Maps

Apple is opening a development office in India’s Hyderabad to support Maps development

Christian Zibreg ∙ February 16, 2016

The 1.25 billion people market of India is estimated to soon become the world's top smartphone market and is already one of Apple's most important markets despite the fact that the Cupertino firm is yet to open its first branded store in the country.

But that's not stopping Apple from investing in India. According to a statement Tuesday by an Apple spokesperson given to The Economic Times, the iPhone maker is opening a new $25 million development office in Hyderabad, where some 150 employees will be supporting Maps development.”

Get where you’re going with fewer steps using these 3D Touch shortcuts in Apple Maps

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated May 29, 2019

Getting where you’re going with fewer steps is a lot easier with time-saving 3D Touch shortcuts in Apple Maps. For example, pressing the Maps icon on the Home screen lets you instantly get directions home, send your location to a friend, search what’s nearby or drop a pin on your current location so you can remember where you parked your car.

And within the Maps app, 3D-touching a point of interest lets you preview it quickly, navigate there, call the place and more.

In this tutorial, you're going to learn about all the ways you can take advantage of 3D Touch shortcuts that are currently supported in Apple Maps.

Apple boosts Maps with new Flyover cities, Traffic and Nearby data

Christian Zibreg ∙ February 4, 2016

Apple has updated its Maps backend with nearly two-dozen new cities now supporting the Flyover feature. In addition, the company has activated live Traffic data for Taiwan and added Finland to the list of countries that support iOS 9's Nearby feature. Three-dimensional Flyover data has been added to five new cities in the United States, with additional Flyover views now available in various cities across Europe, Africa and Japan.

Google Maps for iOS updated with business hours and gas prices

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated November 9, 2016

Google today updated its native Maps application for the iPhone, iPod touch and iPad, adding two nice-to-have features: gas prices in the United States and Canada and business hours for millions of points of interest around the world. Now when searching for gas stations in the US and Canada, the application will display up-to-date gas prices so you can better decide between the nearest gas stations and those that potentially offer the lowest prices of gas.

Poison Maps makes great use of 3D Touch gestures

Christian Zibreg ∙ December 11, 2015

Poison Maps, a cool map app in the App Store based on the OpenStreetMap database, takes a novel approach to 3D Touch gestures versus most other 3D Touch-enabled apps, which makes it uniquely useful for navigating.

On non-iPhone 6s devices, the app takes advantage of the patent-pending Context Pan gesture letting you pan large distances by using a single touch of a finger instead of the usual two-fingered pinch-zoom gesture.

On devices without 3D Touch, however, context zooming and context panning is implemented using a long touch to control how far the map zooms out, rather then using the force of the press, as shown in a video demonstration further below.

Full offline maps with navigation and more coming soon to Google Maps for iOS

Christian Zibreg ∙ November 10, 2015

Although Google Maps for the iPhone, iPod touch and iPad in its current incarnation supports saving a limited area as an offline map (just type 'OK Maps' into the search field), the full offline functionality used to be an Android exclusive, but that's about to change soon.

According to Google today, full offline maps in Google Maps are coming soon to the iOS edition of the software.

Google Maps for iOS gains spoken traffic alerts

Christian Zibreg ∙ November 5, 2015

Google yesterday refreshed its iPhone and iPad mapping application in the App Store with a pair of new features. For starters, the iOS application introduces spoken traffic alerts to help you find the best route without taking your eyes off the road. In addition, it is now possible to add new and missing businesses from the app's sidebar menu.

Google Maps is available free in the App Store.

New patent points to lusciously animated Apple Maps with photorealistic visual effects

Christian Zibreg ∙ September 29, 2015

Three-dimensional Flyover aerial photography in Apple Maps is cool, but wouldn't it be great if things like water, foliage and other dynamic objects were animated based on touch, motion and sound?

That's exactly what Apple appears to be researching if a new patent application uncovered by AppleInsider is indicative of future Apple Maps features. The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) on Tuesday awarded the iPhone maker a new patent on “Non-static 3D map views.”

Apple Maps Flyover coverage expands to new locales in France, Germany, Japan and more

Christian Zibreg ∙ September 29, 2015

Apple has added a bunch of new cities and landmarks around the world to its three-dimensional Flyover views in Maps. The new locales in France, Italy, Germany, Spain, Japan, Australia, Mexico and the United States are now available in Apple Maps on both iOS and OS X platforms.

Apple acquires mapping visualization startup Mapsense

Cody Lee ∙ Updated May 17, 2016

Apple has acquired Mapsense, a San Francisco-based startup that specializes in tools for analyzing and visualizing location data, Recode reports. A spokesperson confirmed the buyout, saying "Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans."

The deal is said to be worth anywhere between $25 million and $30 million, and it includes Mapsense's 12-person team and technology. That tech includes a cloud-based tool that allows users to manipulate graphical models of maps that hold huge sums of data, and a recently launched platform for developers.

Google releases standalone Street View app for iPhone and iPod touch

Christian Zibreg ∙ September 3, 2015

A month ago, Google promised to release a standalone Street View mobile app “early next month.” Today, the Internet giant has made good on that promise as the all-new Google Street View app just hit the App Store (actually, it soft-launched in August 2014, but today's update feels like a whole new app and anyone can use it now).

Available for the iPhone and iPod touch, it lets you browse and enjoy Google's awesome street-level photography.

With this software, you can move and pan around by dragging your finger on the screen and even upload your own 360-degree photography to Google Maps to share your photo spheres with the world.

Apple adds 20 new Flyover locations to Maps

Cody Lee ∙ Updated April 30, 2018

Apple on Tuesday added 20 new locations to the 3D Flyover feature in its iOS and OS X Maps applications. The new spots include cities and landmarks in the US, Japan, Italy, Spain and France.

First introduced when Apple Maps launched in 2012, the Flyover feature allows users to take interactive, three-demensional virtual tours of various points of interest from around the world.