This is just a guess, but it's probably linked somehow to Apple Intelligence -- which would make it available only on 15 series models and later. Apple has a bad habit of making those kind of flimsy connections at times.
It’s not a separate thing. It just happens - Maps learns what your preferred routes are, e.g., it tells you to take main street, but you consistently take 1st ave instead, so after awhile, it’ll start telling you to take 1st ave.
No it’s not! I delete the Maps app (and all its data). Re-installed. Never was asked to opt-in or out. And the setting is still not there.
This article gives bad advice, since, unlike Google Maps, your Visited Places in Apple Maps is not shared with anyone,
In iOS 26, Apple Maps has a feature called Visited Places that when enabled automatically logs where you've been, with the aim of making it easier to revisit your favorite spots or to share locations with friends.
While it can be useful for tracking your travels, you might prefer to keep your location history private. Here's how to disable the feature and clear your history.
What Is Visited Places?
Visited Places keeps a record of locations you've visited, organizing them by category such as restaurants, shops, or transit stops. The feature is end-to-end encrypted, so Apple can't read your data, and it syncs across all your Apple devices signed into the same account.
You can search your visited places by name, date, or category, add personal notes, and even save locations to custom guides. However, if you'd rather not have Maps tracking your movements at all, you can turn it off completely.
How to Turn Off Visited Places
When you upgrade to iOS 26, the Maps app pops up an alert on first launch letting you know about the new Visited Places feature, so that you can opt in or opt out. If you opted in and now want to disable it, or you don't remember seeing the popup, here's what to do.
- Open the Settings app on your iPhone.
- Tap through to Apps ➝ Maps ➝ Location.
- Toggle off the Visited Places switch.
With the toggle disabled, Maps will no longer track the places you visit. Note that you can also access the toggle by going to Privacy and Security ➝ Location Services ➝ Maps.
How to Clear Your Visited Places History
In the Maps app's Visited Places card, the Keep Visits buttons gives you options to change how long visits are kept (three months, one year, and forever). If you want to delete the entirety of location history, you can also clear it from within the Maps app.
Your visited places history will now be permanently deleted. You can also remove individual locations by tapping More (the three dots) next to any place card and selecting Remove.
- Open the Maps app on your iPhone.
- Tap Places, then tap Visited Places.
- Scroll to the bottom, tap Clear History, then tap Clear All.
Article Link: Apple Maps May Be Logging Places You Visit – How to Disable
As noted in the article, Visited Places data is end-to-end encrypted, and not shared with anyone. It’s your information, there to help you. There’s no reason to ever delete it, and plenty of reasons not to. For example, you can expect that Visited Places will be an important part of the personal context that will enable Siri to be able to do things like book a table at the restaurant that you had veal milanese at a couple of weeks ago without sharing where you’ve been with giant cloud AI service vendors (and their advertiser customers).
In iOS 26, Apple Maps has a feature called Visited Places that when enabled automatically logs where you've been, with the aim of making it easier to revisit your favorite spots or to share locations with friends.
While it can be useful for tracking your travels, you might prefer to keep your location history private. Here's how to disable the feature and clear your history.
What Is Visited Places?
Visited Places keeps a record of locations you've visited, organizing them by category such as restaurants, shops, or transit stops. The feature is end-to-end encrypted, so Apple can't read your data, and it syncs across all your Apple devices signed into the same account.
You can search your visited places by name, date, or category, add personal notes, and even save locations to custom guides. However, if you'd rather not have Maps tracking your movements at all, you can turn it off completely.
How to Turn Off Visited Places
When you upgrade to iOS 26, the Maps app pops up an alert on first launch letting you know about the new Visited Places feature, so that you can opt in or opt out. If you opted in and now want to disable it, or you don't remember seeing the popup, here's what to do.
- Open the Settings app on your iPhone.
- Tap through to Apps ➝ Maps ➝ Location.
- Toggle off the Visited Places switch.
With the toggle disabled, Maps will no longer track the places you visit. Note that you can also access the toggle by going to Privacy and Security ➝ Location Services ➝ Maps.
How to Clear Your Visited Places History
In the Maps app's Visited Places card, the Keep Visits buttons gives you options to change how long visits are kept (three months, one year, and forever). If you want to delete the entirety of location history, you can also clear it from within the Maps app.
