly implied: "Are you saying that we have it all backwards, and that the wrong people get promoted, while the smart prolem-solvers get stuck in low level position and ignored?".
In fact the parent doesn't make any such argument, just asks "how this made it past QA" -- and then makes an guess/assumption about what could have transpired.
>In that case, the only alternative is to completely ignore the far-away match, frustrating users' #1 expectation of how a search engine works. Or to present the user with some dialog "oh but that's far away!"
Assuming a user wanting to find a POI thousands of miles away from where they are is rare, then the latter would be better than wasting their time, and changing their selected area on the map, with an irrelevant result.
I have never experienced this, and I almost exclusively use Maps for this very purpose (never for directions; only for finding places nearby of a specific type).
Well, for example, I won't use Google Maps for driving directions because of a chrome issue: The voice they use is about the same pitch as the background driving noise in my car, so it can be difficult to understand if I don't really crank the volume.
Apple Maps doesn't always find the fastest route, but at least I can understand what it's saying.
You must mean the UI - although that's debatable, in my experience.
Personally I won't use Apple Maps while driving, for example, because Google Maps lane hints provide a much better experience - although when I was out of the UK recently, I wad disappointed by how poor Google's routing was on some journeys.
But even if it were true - what's the point of a good UI if it displays bad data?
At least in the US when I've used it, Apple's lane guidance is pretty comparable to Google's (i.e., mostly but not always on target).
I suspect "bad data" is both a little subjective and, as I mentioned in another comment, very location dependent. It's quite possible that one of the reasons Apple is starting to build their own location data set is because relying on other providers leads hasn't worked out so well for them outside the US. (Although I suspect they're going to still be dependent on those providers for years to come.)
I find Apple Maps to be more usable in terms of UX, how it gives directions, and how it displays information.
Their data still isn't as good though. For the most part, as long as you're in/near a population center or sticking to major highways it's fine. But it still makes a lot of minor errors when you're out in the hinterland. When I'm going places I'm not familiar with I still default to Google Maps since it's more reliable. This is especially true in countries outside the US.
Google also does a way better job at address verification. Apple Maps tends to take the names I type very literally while Google is pretty uncanny at being able to infer where I'm actually trying to go. For example, if I type the name of a local French restaurant, I can't count the number of times Apple Maps defaulted to showing me a restaurant by that name in Senegal or France or something.
This is especially weird in light of the fact that it's Apple, not Google, who has access to my chat logs and calendar appointment data and I have location services on by default for Apple Maps.
Really depends where you live. We live North of Boston and still countless times run into issues where the dot is the wrong place, or the location data for the place going is wrong, or Google maps provides extra relevant info like it will be closing before I get there, or when the store has special hours google maps knows and Apple maps doesn't, and countless other differences. I still use Apple maps mostly because the integration with Apple Watch and iOS (getting back to the app) and notably using Siri make it for a better experience and if going somewhere new ( a long drive) I check with Google Maps first to avoid any major issues. If Google Maps on iOS was allowed to be deeply integrated like Apple Maps wouldn't touch maps with a 10 foot poll, but that will never happen. So any improvements to Maps data will be a welcome improvement and while hard to imagine them beating Google Maps they only have to be good enough to beat them in the long run.
I haven't bothered to check in detail, but I assume that Apple Maps does a better job at respecting the user's privacy than Google Maps. That's an important point in its favor that doesn't seem echoed in sibling comments. (The article seems to echo my suspicion.)
As of a year or two ago, Apple Maps now consistently performs as well as Google Maps (as measured by its ability to route around bad traffic). At least in my area. So given their equivalence I always opt for Apple Maps these days to help preserve my privacy.
Of course, as other have already said, Google Maps has had a number of UX failings over the years (doesn't Google always?). But what really frustrated me was their handling of toll roads, at least a few years ago. They updated the app and then suddenly the Avoid Toll Roads setting was tucked away, hidden behind layers of obscure and opaque minimalist UI nonsense that Google so loves. As if that wasn't enough the setting would constantly revert.
So there you are scrambling to bring up directions in the car while running late. If you're lucky you recognize that Google is routing you through the toll roads. So you burn precious time trying to remember the arcane recipe of nameless shapes that you have to press to find the setting. And then re-find directions.
