What are the differences between the different map/GPS apps?

[vellocet]

So, I've started riding my motorcycle around outside the city and Baidu maps, my usual default in town for my ebike, seems like it's not the best.  It can't find some of the countryside locations despite me having the correct street address, and sometimes it suggests less than optimal paths.  What are the pros and cons of each of the GPS apps in China?

 

There's:

• Amap 高德地图
• Sougou maps 搜狗地图
• Tencent maps 腾讯地图

 

Any more?  

 

What's the functional difference between these?  Anyone like or dislike each of them?  Do they have killer features?

 

I know on Baidu maps you can choose celebrity voices to announce your turn-by-turn directions.  You can even record your own voice, though I never got around to this. (It gives you text prompts to speak the words, I was just gonna say it in English but the vocabulary lost me along the way ?)  You can't annotate Baidu maps, only put stars on locations you want to remember.  I'd really prefer to be able to use different icons and be able to write notes.  I have locations starred that I've totally forgotten what they were or why I starred them.  

 

Google maps I gave up on long ago after it continued to insist that locations that closed years ago were still there. New venues didn't appear.  Baidu has them on the map within days, it's shocking how fast they react honestly.  Plus it's just easier to read maps in Chinese characters, some of that pinyin they have on Google for map labels are mystifying.  And Google deliberately hides street names in order to force you to use the app instead of just memorize your town's roads. I'm an Apple hater so no Apple maps.  

[道艺]

I generally default to 高德地图. Only got one complaint and one tip I can share.

 

For some reason when using the apps, I find it so hard to get street names to appear. If I zoom too far in/out, it's a mystery as to where I am. There seems to be a different sweet spot for each road.

 

The cool part though is the 高德实时交通 which let's you see how far out your next bus is, or whether you've actually just missed the last shuttle altogether.

[mungouk]

On 12/1/2021 at 2:37 PM, vellocet said:

I'm an Apple hater so no Apple maps.  

 

OK so for anyone else reading this thread it may be worth mentioning that Apple maps has a lot more detail in since iOS 15 was released.

 

[Jim]

I'm another AMap regular, thought not really tried the others to compare, just sort of rule of thumb that dedicated providers might be better than where it's one of ten thousand things (of course loads of exceptions spring to mind). Find it's been pretty prompt updating the COVID road closures even out here in the sticks and has some right old dirt track back roads so pretty decent experience.

[889]

Satellite View on Google is good to find pockets of traditional housing or see what's behind some high wall.

 

But there's an offset that makes finding your location on Google Maps haphazard.

[vellocet]

On 12/1/2021 at 10:00 PM, 889 said:

Satellite View on Google is good to find pockets of traditional housing or see what's behind some high wall.

Baidu maps has satellite view, too.  It works fine except for islands off the coast which presumably have military installations on them.

 

On 12/1/2021 at 10:00 PM, 889 said:

But there's an offset that makes finding your location on Google Maps haphazard.

Yeah, I forgot about that irritating detail.

 

On 12/1/2021 at 4:55 PM, 道艺 said:

For some reason when using the apps, I find it so hard to get street names to appear. If I zoom too far in/out, it's a mystery as to where I am. There seems to be a different sweet spot for each road.

That's an innovation from Google Maps.  They deliberately do that.  They don't want you learning the roads.  They want you to maximize the amount of time you spend in the app, and if you started to get to know the roads, you'd use the app less!  You don't need to know road names.  You just need to know go left, go right. That's enough for you.

 

On 12/1/2021 at 4:55 PM, 道艺 said:

The cool part though is the 高德实时交通 which let's you see how far out your next bus is, or whether you've actually just missed the last shuttle altogether.

I quickly noticed it also has a feature that, when you're stuck in traffic waiting for a light to change, it will tell you how many cycles of the traffic light you'll have to suffer through.  Pretty cool.

 

On 12/1/2021 at 7:43 PM, Jim said:

sort of rule of thumb that dedicated providers might be better than where it's one of ten thousand things (of course loads of exceptions spring to mind)

I've already seen that Sougou Maps doesn't have a "go by motorcycle" option.  Only car, walking, and bus.  Tencent Maps adds ebike and bicycle, but no motorcycle.  So I suppose the only real option is Amap. I'll switch my default to Amap for a while and see how things go.  Thanks for the advice!

 

I should also mention a neat feature from Baidu Maps (it really does a lot when you dig into the menus).  You tell it how far you want to walk and it will draw a path for you to follow.  Different every time, although if it's near your house you'll necessarily go a lot of the same places.  It took me to some interesting areas I didn't even know existed, and used a pedestrian bridge over the river that I've passed under dozens of times but never really noticed.  

 

And now that I'm playing with Amap for a while, I see it has "我的DIY地图“ which I'll explore further.  Seems you can attach photos to places, already an improvement over Baidu.

[道艺]

God...knowing that frustrates me beyond belief. I enjoy learning street names. It also doesn't help that I've dropped this bad boy quite a few times so the gps isn't all that accurate, meaning I rely on street names more than others.

[abcdefg]

On 12/1/2021 at 12:37 AM, vellocet said:

What's the functional difference between these?  Anyone like or dislike each of them? 

 

Most of my Chinese friends swear by Amap 高德地图。 They tell me it updates more frequently, which makes it more reliable and useful. (I don't know how it stacks up for your specific intended use, namely motorcycle outside city limits.)