I imagine certain features like Google Maps’ different busyness indicators might be missing because otherwise that would require telemetry?
Try OrganicMaps (https://organicmaps.app) on Android. It’s awesome!
it’s nice, but its navigation/route finding can be pretty atrocious
This is my favorite front end for openstreetmaps. The only problem is I live in NJ and most addresses are missing. I usually just get coordinates from Google maps and add them manually.
Can you use this with Android Auto?
Oh wow, this is great! Thanks.
Only thing I consistently don’t see well done are parks and other green spaces, where the boundaries are ill defined or missing. Other than that, also my mainstay
Try adjusting them on openstreetmap.org/edit, takes a few minutes at most
Will try, thanks
2nded! I really like it as a google alternative for maps and nav.
https://www.openstreetmap.org/
It’s the only one I know, I’ve also done mapping for them and updating several places around my home town.
I like Organic Maps. It uses the openstreetmap data.
Never heard of it but a great tip! Looks very nice, thank you.
Open Street Map is legitimate. In bicycling communities, Strava is the gold standard app for tracking rides, and it uses Open Street Maps on the backend. It’s always super accurate for me, even for fairly obscure bike trails off the beaten path.
I noticed allot of the trails in my area are mapped better than on Google.
Wow, that’s so cool. 👍
My house doesn’t even exist on OpenStreetMap, so I don’t have much faith in it
Then you can map it and add it to the map with a free account and some “proof”, unlike Google Maps where the main road to my colleague and his four neighbours houses still isn’t on Google Maps after almost a year of reporting. The road is almost a year old but my colleague still can’t get deliveries to his house.
Try it out! The mapping community on OpenStreetMap is often very helpful and open to new people.
This is why these alternatives fail. We could be talking about maps or MS Office. If the end user has to “fix” the software, it will fail. Google spends A LOT of money maintaining google maps so that the user does not have to.
All software and services has bugs and missing features, Google maps as well.
The difference here is that the user is actually able to fix these missing details on the maps themselves if they want. Or ask the local mapping team for help.
Have you ever tried to correct anything on Google maps?
I have given feedback on google maps on businesses that are either closed or have the wrong hours on google maps. Google maps has a feedback option that is easily accessible from location on the map. That’s about the extent I am willing to participate.
Yes, many times. I’d say 80% of the time, my correction goes through the same day.
Have you ever tried to correct something on Google Maps? I get the desire to want to switch to open alternatives, and I’m all for it, but Google Maps is not exactly hard to get fixed yourself.
Yes I have corrected Google on numerous times and sure the changes go through, only to be rescinded after about three months.
I work at a small business with only a few employees, one of my tasks is to update our online presence. Our warehouse is located in an awkward position which makes it hard for deliveries to find us, often they call for directions. I have gotten Google to change our pin position to a more correct place and also added a small road to get to us but these disappear after about three months. I have tried to contact Google about it for over a year but I have gotten no answers.
Fix it or STFU
Chill man
Almost all alternatives use OpenStreetMaps. I prefer Magic Earth but all of them are similar enough
The main issue is OSM. They lack many addresses (varies A LOT among different countries, some are fine) and POIs. Please consider contributing yourself, because it depends only on volunteers!
It is SUPER easy. Just download StreetComplete on Android to add multiple different info in a very easy way (or just house numbers which are the most important info) and EveryDoor for POI editing/deletion/addition in just a few clicks. And don’t worry if you don’t input something because you aren’t sure as long as what you enter is correct
interestingly in my region in germany osm is more reliable in regards of house numbers then google is
in some areas osm is insanely detailed, with trash cans, flower pots, and all kind of stuff. Nerds fucking rock.
Some basic information, including building numbers, can also be edited from within Organic Maps.
OrganicMaps, love it
Currently on vacation and switched to organic maps for the trip. Some stuff is awesome and some is kinda counter intuitive. Try to stick with it for now and see if I get used to it.
For walking nothing beats OpenStreetMap. Absolutely destroys Google maps as it knows all the footpaths and what is and isn’t walkable.
For driving I’m stuck with Google due to Android Auto.
For finding businesses etc Here is the best alternative but frankly Google is in a different league in this regard, nothing beats it.
If you want a good alternative for driving try out Magic Earth! Also uses openstreetmaps and has some Waze like features to report stuff
I am waiting for an android auto update where it has a mute button for navigation, if it had that I could live with all the inconveniences.
