Maps are one of the key features in a smartphone and Apple is terribly behind on that. No turn by turn mapping and sorely outdated 2D map design. Android has the edge on this.
I prefer iOS’s map UI greatly, but that’s personal preference. When it comes to turn-by-turn guidance, iOS comes with no solution, while Android comes with a terrible one: you lose guidance when you lose cell signal, because it’s Internet dependent! Haven’t ever lost the cell signal at the moment you most needed it? That’s fortunate—wait until you do. (My Android friends have.)
For $15, I upgraded iOS from no turn-by-turn guidance to something FAR better than Android has built in: Navigon MyRegion (usually $20-$25) with the map data pre-loaded. It even runs great on my old iPhone with SIM removed. No Internet needed. Choose other brands if you wish: TomTom, Garmin, whatever—but I like that MyRegion allowed me to buy just my half of the US.
So if Android’s big selling point here is that you can save $20-$30 on turn-by-turn guidance, but the penalty is that you lose it sometimes when you need it... no thanks
I agree it’s a nice “extra” to toss in out-of-the-box without needing an app. But it’s not nice enough to solve the problem well.
(And if you really want Internet-dependent turn-by-turn guidance on iOS, the Waze app, for one, is free. It’s fine in cities, at least.)
