It doesn’t, sadly.
I don’t know that it’s as good as Waze at it, but I have seen police on Google Maps.
It does get some of that data from Waze. But I don’t know if it is comprehensive.
I usually try to report to Google Maps if I see a cop, but it’s a very cumbersome process. You can’t just be in the app, you have to be in navigation mode, and then there’s a button to hit for a cop sighting. So if my hands are busy driving, I can’t do it. But sometimes even if I’m the passenger, it’s a pain in the ass to start up navigation mode first just to be able to report the police sighting.
So now that I’m traveling across town for work again I’ve been using Waze like I used to every day. In the morning traffic is fine so I don’t pay too much attention but going home with higher traffic volumes I’m seeing Waze try to send me off an exit ramp and immediately back onto the highway. And there is a light at the underpass I’d have to go thru. So the time would be worse.
And the other day I ignored what Waze said about the last few miles of my drive and went a more direct way. Both ways are almost the same in terms of time (I’ve checked both via Waze at different times) but when I ignored the turnoff Waze suggested instead of Waze rechecking and sending me home along the route I was taking it kept trying to be me turn back around and do all this crazy stuff to get back to the way it had previously told me to go. Even though at this point it would have added about 10 minutes to my drive.
Has anyone else noticed Waze’s directions doing strange stuff like this? It used to be occasionally odd but now it’s almost unusable because it’s always trying to send me on strange diversions that don’t make sense.
It’s always been like that for me here in the Seattle area. It’s overly ambitious and doesn’t take into account things that I know will slow me down. Like get on this freeway to immediately get off of it a light that is completely backed up. Or take this detour through a residential neighborhood only to try to make a left turn back on to a very busy road with no stop light. Outside of the user warnings, I don’t really like Waze. If I don’t know where I am going I use Apple Maps. If I know where am I going and want the warnings, I use Waze.
Apple Maps is adding user warnings though, so hopefully in a year that is fully baked and I can quit Waze for good.
Makes sense. I’ve only used Apple Maps when I click a link and it automatically takes me to it. Otherwise I use Waze but like I said, it is currently almost useless except for the initial plan of what to take since it at least has all the warnings you mention. If AM is adding warnings I may switch to it.
Apple Maps has improved a lot, at least in my area. I have found it to be reliable. It sticks to main roads so it doesn’t get too fancy like Waze does. I wonder if Waze sometimes lacks enough data in some places so it thinks what it giving you is faster, but under current conditions it isn’t.
At times, even if what it is telling me is faster, it can be more stressful. I would rather go a little out of my way, but still be moving rather than sitting at a light where I feel like I am not making any progress, if that makes sense.
Waze isn’t my preferred choice anymore. I’m using Apple Maps quite a bit. However, it does like to send me down dirt roads. Waze—outside of cities—doesn’t which is a big point in its favor. On the other hand, when traveling a longer distance, Apple Maps is great at giving me a choice of multiple routes to get there which I appreciate.
Google maps has the ability to add alerts also, but it seems like noone does. The good thing about Waze is that it has a very large base of users who are diligent at adding everything you can have an alert for to the map. I avoided a big pothole on the highway on the way to work a couple of mornings ago because a Waze user added it. It wasn’t on Google Maps. Silly as it sounds, I also like the way that Waze shows your current car speed. I just like seeing it on there (and it’s handy for my work car because it seems to be about 5 MPH off.)
What is frustrating for me with Waze is the difficulty, for a long trip, to force it to take a route different from the one or two it displays. I don’t like driving through Memphis (it takes me through downtown on one route) but I can’t get it to display the alternate route I want to take. I know, I could just enter one trip to one city that forces it that way and then enter another when I get there,but clunky.)
If apple maps (or Google Maps ) were to develop the user base who were as active at adding every event and hazard as Waze, I’d switch. Oh - another annoyance and no one on the Waze forums or Waze tech support has an answer: in two separate cars, Waze on my iPhone, connected via bluetooth - the volume is extremely low through the car speakers UNLESS I also am playing something like an audio book via Audible or music via any music service. Then the volume is the same as the book or music. If I shut the book or music app down, the Waze volume drops to extremely low.
I try to, but it’s a real pain in the ass. Basically you need to be in navigation mode to do it. So in order to add the alert, you have to start google maps, then enter where you want to go, then start navigation, and THEN you can add alerts like a cop who has setup a speed trap. And usually by the time you do all that, you’re long past that point on the road where the cop was, for instance, so it doesn’t seem worth it. If google maps had the ability to just add alerts from the main screen, I’d do it a lot more often.
Yeah, that’s another advantage of Waze over Google Maps. The map and alerts and functions are all the same whether you have a location entered or not. I pull up Waze for my drive to work and back without entering a location just to see and hear the alerts like the huge pothole or an item on the road (slowed down enough a few weeks ago due to that item in the road alert to miss what looked like a full sized tire and wheel in the middle of my lane right around a curve in the road, i.e. I wouldn’t have time to see and avoid it otherwise.)
For whatever negatives it may have, for me it’s still the best map for driving purely due to all of the hazard and police alerts that appear to be timely and accurate.