Comment by Centigonal
3 days ago
I trust people like David Smith and companies like onX more than Apple when it comes to creating and supporting a top tier outdoor mapping app.
3 days ago
I trust people like David Smith and companies like onX more than Apple when it comes to creating and supporting a top tier outdoor mapping app.
Maybe some people are too young to remember Apple's Maps v1. Even Tim Apple recently mentioned that debacle in what was essentially an exit interview.
I recently switched back to Google Maps after Apple announced ads were coming to Apple Maps, since if the default Maps app is going to be saddled with ads on my thousands of dollars worth of Apple hardware anyway, I may as well use the best. And yeah, let’s be honest, Apple Maps is good enough for most use cases, but Google Maps blows it out of the fucking water.
In that light, I may be hard pressed to call it a debacle, but it’s still third-rate.
For sports OpenStreetMap is much better anyway, in most countries it has many more hiking/cycling/MTB trails. More details on relevant POIs (water points, bathrooms, etc.). Plus there are many specialized versions like Open Fiets Map (cycling), Freizeitkarte (general outdoors), OpenMTB (mountainbiking and hiking), etc.
Currently I'm using Garmin's version of OpenStreetMap + an overlay for the Dutch cycle path network [1] on my watch.
[1] If you are in the Netherlands, this is a gem: https://planner.gps.nl/download.php?toolid=1 . Download the device version, copy it to your Garmin gpsr or Watch and you have a very nice overlay of the cycle network with nodes (knooppunten), etc.
Examples.
https://www.macrumors.com/2026/04/24/apple-maps-ads-what-to-...
How to advertise in Google Maps
https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/16388390?hl=en
My kids pointed out that Apple Maps shows street lights, which makes navigation much easier than waze or google maps. They use apple maps exclusively.
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> In that light, I may be hard pressed to call it a debacle, but it’s still third-rate.
Not sure how that isn't a debacle:
"The product wasn’t ready," Cook, who will step down as CEO in September, said during an Apple town hall on April 21, Bloomberg reported. "We apologized for it and we said, 'Go use these other apps. They're better than ours.' And that was a humble pie. But it was the right thing for our users."
https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/news/2026/04/24/tim-cook...
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-04-22/tim-cook-...
(Bloomberg site paywalled, so used a non-paywalled source quoting Bloomberg)
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