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Google Updates Maps and Waze for iOS, Top CarPlay Feature Still Missing

Google has recently released new updates for both Google Maps and Waze on iOS, but the most anticipated feature is still nowhere to be seen.
New Waze for iOS update in the App Store 1 photo
Photo: autoevolution
Right now, Google owns two of the most popular navigation apps that iPhone users turn to when launching CarPlay on their head units.

And despite rolling out updates for both of them every now and then, Google still doesn’t seem to be in a rush to provide users with support for the CarPlay dashboard.

Earlier this year when it rolled out iOS 13.4, Apple officially unlocked the maps card on the CarPlay dashboard for third-party vendors, technically allowing other apps to replace Apple Maps on the multi-view screen. The only requirement was for apps themselves to support this feature, which means that it’s only up to developers to add such functionality.

As the maker of the most popular navigation apps, Google was supposed to do this rather fast, but contrary to all the expectations, the search giant isn’t very committed to making this happen.

This is why the recently released Waze for iOS 4.64.2 and Google Maps version 5.47 come without support for the dashboard. Instead, what they bring are bug fixes and additional optimizations under the hood, according to the official changelogs.

In the case of Waze, Google says it resolved “a bug that caused the app to close after searching for a saved location,” but this is actually an older changelog that was first published on June 28. If anything, this update introduces additional fixes for the same bug.

What I noticed after installing the latest Waze update is that the app sometimes takes more time to locate me on the map, something that didn’t happen before this new version was released. I’m not sure this is a widespread behavior, but the change is easily noticeable, especially when launching the app.

Google Maps also comes with a generic bug, but hopefully, the company improves the app’s general reliability, as some users complained of various crashes and GPS tracking problems on CarPlay.
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About the author: Bogdan Popa
Bogdan Popa profile photo

Bogdan keeps an eye on how technology is taking over the car world. His long-term goals are buying an 18-wheeler because he needs more space for his kid’s toys, and convincing Google and Apple that Android Auto and CarPlay deserve at least as much attention as their phones.
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