Your visited places history will now be permanently deleted. You can also remove individual locations by tapping More (the three dots) next to any place card and selecting Remove.
- Open the Maps app on your iPhone.
- Tap Places, then tap Visited Places.
- Scroll to the bottom, tap Clear History, then tap Clear All.
Article Link: Apple Maps May Be Logging Places You Visit – How to Disable
Then the feature isn't available in your region (I believe there are only 6 countries currently), and/or your phone is too old to support it, and/or you have "Significant Locations" setting disabled (which this feature depends on)
This feature is per Apple currently disabled for all users in the EU! So you cannot enable this feature and there is no way to disable this feature, as it is technically removed for all iphones in the EU ...
In iOS 26, Apple Maps has a feature called Visited Places that when enabled automatically logs where you've been, with the aim of making it easier to revisit your favorite spots or to share locations with friends.
While it can be useful for tracking your travels, you might prefer to keep your location history private. Here's how to disable the feature and clear your history.
What Is Visited Places?
Visited Places keeps a record of locations you've visited, organizing them by category such as restaurants, shops, or transit stops. The feature is end-to-end encrypted, so Apple can't read your data, and it syncs across all your Apple devices signed into the same account.
You can search your visited places by name, date, or category, add personal notes, and even save locations to custom guides. However, if you'd rather not have Maps tracking your movements at all, you can turn it off completely.
How to Turn Off Visited Places
When you upgrade to iOS 26, the Maps app pops up an alert on first launch letting you know about the new Visited Places feature, so that you can opt in or opt out. If you opted in and now want to disable it, or you don't remember seeing the popup, here's what to do.
- Open the Settings app on your iPhone.
- Tap through to Apps ➝ Maps ➝ Location.
- Toggle off the Visited Places switch.
With the toggle disabled, Maps will no longer track the places you visit. Note that you can also access the toggle by going to Privacy and Security ➝ Location Services ➝ Maps.
How to Clear Your Visited Places History
In the Maps app's Visited Places card, the Keep Visits buttons gives you options to change how long visits are kept (three months, one year, and forever). If you want to delete the entirety of location history, you can also clear it from within the Maps app.
Your visited places history will now be permanently deleted. You can also remove individual locations by tapping More (the three dots) next to any place card and selecting Remove.
- Open the Maps app on your iPhone.
- Tap Places, then tap Visited Places.
- Scroll to the bottom, tap Clear History, then tap Clear All.
Article Link: Apple Maps May Be Logging Places You Visit – How to Disable
I need to start trying it out more. One thing I love about it is the way it gives directions, such as telling you to go past this light, then turn right at the next. Meanwhile, Google will tell me "In 0.5 miles, turn right".
I thought it was only me having that problem. A while back someone sent me an address link for Google Maps, and because I was in the middle of traffic I just let Google Maps guide me. So at least twice it told me to turn the wrong way.I need to start trying it out more. One thing I love about it is the way it gives directions, such as telling you to go past this light, then turn right at the next. Meanwhile, Google will tell me "In 0.5 miles, turn right".
Also... this might be anecdotal, but it's happened enough times and my fiancé has heard it too... Google will occasionally say to turn the opposite direction of which I'm supposed to... but when I get closer to the turn, will then say to turn in the correct direction. I've chalked it up to me not listening, but sometimes I feel like Google's trolling me.
A road map. Seriously, we recently tried to use Apple Maps for a multi-day drive across country and it absolutely sucked.
Yeah, I agree. It’s actually bordering on clickbait and misinformation. The feature is not only opt-in, but it’s private by design, and has none of the concerns that go along with sort-of equivalent features on other apps. Even worse, it’s cajoling people into possibly disabling a feature that will be an important part of providing personal context, which means that those who follow the instructions will have a worse user experience than those of us who do not - with no impact on privacy either way.
Apple Maps isn’t a trip-planning app. It’s a navigation app. There are trip-planning apps that might be a better choice for that kind of thing — although I’ll note that there aren’t a lot of them - seems that long road trips are quickly becoming a thing of the past.
I used to use Waze all the time. It’s definitely better than Google Maps is, but the only thing that keeps it still on my iPhone is Waze’s support for HOV/HOT lanes, which Apple Maps just doesn’t seem to know about.
And it is prettier than Google Maps and more privacy conscious. I rarely use Google Maps for anything anymore.
