Is Apple Maps any good these days? I remember it being useless when it was released.
this post was submitted on 14 Jul 2023
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Another +1 for Apple Maps from me. I prefer how it handles navigation and even the look of the maps is nicer after years of using Google Maps. It plays nicely in the car with CarPlay too, naturally
I use android auto and carplay and for some reason Google maps is crippled on car play. Can't move the map around with the touchscreen or change routes easily, apple maps has those features on carplay and Google maps has those features on Android auto. I'm not sure if it's apple trying to push apple maps and disallowing those features, but it does push me towards apple maps or just using android auto for Google maps.
I’ve used Apple Maps for years and it’s never steered me wrong. It’s no better or worse than any other map app.
Visually it’s nicer than Google Maps… I still prefer the amount of data about points of interest that Google Maps has. Apple’s reliance on Yelp is a bit cumbersome. Overall, I trust Apple a bit more from a privacy standpoint though.
Both have terrible literally terrible Privacy.
IIRC Apple does apply differential privacy - sending wrong information randomly about your trips to themselves, where they then average over all users to get rid of the noise they added so it becomes useful aggregate data.
And they never submit the start and end locations of the trips. Maybe the privacy is still terrible but it’s way way way better than Google’s IMO
Source: https://techcrunch.com/2018/06/29/apple-is-rebuilding-maps-from-the-ground-up/
“We specifically don’t collect data, even from point A to point B,” notes Cue. “We collect data — when we do it — in an anonymous fashion, in subsections of the whole, so we couldn’t even say that there is a person that went from point A to point B. We’re collecting the segments of it. As you can imagine, that’s always been a key part of doing this. Honestly, we don’t think it buys us anything [to collect more]. We’re not losing any features or capabilities by doing this.”
The segments that he is referring to are sliced out of any given person’s navigation session. Neither the beginning or the end of any trip is ever transmitted to Apple. Rotating identifiers, not personal information, are assigned to any data or requests sent to Apple and it augments the “ground truth” data provided by its own mapping vehicles with this “probe data” sent back from iPhones.
Because only random segments of any person’s drive is ever sent and that data is completely anonymized, there is never a way to tell if any trip was ever a single individual. The local system signs the IDs and only it knows to whom that ID refers. Apple is working very hard here to not know anything about its users. This kind of privacy can’t be added on at the end, it has to be woven in at the ground level.
Still.. its closed source. I can tell you that my closed source code that i only have access, doesnt track your movement everywhere. "Trust me bro" move. The first sentence doesnt make sense at all.
They added noise and then removed the noise?
You're absolutely right that closed source makes it much harder to verify that software does what it's supposed to do. I'm not sure in the absence of ability to view the source how we can be sure that Apple does what they say. (maybe network packet sniffing? Are there privacy audits? Must it be disclosed in GDPR requests?) I hope someone with the appropriate qualifications is able to chime in on this.
I'm sorry for my poor explanation, and unfortunately I do not specialise in differential privacy. My layman's understanding is that they add noise to the segments of your navigation before sending it to themselves. Once they receive the noisy data, if they average out many samples, the noise is "averaged out" in aggregate statistics. I hope an expert on differential privacy is able to chime in.
It depends where you are. Apple Maps gets its data from different places depending on where you are. If you’re in any place with Apple’s “new map” which is data collected and maintained by Apple themselves, Apple Maps will be pretty dang good! Better than Google in most cases. This includes places such as the U.S., UK, Australia, France, Spain and many more. In some larger cities such as San Francisco, London, Melbourne, Paris and more, Apple Maps has a dataset (also collected and maintained by Apple) called the detailed city experience. This is pretty comfortably the most detailed map available and is super good! In other countries it’s hit or miss. The data will either come from Tom Tom, OSM, or a local provider. Sometimes this data is super good, sometimes it’s average, and sometimes it kinda sucks. But that’s all just the actual map bit. When it comes to locations on the map, chances are, Google will have more information. Personally, I prefer using Apple Maps (I’m in a location with the detailed city experience) but you’d have to have a look. Feel free to tell me your region if you’d like to know what data they have where you live
I find that Apple Maps is noticeably worse at directions in the countryside in the uk, but I just put up with it, as I try not to use google products. It’s definitely improved recently, but it’s still not reached parity
Visually, it’s fantastic imho, and absolutely my daily driver so to speak. Tons better than google maps, waze etc. Visually. I use it almost exclusively, for driving. It is decently up to date on traffic, handles high traffic with extra time well, offers re-routing etc., although not as aggressively as waze.
Google maps has more features still. I use it more to look up places, restaurants, see street views, biking paths which are not available in Apple Maps for my area yet, and I’ve so far used it for offline maps when traveling abroad.
I would also say Google Maps still offers more correct data if you’re in edge cases, but it’s seldom a problem for me. However, I have ended up driving hours on extremely narrow roads into the most remote places in the Scottish Highlands where there is absolutely nothing but nature in sight, and when finally arriving to my “destination” in Apple Maps - it wasn’t there. Nothing in sight. Am up the wrong valley? That would be a four hour detour.
Luckily, I had also downloaded offline maps from Google for the area (there was no cell coverage), and it showed the destination just some hundred meters further, around a bend and a twist and it became visible. I’m not saying I would have turned around without looking. But I would have been much more uncomfortable.
@EyesEyesBaby @enu I prefer it to Google maps as far as turn by turn directions. It’s also feels more natural with spoken directions. For example turn right at the second light or stop sign instead of 30 feet. Google has it beat for information though. Nothing beats google search. What I hate about Google maps are their weird directions. They will put you in back roads pretty frequently. I’ve been in dangerous roads because of Google and never had that happen on Apple Maps.
I live in Sydney and it’s been pretty good for months. The only issue I’ve seen is when I have avoid tolls on, it might give me a much longer route than it should. I expect this is because toll roads around me are only tolled if you take certain on ramps/exits, and Maps fails to recognize that and avoids the road entirely. However, I've run the opposite issue with Google Maps a few times so it might just be our confusing roads
Is there an OsmAnd equivalent for iphones?
Check if 'organic maps' app is available on ios. Thats what i use on android.
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