Photo: autoevolution
Google Maps continues to be the preferred navigation app for many iPhone users out there, both on their mobile devices and on CarPlay.
And now that it also comes with support for the CarPlay dashboard, it’s easy to see why Google Maps is the top choice in the Apple ecosystem.
At the same time, the frequent updates that the app receives further polishes the experience for everybody, and this appears to be the case of Google Maps 5.55 as well. The update that went live this week is now available for all iOS users, and it can be installed from the App Store here.
As usual, Google doesn’t provide any information as to what’s included in this latest update, but judging from user feedback, the new version of the app refines the GPS tracking system on iPhone. In other words, version 5.55 seems to resolve at least some of the GPS problems that users experienced in the past and which sometimes broke down the app completely.
Without accurate GPS data, Google Maps can no longer determine users’ locations and believes they are on a different street than they actually are. Eventually, the app ends up offering inaccurate navigation directions.
But while many are seeing an improved GPS connection after this update, version 5.55 has caused an odd black screen problem on CarPlay for me. After installing the update, every time I launch Google Maps following an iPhone reboot, the app gets stuck with a black screen on CarPlay, and the only way to deal with it is to reconnect the smartphone to the car.
This only happens the first time I launch Google Maps after starting the iPhone, so I think that a simple workaround is to just launch and close the app and then connect the device to the car to run CarPlay.
This doesn’t seem to be a widespread problem and the generic workarounds like replacing the cables and everything else don’t seem to make any difference for now.
At the same time, the frequent updates that the app receives further polishes the experience for everybody, and this appears to be the case of Google Maps 5.55 as well. The update that went live this week is now available for all iOS users, and it can be installed from the App Store here.
As usual, Google doesn’t provide any information as to what’s included in this latest update, but judging from user feedback, the new version of the app refines the GPS tracking system on iPhone. In other words, version 5.55 seems to resolve at least some of the GPS problems that users experienced in the past and which sometimes broke down the app completely.
Without accurate GPS data, Google Maps can no longer determine users’ locations and believes they are on a different street than they actually are. Eventually, the app ends up offering inaccurate navigation directions.
But while many are seeing an improved GPS connection after this update, version 5.55 has caused an odd black screen problem on CarPlay for me. After installing the update, every time I launch Google Maps following an iPhone reboot, the app gets stuck with a black screen on CarPlay, and the only way to deal with it is to reconnect the smartphone to the car.
This only happens the first time I launch Google Maps after starting the iPhone, so I think that a simple workaround is to just launch and close the app and then connect the device to the car to run CarPlay.
This doesn’t seem to be a widespread problem and the generic workarounds like replacing the cables and everything else don’t seem to make any difference for now.
Google News