Is there any alternative to Apple Maps for iPhone?

When Apple was launching its own maps application, they have promised a lot of promising features. However, with a launch of iOS6 back in September, no could have ever imagined it could be a complete disaster. Apple CEO, Tim Cook apologized for this later. It was cluttered with tons of bugs and inaccuracies and consumer need to face a lot of difficulty using it.

image: credited from Guardian.co.uk

When Apple Inc. moved towards their maps application and they removed Google maps completely from their sphere, the actual problem started. As per the latest news, consumers are still facing problems related to the inaccuracies by apple maps.  Australian police warns that "Apple’s iOS Maps app is so bad it can kill you". According to The Guardian, Apple redraws maps after Australian drivers led astray in the bush.

We all were left pondering is there any alternative to these maps? That really works with it or could a good substitute to it. After some research, I come to a conclusion where I listed down top 4 replacements that can be used instead of Apple Maps. If you find out more interesting and informative map applications, you can share it in comment section. These Maps applications are just a part of a vast mobile application development world. There are much more to explore.

1. MapQuest: This Company is known for its trade. Many of you still remember the days when people used to take printouts of maps from their computers using this program to reach to the destination place.  Well now this company has come a long way, and have developed an application which offers you turn-by-turn navigation and GPS searching.

It also builds-in layers to its navigation maps, so that you can take a quick glance at restaurants, hotels, gas stations and more that show up along your route. You also get real-time traffic conditions, multi-stop routes, gas prices, business reviews and access to live traffic cameras.

2. Waze: It is a free mapping application. It got crowd-sourced mapping, so you can get person-on-the-scene traffic updates, information about traffic jams, accidents, road hazards, gas prices, speed traps and more based on the number of people using the app in your area. Because of crowd-sourced it also has the downsides like inaccuracies, accidental or otherwise, and a dearth of information if not enough people are using it.

3. TomTom: It got point to point or it locates endpoints like hotels, restaurants, gas stations, bookstores, etc. TomTom has it idiosyncrasies which even GPS doesn’t have. The only downfall of this application is that it is a paid application and you have to pay approximately $39 to download it.

4. MotionX GPS Drive: When it comes to GPS spending money over navigation system of iPhone is just waste of money when you can have MotionX GPS Drive application. First of all, it is really capable of searching destinations that are presented in a driver wheel interface with buttons for searching like Bing, Wikipedia, and Facebook etc.  It is a data connected mapping app. This means it must rely on your phone’s data connection in order to work.

There many other map applications are available in iTunes to be downloaded some of them are free and even paid apps are also available. Download one as per your need. If you are someone who drives a lot and needs constant driving instructions or if you are planning for a long drive then it’s better to download such apps in your phone. At the end, all we hope that let Apple Inc. fix this problem ASAP. 

You can suggest other map applications too under the comment section.