If you're not lucky, you forget to check the directions for toll roads, and now you're barreling down the highway, surprised to suddenly see the traffic cleared, only for horror to dawn on you shortly thereafter as you realize you're about to enter the toll road and there's no escape.
Over the years Google has screwed with their handling of toll roads a number of times. Why they have such a penchant for dark patterns surrounding toll roads is beyond me. Maybe some Google employee is on the take with the toll road companies? (mild sarcasm)
I have not experienced these issues with Apple Maps. Another point in its favor.
P.S. It's interesting to have watched this evolution. Apple Maps came out it seems like forever ago. Wikipedia says ~6 years. The growth since then has been incredible, but I don't think any of us have forgotten that Apple Maps was, frankly, a laughing stock. The village idiot of mapping. I'm glad they stuck with it though. It's nice to have alternatives. Whether you're a fan of Google or Apple, I hope it's appreciated that options exist. Because let's be honest, before Apple Maps, was there a real competitor to Google Maps? (Though I'm always silently rooting for OpenStreetMaps.)
Google Maps has more accurate and up-to-date data, while Apple Maps has more accurate drive time estimates (Google always underestimates).
However Google Maps has an incredibly obnoxious UI pushing me to enable more data collection. The largest text on the search surface is "You're missing out" (by not signing in). If I do sign in, a search for "Home" pops up a modal dialog "Turn on Web and App Activity to search for home and your other personal places". This occurs despite setting an on-device Home location, which GMaps supports.
Apple Maps doesn't ask for sign-in, and a search for "home" uses the location stored on-device. Privacy is why I prefer Apple Maps.
IME Google is really bad at traffic drive time estimates when there are situations where different lanes have different traffic. E.g. two lanes of the road are moving fine, but the left turn lane is backed up like crazy. Or the fast lane is fine, but the freeway on-ramp and exits you need are horrible.
I think whoever cracks lane-aware positioning, mapping, and routing could make some big improvements.
But mainly I just want a big button that says "don't make me make unprotected turns across multiple lanes of traffic" - Apple Maps seems less aggressive in that regard than Google Maps, which is why I prefer it.
This drives me bananas with Waze. Even with its option to decrease the number of left turns, there seems to be no concept of "prefer left turns onto multi-lane roads at controlled intersections."
I quit using Waze for exactly that reason, after being a happy user for years. I wonder who thought it would be a great idea to have me make an unprotected left turn from a side street onto a major road with no signal at rush hour.
>IME Google is really bad at traffic drive time estimates when there are situations where different lanes have different traffic.
Exactly, that's the one case where Gmaps gives me bad estimates, as there's something like that for me on my drive to work. The rest of the time, its estimates are very good.
If someone is a slower than average driver, they should realize that Google's estimates target average speeds (since they're aggregating data from lots of drivers), and take that into account when looking at Google's estimates.
I guess it'd be nice if Google over time determined if you're a faster or slower driver than average and adjusted accordingly.
Google's estimates seem most accurate for me if I can consistently break the speed limit by about 15 mph. If I get into a bit of congestion and get stuck at the speed limit then it misses the mark.
I also find it perfectly usable. Does it sometimes suggest a longer route than Google Maps does? Sure. That could be partially attributed to the sheer number of drivers Google Maps has, though.
I think search is almost certainly better on Google Maps, but that's no surprise. I think Apple Maps is the better choice for iOS users, though, if only for the tighter integration with the OS itself and reportedly better battery life.
For one example: I believe this is no longer the case, but for a long time 3rd party mapping apps could not display route information on the iPhone lock screen.
Last time I checked, one of my favorite apps for routing me on back roads, Scenic, still can't use my Watch for routing.
Why would your phone be locked while you're driving and trying to use it for navigation? Surely you're not looking down and locking / unlocking it every time you want to look at it, right? You just have it mounted on your dash and it stays on.
>if only for the tighter integration with the OS itself and reportedly better battery life.
So, gmaps is more accurate and overall better in execution, but you recommend an inferior product because of OS integration and battery usage? Makes no sense to me. The number one priority is getting the best directions to where you want to go.
The google UI paradigm is utterly bewildering and foreign to me. I would probably give Google Maps a chance, but every time I open it, I feel lost. When the maps are good enough, the other stuff matters.
