I'm Andru Edwards and you're watching Gear Live.
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When Apple Maps launched back in 2012,
it was heavily criticized for not having the accuracy
people had come to expect from Google Maps.
Over time, Apple has constantly iterated
and improved the Maps app.
But now after more than four million miles
of driving around the country, Apple has a whole new map
that's far more informative
and offers a much more realistic view.
In this video, I give you a look
at the brand new features in Apple Maps,
and show you why if you use an iPhone,
then Apple Maps is the way to go.
What is going on tech squad, Andru Edwards here,
editor-in-chief of GearLive.com.
And as I mentioned today, we are talking about Apple Maps,
the history of Apple Maps,
the improvements made over time to Apple Maps
and the all new map that Apple is rolling out
all across the United States right now,
and across the world next year.
Now you may not have been paying attention back in 2012.
But the launch of Apple Maps
alongside iOS 6 was pretty rough.
iOS had been shipping with Google Maps
as a default map app built into iOS.
But with the release of iOS 6,
Apple made a switch to its own internal Maps app.
First impressions weren't great,
and the result was an apology from Tim Cook,
and Apple went to work on making Maps a better experience.
Now over the years, we've seen many improvements
to the Maps app year over year,
driving directions got better,
transit directions were added, business info, parking data,
the flyover feature from major landmarks
and even flyover tours over major cities.
Apple has definitely improved the Map app
over the past six and seven years.
But in the background for the past four years,
Apple has been rebuilding the Map from the ground up.
As I mentioned earlier, four million miles
of driving all over the country
in an effort to completely replace the map data
without a full complete overhaul.
Now San Francisco in the Bay Area got the newer Map
roughly a year ago with iOS 12 and since then,
it's been rolling out all across the country.
And a couple weeks ago, Apple let me know
that the biggest Maps rollout was about to take place.
And it was going to include the United States area
of the Pacific Northwest,
which is where I live here in Seattle.
So I've been using the new Maps now for about two weeks.
And it's very obvious when compared
to what we had previously
that Apple definitely has an absolute winner on its hands.
Now before we talk about what's new,
let's talk about how Apple treats privacy
as it pertains to maps.
When you ask for directions,
Apple doesn't know where you're leaving from,
where you're going, or even the route you take.
In fact, you don't even need to be signed in
to Apple ID in order to use the Maps app at all.
And the reason for that is that nothing gets tied
to your Apple ID when you use Maps.
Apple also doesn't put advertising in Maps.
So there's no ad identifiers in there either.
And any Siri requests that you make to the Maps app,
gets handled on the device itself,
and it's never sent to or come back from Apple's Cloud.
Now that part isn't new but it's still good to know
before using the Maps app,
that anything you do in that app stays private.
Now what is new just by opening the Maps app
and looking at it,
is that you're getting a more accurate view
of the world around you, you'll see bodies of water,
sporting areas, parts of vegetation,
and even swimming pools.
If you look at a golf course,
you're going to see the sand traps and the water hazards.
Now this is all thanks to new computer vision
and satellite imagery technology that Apple's been using.
And one cool thing going back to privacy for a second,
when you zoom in on Maps, you see people and cars,
what you're not going to see are the faces of the people
or the license plates of the cars.
Now Apple also wanted to make maps more usable
for real world scenario, just a little easier to get around.
And one example of this
is the fact that they've licensed the different type faces
to match up with major public transit systems.
So for example, they've licensed the Helvetica font,
which is what's used
in the New York Metropolitan Transit Authority.
So the trains in New York City,
if you look at the signage that you see
in the real world on the subway in New York,
it matches up exactly with what Apple puts into the Map app.
So typefaces and fonts look exactly the same.
So it's much easier to get around
when you can just look at your phone,
look up and see that's an exact match, you know where to go.
Now in addition to the new map itself,
Apple has also built in a bunch of extra cool features
and usability features that Apple has added to the Maps app,
starting with improved turn-by-turn directions.
When using turn-by-turn directions,
Maps will factor in real-time traffic information,
including your current speed limit,
so you'll know exactly how long it'll take you to arrive.
