iPhone Map Apps Reviews
In case any of my readers are planning a summer road trip before we head into fall, I wanted to take a moment to provide a brief review on the various popular iPhone map apps available, as well as my personal recommendations. Over the past year, I have had a chance to evaluate the different ones to the point I have finally chosen two of them as my personal recommendations:
Google Maps: Google Maps is considered to be the “gold standard” of map apps. It was the original map app built-into the iPhone, although now Google maintains their own version of it. It is highly praised for its accuracy and ease of looking up information. It is criticized of sometimes having too cluttered of an interface, as well as Google’s privacy policies in general. While I’m not personally a fan of Google or its privacy policies and try to choose alternatives to Google when possible, I still recommend Google Maps as my first choice of map apps and is my primary map app I use for long-distance traveling or trip planning. I keep it in “While Using” instead of “Always” mode for location privacy, as well as I don’t sign into a Google account while using it. I also agree the interface can be cluttered, but I simply focus on the features I need to use. Its accuracy is spot on, and I don’t want to take chances with accuracy when traveling.
Google Earth: I also tried Google’s companion app, Google Earth, for trip planning once. Overall it did a decent job of giving me a satellite view between my house and my destination, although there was one area that was mis-labeled I needed to report to Google (that I didn’t see mis-labeled in the Google Maps app). Since the Google Maps app has satellite mapping, I don’t see a reason to keep both Google Maps and Google Earth installed on your iPhone, just use Google Maps.
Waze: Waze was originally developed in Israel and is now owned by Google. The main benefit of it is that it offers crowdsourced traffic and road hazard data from a community of users (called “wazers”), and it is easy to also report traffic or road conditions from the app. I also like the overall design of the app. I use it as my secondary maps app while traveling if I don’t need to consult a satellite map, need quick access to directions, or if I’m traveling in an area I need to know traffic or road hazards. Since it is now owned by Google, I also run it in “While Using” instead of “Always” mode for location privacy, and I don’t use a Waze account with it (you’re no longer required to have an account). I would recommend keeping it installed on your iPhone next to Google Maps.
Apple Maps: Apple developed their own in-house maps app to replace Google Maps back in iOS 6. It was at first met with much controversy. Overall, it has improved since then and become more reliable in general. It is also praised for having a simple interface that is more integrated with iOS and for its strong privacy policies. However, when I compared the quality of mapping between Apple Maps and Google Maps, especially satellite mapping in rural areas, I found Apple Maps is still lacking the overall quality found in Google Maps. I don’t believe that it would be reliable enough for my traveling in general. I personally don’t use or recommend it unless you live and travel exclusively in an area where other users have recommended it. I don’t wish to sacrifice the quality of Google Maps for the experience I would receive with Apple Maps.
HERE We Go: Since I was concerned with Google’s privacy policies and dissatisfied with the quality of Apple Maps, I gave HERE We Go a try around town recently to see if it could be a viable contender to Google. Unfortunately, it isn’t. For starters, the mapping data is out of date since January 2025. In one route, I missed my turn since it didn’t update me on the map until after my turn. In another route, it wouldn’t actually calculate my route and show me where to turn at all. I’m also unsure if its privacy is any better than Google’s. Therefore, I don’t recommend the app at all. Stick with what works.
Scout by Telenav: I’ve always praised the accuracy of Telenav. I used the paid Telenav service inside AT&T Navigator for a while when I first owned an iPhone. It did an excellent job on all of the long-distance trips I took. I was pleased to see that Telenav now offers a free alternative in Scout. However, the reason I have chosen not to use it is that built-into the app is a “driving scoring” feature. It looks like this can be disabled, and Telenav claims they don’t share this data with others. However, after being burned by State Farm’s Drive Safe and Save feature that mis-calculated our “safe driving score” and reported back data to State Farm that we did not authorize (to the point where I have now moved all my insurance over to Farm Bureau), I simply don’t trust any app that includes this feature, whether I can disable it or not. My recommendation would also be to skip this app.
While I seldom use Google services (I don’t even use Gmail), I still recommend Google Maps as my primary choice for an iPhone maps app, with Waze as a secondary choice to also keep in your toolbox. Hopefully these reviews will benefit any of my readers planning a summer road trip!
Update on a Previous Newsletter: Recently I wrote a newsletter on Public DNS services and mentioned that I was using CloudFlare as my default Public DNS service and Cisco OpenDNS as my secondary Public DNS service. Since then, I have continued to experience issues with CloudFlare. Therefore, this week, I have been exclusively trying Cisco OpenDNS as my Public DNS service. While I’m no longer a huge fan of Cisco’s routers due to their expensive service contracts (I moved to Ubiquiti routers for this purpose), I did use OpenDNS for years when I used Cisco routers, and OpenDNS pre-dates its Cisco acquisition and was generally reliable (I maybe had one brief outage in about a ten year period with it). I’ve noticed since switching to it, even though my DNS resolving is “slightly” slower (although who can really tell), it does seem to be more reliable in general and more stable without the “glitchiness” I was experiencing with CloudFlare. The web filtering also gives me some basic network-level protection but seems less aggressive than Quad9 (which blocked my TV streaming on my Apple TV). I have no plans to invest in Cisco Umbrella or OpenDNS premium subscriptions (been there, done that), but the free version seems to be running well for me.