The Google Maps app doesn't follow any of the iOS UI paradigms, so any time I want to do anything beyond what you described (like transit directions, bike directions, etc), I have have a hard time figuring out how to do that.
I was recently on vacation and Apple Maps provided a poor experience, including but not limited to telling me to take a right where there was no road and into the ocean.
Google Maps to the rescue; it gave me 100% accurate directions 100% of the time.
It really depends on where you are. If you're using it for car navigation in the US, it's probably fine. When I need a map on a hike in rural Germany Apple Maps is completely unusable. Google Maps is much better and OpenStreetMap is even more accurate.
I like the usability of Apple Maps a lot, but just this weekend it took me to the wrong part of town. I put the same address into Google Maps and it took me to the correct place.
It seems to depend an awful lot on where you are in the world. I've rarely -- not never, but rarely -- had problems with Apple Maps, and I tend to prefer it to the Google Maps iOS application. But, I also live in the San Francisco Bay Area, which almost certainly makes a difference. To be fair, I've also had no problems with it in Portland, Seattle, Kansas City, Lawrence (Kansas), Eugene (Oregon), St. Louis, and around Tampa Bay. But it's not lost on me that all of those are not only in the United States, they're all pretty urban. (I've heard anecdotes of Apple screwing up in urban areas, too, but for me it hasn't behaved any worse than the other mapping apps -- Google has sent me to a few weird places.)
I think on the whole it's good for Apple to be taking control of their mapping back end, although I suspect it would have been better for them if they'd started by, say, buying Here (the former Nokia mapping unit).
I’ve tried to transition from gmaps to Apple maps a couple times in the last few years. It’s not broken anymore, but it’s still sufficiently inferior that attempting to switch was painful and I ended up going back. This despite wanting google and it’s snoops firmly out of my digital life.
I use Apple maps because my car has Carplay and apple doesn't allow any other map provider. It still has issues finding locations and maps me to the wrong location. In LA, being a mile off can easily result in 1/2 hour delay or more. It also lags on construction closures updates(eg: exit closure) which are common in LA, unlike google products which gets up-to-date data from Waze. Apple maps needs to be perfect all the time to be viable.
Until Apple fixes all their issues, they need to allow other map providers for Carplay.
I also prefer it over Google Maps when I'm in an area where I know Apple's data is good enough. I simply find the UI simpler, easier to use, far less cluttered, and downright faster. Apple Maps is buttery smooth whereas sometimes Google Maps is pretty choppy (admittedly, its performance on iOS has improved a lot over the last year).
The only two google products I still use are Gmail (for work) and Google Maps.
Apple Maps has improved since it launched but its far less accurate for me than Google has been despite that its integration is far tighter including CarPlay.
Your results may vary but I am very happy to hear they are doing a ground up rebuild. I won’t miss what they have today at all.
I resisted for a long time, but when I got my newest car it came with CarPlay and so I started using Apple Maps because I had no alternative. Now I see that iOS 12 is going to relax that restriction ... and I am going to stay with Apple Maps. Works fine for me, and nice to know Apple is not tracking my every move.
I've deleted Google Maps and Waze from my phone (moving away from Google products) and now only use Apple Maps. Works pretty well for me but occasionally has some bad data (freeway exits that didn't exist due to construction). I'm in the bay area so I can't speak for other areas.
For me Maps is consistently less accurate than Google Maps. However, the Google Maps UI bothers me just the same as everyone else here. I'm hoping that the improvements continue to roll in on Apple's version, because I'd much rather just use theirs.
I even walked into an Apple Store, found an iPad, and submitted a correction request once. That was almost two years ago. For a long time, every time I'd pass that Apple Store, I'd walk in, go to an iPad, and search my house on Apple Maps to see if they accepted my request. They never ever fixed it. I don't think they ever did, though it's been a few months since I gave up checking so who knows.
Until Lyft banned Apple Maps, I'd have to call drivers in advance to make sure they weren't using Apple, and if they said they were, I'd cancel on them (I still do this for Waze users, because Waze can't path to my house).
They still don't have bicycling directions or transit directions in many cities. They still show businesses that were demolished years ago. They don't have indoor maps of anywhere near the number of places that Google has.
I dunno- this might be an edge case but I was going hiking and was trying to get to a trailhead a month or so ago using Apple maps, and I ended up quite lost in the fireroads of the buckhorn wilderness. Spooky.