It will also now say things like turn right
at the next stoplight rather than turn right in 1,000 feet.
And it'll tell you which lane you need to be in
when you need to make a turn or take an exit.
And now Maps will also guide you even more precisely
than it used to, this is actually something
that Apple seems to be doing better
than anyone else right now.
Let's say you wanna go to a store
that is in a shopping mall.
Well, shopping malls have
a bunch of different entrances and exits,
a bunch of different parking spaces
instead of directing you to the mall itself,
Apple will actually direct you
to the nearest entrance to the store
that you wanna go to that's in the mall.
This way when you park your car,
you're right near your destination.
And when you get out of the car Maps will drop a pin,
so that if you have a hard time finding
where you parked later, you can just ask Siri.
Apple has also added the ability to share your ETA,
estimated time of arrival.
If you're meeting up with a group of people,
you can share the ETA with them
which will update in real time and let them know
if you're significantly delayed for any reason.
There was also real-time transit information,
so not general transit information
but real-time to keep you alerted
as to what's going on as you're commuting.
Real-time transit info
lets you see detailed transit schedules,
live departure and arrival times,
real-time outage and delay info
and even the location of your bus or train
in supported areas.
Now Maps isn't just for outdoors anymore,
Apple also has built some indoor maps as well
to help you get around in big areas
like airports and shopping centers.
This way you can find out
which restaurants are nearest to you,
where the restrooms are,
and what floor your favorite store is on.
Now there's also a new feature called Look Around,
and this one is very impressive.
In fact, I personally think that Apple leapfrogged
over Google with this one,
when you compare it to Google Street View.
In select cities, you can access the Look Around feature
and it lets you explore cities in a 360 degree environment
with transitions that are smooth and seamless
if you wanna go down the street.
If you see something of interest,
you can just tap on a location to get more information.
And as I mentioned earlier,
this is where you'll see cars and people on the streets,
but you're not gonna see people's faces,
or the license plates of the cars
due to Apple's commitment to privacy.
Oh, also a typical Apple fashion
when using the Look Around feature
regardless of what city you're using it in,
it's always going to be a nice, bright, sunny day.
Now the new Apple Maps also has a couple of new ways
to keep places right at your fingertips.
In fact Maps support saving places as favorites,
giving you quick access to places you visit regularly
like home, work, specific restaurants
or grocery stores, or your kid's school.
This gives you one tap quick access
to directions right from the Maps app
or your CarPlay dashboard.
Siri suggestions displays a list of places
you're most likely to go.
If you have an upcoming appointment
with an address in your calendar, it'll pop up.
Or if you have a flight schedule,
you can get directions to the airport
and information about your terminal,
the gate you need to get to and the time of your flight.
There's also a new collections feature
that lets you build out lists of locations into groups.
For example, if planning a vacation,
you can create a collection called New York
and save all the places that you wanna go to
in New York into a collection.
or alternatively, you might wanna create
a best pizza places in the US group
and add all the different pizza places in the country
that you wanna visit while traveling.
Even cooler, collections are actually shareable.
So you can share them with friends and family.
So as you can see, Apple Maps is getting
the long awaited attention that it deserved.
And by taking ownership of the Maps data fully,
Apple is committing itself to actually creating the map
that its users expected from them at the beginning.
The argument has been made by many, but it's worth repeating
that if Apple thinks that Maps are important enough to own,
then it should do everything it could to own them.
And that's exactly what we're seeing here
with the new Maps app and the new maps data found within.
Now let me know what you think.
Are you an Apple Maps user?
Do you use an iPhone
but still use an alternative mapping app?
Has it been a while since you tried out Apple Maps?
Let me know in the comments below,
I will meet you there for further discussion.
We'll be talking more about Apple's new Map
on the Geared Up podcast,
that is the weekly podcast I do with Jon Rettinger,
formerly of TechnoBuffalo.
Each and every week, we bring you the latest
in tech, gadgets, and games.
If you wanna listen to the podcast,
I will leave a link down in the description below
along with a card here
if you wanna see the YouTube video version.
Till next time, thank you so much for watching.
As always, guys, I appreciate your support.
I'm Andru Edwards and I will catch you in the next video.
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