Wish i could rely on alternatives like OSM. But every time i try its horrendously bad. Search is near useless. Dont have an exact address? That sucks you won’t find anything. Directions are basic, roads that no longer exist are used, and ofc it can’t take current traffic into account.
This is all in Seattle, WA so it’s not lile its a density problem. I have learning disabilities that specifically make navigation in unfamiliar areas nearly impossible for me. I need my GPS to be reliable, while Google does occasionally do something stupid OSM does it every single time i open the app.
Which is a shame because its way nicer looking and uses less memory/cpu then google maps, stays snappy and has some cool extra features. But i need to be able to search abstract concepts like grocery, restaurant, ramen, hardware store and have it actually find locations. Hell even if i search a specific name like Safeway it usually cant find it. Needing an exact address only makes a map worthless.
There are many OSM apps, results may vary a lot. For search and adresses, Magic Earth might be your best choice. They also integrate some open data sources to improve address search, and there’s some live traffic data.
Of course, if the road data is simply wrong, there’s little to be done about that. But some fixes are easy enough to do yourself without previous experience, or you can just drop a map Note on OpenStreetMap.org describing the issue and someone will fix it for you.
OpenStreetMap in the US doesn’t have the same level of detail as in Europe, but it is evolving quickly. So even if it is not perfect now, don’t give up on it forever.
Wish i could rely on alternatives like OSM. But every time i try its horrendously bad. Search is near useless. Dont have an exact address? That sucks you won’t find anything. Directions are basic, roads that no longer exist are used, and ofc it can’t take current traffic into account.
This is all in Seattle, WA so it’s not lile its a density problem. I have learning disabilities that specifically make navigation in unfamiliar areas nearly impossible for me. I need my GPS to be reliable, while Google does occasionally do something stupid OSM does it every single time i open the app.
Which is a shame because its way nicer looking and uses less memory/cpu then google maps, stays snappy and has some cool extra features. But i need to be able to search abstract concepts like grocery, restaurant, ramen, hardware store and have it actually find locations. Hell even if i search a specific name like Safeway it usually cant find it. Needing an exact address only makes a map worthless.
There are many OSM apps, results may vary a lot. For search and adresses, Magic Earth might be your best choice. They also integrate some open data sources to improve address search, and there’s some live traffic data. Of course, if the road data is simply wrong, there’s little to be done about that. But some fixes are easy enough to do yourself without previous experience, or you can just drop a map Note on OpenStreetMap.org describing the issue and someone will fix it for you. OpenStreetMap in the US doesn’t have the same level of detail as in Europe, but it is evolving quickly. So even if it is not perfect now, don’t give up on it forever.