I am not using Android Auto, but cant you just change the voice volume to 0 in the app? Wont it carry over the settings to the car?
Sure but that is a lot more difficult to do when you forget and your a mile down the road and it’s illegal to use your phone while driving. I might use it for my normal drives that I just leave on for reporting and use gmaps for navigation until it’s added though.
Thanks, I tried it a while ago (two years or more) and didn’t like it then, but it looks a lot better now. Will give it a go on some routes I know and see how it does!
Osmand with some of these custom maps that add address data to the normal maps. It works amazingly and is also entirely offline.
I’ve been using Osmand for years, it works fine here in Denmark. I just use the standard maps.
Offline functionality used to be very important to me, but not so much anymore. Still I’d hate my map to stop working, just because I don’t have good enough signal.
I find offline still very important. Great for travelling, mobile data, and reliability
But I also have a SD card full of music on my phone. And no cloud storage
Oh my thank you so much, this and no trafic data are my main 2 pain points with this app, now it’s one less!
Also on F-Droid!
Why isn’t that address data included in OpenStreetMaps and/or OSMAnd by default?
good question :( why not upstream the data?
I use OsmAnd~ it’s very nice ,and open source . Oh and if you use the F-droid version you got the pro feature .
OsmAnd is awesome, I use it especially for cycling. It has an awesome cycling/hiking route planner, and even the smallest forest paths are on the map!
Oh yes for bike it’s amazing . I even find 1 accesses to a highway store wich normaly are not alowed .
openstreetmaps.org ecosystem
for navigation I use Organic Maps: https://f-droid.org/en/packages/app.organicmaps/
I like OsmAnd too, but it’s too much for most of my use cases. I still use it for recording trips.
I use Open Street Maps. There are multiple clients available, but the one I use is called OSMAnd+. It pretty much works just as well as Google Maps in my experience.
The FOSS ones suck in comparison honestly. There’s really just osmAnd that has a really ancient UI. As for other OSM(OpenStreetMaps), I find MAPS.ME to be the best, but it’s closed source with some crypto scam crap built in that you can’t disable.
I don’t really like OSM based maps because they miss tons of places where I’m at, when I specifically need building numbers and locations. Also the search on both apps is god awful and straight broken.
Google Maps is definitely miles ahead of the competition here. The other features like seeing how busy businesses are, reviews/images, menu and phone number/website. These are also icing on top of the cake that make it essential to have which none of the competition have, let alone any FOSS ones.
It really depends on where in the world. I’m in the Caribbean and Google maps is terrible here.
Even on the main road network there is places where a bridge is seen as an intersection on Google maps.
Open street maps is much better here.
The app I’m using for open street map is called Organic Maps.
Yeah when traveling I’m always supplementing my Google maps with OsmAnd just because gmaps is missing so much data.
Honestly, OsmAnd doesn’t have that bad of an ui these days. I’m perfectly happy with it, most of the time. Definitely prefer it to Google Maps while cycling.
Organic Maps is a great open source replacement for MAPS.ME and osmAND, but also with the same disadvantage of not having good public transport options and needing to download offline maps beforehand. Magic Earth, while not FOSS, at least does show public transport times (in my country at least).
Address based search works, but the data is largely lacking.
You can help by adding building numbers from within Organ Maps (tap a building and, then “edit place”).
The underlying OSM dataset supports building number interpolation, so even a few accurate entries could be very helpful.
Open Street Maps. It has some gaps or missed addresses/neighborhoods/roads because it is built on contributions of volunteers.
I like OsmAnd as a client for using open street maps. I hadn’t heard of organic maps though which someone else mentioned- I’ll have to give it a try!
Organic Maps. It uses OpenStreetMap as a backend, plus it has hiking trails as well.
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I’m curious, what are some steps I can take to degoogle my phone? Obviously using non Google apps when possible (browser, email client, etc…)
What worked for you?
You will basically need to start fresh with a custom rom as google services are deeply ingrained into the standard operating system. Its almost impossible/not worth it even to to to get rid of those once they are installed. You could check first, which custom roms are available for your phone. Graphene, divestos and calyxos are probably the most private roms, but only available on a few models. Lineageos is widely available but will need extra steps to degoogle.