I would never trust Apple or Google maps to get me anywhere more complicated than a local restaurant. If you're wandering out amongst the logging trucks (or anything that isn't paved, for that matter), try something like Gaia GPS. Gaia allows you load whatever maps you want, including USGS Topo maps. On the dirt-road-loving motorcycle, I paid the $50 (or whatever it cost) to get the topo dataset on the Garmin that rides on the dashboard.
EDIT: BTW, if you're on anything that might be labelled "fireroad" you don't want to be depending on a map app that needs a connection to begin with.
I tried using Apple Maps on my iPhone to navigate to WeWork in San Francisco last week and it sent me three blocks off target with the exact street address entered. I switched to Google maps to find it correctly with the same street address. YMMV, single data point and all that.
I've also used Google directions going through Los Angeles (from San Diego to San Jose) and it told me to exit the freeway for some reason in Los Angeles and get back on, which I followed blindly but wasn't too bad a diversion.
I used it a year ago and it still sucked. From an stability standpoint it was fine, except it had plenty of terrible ui decisions. Take driving in manhattan for example. A driver would like to glance at the directions and see turns and the directions the road is turning. However, this is not possible. 3d renderings of the new york skyline block the roads on the map so you cannot see in the app any further than you can outside your front window.
It's been mostly fine for me, but their database of places isn't as complete. I recently tried to look up a restaurant that opened two years ago and it was completely missing, had to use Google Maps to find it instead.
If you're looking for walking/hiking trails, Apple Maps has pretty much nothing. Google certainly isn't as good as a dedicated trail map app, but at least they try sometimes.
I always use Apple Maps first, and sanity check what it gives me. In my area most mapping solutions work, but Google Maps will frequently give me difficult (though not wrong) directions. Such as going down three blocks instead of two, skipping an intersection with a light, and instead asking me to turn left across 4 lanes of busy traffic, for no evident reason.
I have to use Apple maps regularly due to the iOS<12 CarPlay restrictions, and it regularly gives me bad instructions. Even though I have “avoid tolls” turned on, it consistently tells me to take the Triboro bridge in NYC (an $8 toll) rather than the Queensboro. It also frequently tries to send me the wrong way down one-way streets in the Bronx.
I loved it even when it launched and everyone was complaining about data and it was hyped up. A brand new app had data problems but the user experience was, in comparison to its peers, quite excellent. I still find it my preferred map especially on iOS/MacOS, even though nobody beats Google in certain aspects (functionality for one)
I've found Apple Maps caches the maps around my area so I have been able to use it in areas where I have no wireless reception. Not as fully detailed but they seem to cache the main roads and landmarks at least. I recall Google Maps just failing to show anything but that was a long while ago, so it sounds like things have improved.
It's given me completely day ruining, terrible directions within the past month. Like "go to the street outside this complex" rather than "go to building 5" and them i'm stuck on the phone trying to find someone to explain this, when google maps finds it correctly instantly.
If a map is correct 95% of the time, then one in twenty leads most people to feel like its "always" broken. Edge cases are so frequent that I think it's impossible to get right without a "team on the ground," which it sounds like Apple had finally accepted.
It might depend on where you live. I've been driving around Copenhagen with a group of colleagues and we had to ask the one with the map to switch to Google maps because Apple maps seemed determined to give us a city tour rather than lead us to our destination.
Meh, I usually look at my route ahead of time with both google maps and apple maps. Sometimes one is better, sometimes the other is better. Apple Maps is good enough for what I use it for, and it does integration with iOS better.
Google Maps are slightly more detailed, probably since Google is generating the maps automatically from satellite imagery, but for going to one point of the city to another I feel that the two apps are essentially equivalent!
Something is showing Apple that it is broken. I am betting it is user rates. Google has taken over iPhones for so much of it and I am sure they don't like the fact that Google Maps are used more then Apple Maps.
On my imperical evidence side, my daughter uses Apple Maps and I can tell you it gives back mapping when we are less then an hour away but more then 20 minutes. For example the way i drive isn't on Apple Maps and it adds 5 minutes to the trip and Google Maps has the trip 5 minutes faster. I don't know if Google is getting that data from my driving or from better algorithms but it has happened for then a few times.
Now I'm scared they're gonna break it again by rebuilding it. If it ain't broke (any more), don't fix it.