If a custom rom seems like too much hasle your can improve your privacy most easily by choosing a tracker and dns blocking doh/dns sever on android. It only takes minutes.
Android settings -> search for private dns -> chose private dns provider hostname -> doh.mullvad.net
More examples for providers here: https://www.kuketz-blog.de/empfehlungsecke/#dns
Even lineage OS isn’t available for my motorola g73, so I just removed all google apps, including google play services, via adb
You will basically need to start fresh with a custom rom as google services are deeply ingrained into the standard operating system. Its almost impossible/not worth it even to to to get rid of those once they are installed. You could check first, which custom roms are available for your phone. Graphene, divestos and calyxos are probably the most private roms, but only available on a few models. Lineageos is widely available but will need extra steps to degoogle.
If a custom rom seems like too much hasle your can improve your privacy most easily by choosing a tracker and dns blocking doh/dns sever on android. It only takes minutes.
Android settings -> search for private dns -> chose private dns provider hostname -> doh.mullvad.net
More examples for providers here: https://www.kuketz-blog.de/empfehlungsecke/#dns
Solid! Thank you
You will basically need to start fresh with a custom rom as google services are deeply ingrained into the standard operating system. Its almost impossible/not worth it even to to to get rid of those once they are installed. You could check first, which custom roms are available for your phone. Graphene, divestos and calyxos are probably the most private roms, but only available on a few models. Lineageos is widely available but will need extra steps to degoogle.
If a custom rom seems like too much hasle your can improve your privacy most easily by choosing a tracker and dns blocking doh/dns sever on android. It only takes minutes.
Android settings -> search for private dns -> chose private dns provider hostname -> doh.mullvad.net
More examples for providers here: https://www.kuketz-blog.de/empfehlungsecke/#dns
there is grapheneos for pixel and some other devices
You will basically need to start fresh with a custom rom as google services are deeply ingrained into the standard operating system. Its almost impossible/not worth it even to to to get rid of those once they are installed. You could check first, which custom roms are available for your phone. Graphene, divestos and calyxos are probably the most private roms, but only available on a few models. Lineageos is widely available but will need extra steps to degoogle.
If a custom rom seems like too much hasle your can improve your privacy most easily by choosing a tracker and dns blocking doh/dns sever on android. It only takes minutes.
Android settings -> search for private dns -> chose private dns provider hostname -> doh.mullvad.net
More examples for providers here: https://www.kuketz-blog.de/empfehlungsecke/#dns
You will basically need to start fresh with a custom rom as google services are deeply ingrained into the standard operating system. Its almost impossible/not worth it even to to to get rid of those once they are installed. You could check first, which custom roms are available for your phone. Graphene, divestos and calyxos are probably the most private roms, but only available on a few models. Lineageos is widely available but will need extra steps to degoogle.
If a custom rom seems like too much hasle your can improve your privacy most easily by choosing a tracker and dns blocking doh/dns sever on android. It only takes minutes.
Android settings -> search for private dns -> chose private dns provider hostname -> doh.mullvad.net
More examples for providers here: https://www.kuketz-blog.de/empfehlungsecke/#dns
You will basically need to start fresh with a custom rom as google services are deeply ingrained into the standard operating system. Its almost impossible/not worth it even to to to get rid of those once they are installed. You could check first, which custom roms are available for your phone. Graphene, divestos and calyxos are probably the most private roms, but only available on a few models. Lineageos is widely available but will need extra steps to degoogle.
If a custom rom seems like too much hasle your can improve your privacy most easily by choosing a tracker and dns blocking doh/dns sever on android. It only takes minutes.
Android settings -> search for private dns -> chose private dns provider hostname -> doh.mullvad.net
More examples for providers here: https://www.kuketz-blog.de/empfehlungsecke/#dns
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OpenStreetMap. Google Maps is probably the best product in the field tho, even among paid solutions.
I have tried other open source apps but always end up back on google maps because I live in a city and need detailed directions all the time…
That’s the best part about OSM, if it’s lacking in your area, it’s super easy to fix yourself! iD, the editor built into openstreetmap.org, is super easy to use, or an app I started using a lot more recently is StreetComplete, which lets you answer simple questions as you walk around
I appreciate that and think its really cool. If I lived in a more rural area I could see using it, but it doesn’t help me when I get lost in the city with complex traffic patterns. I wish I could quit google maps but it will be a while before it works well enough as a replacement for me.
