Maps update gives navigation screen a travel-friendly makeover

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Published 1 Sep 2015

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A slight bump in the version number is bringing a pretty big change to how navigation works in Maps for Android.

Version 9.14 provides a much nicer interface gives you more options to planning out your route. For example, when you input your destination beginning point, you’ll see options for driving, transit, walking, or biking right away. eviously, these choices were tucked away behind this screen included a rather tiny map view.

google maps navigation update

The new navigation scheme (center, right) lets you select the mode of tgransportation more easily change up your driving route.

There’s also some type of clever analysis going on behind the scenes, as the route in the screenshot includes “the usual traffic” as the description. knows the Bay Area well.

Maps also gives you more details about a restaurant or other venue’s busiest hours. You can now see how packed the location is, broken down by day, thanks to a new pop-up menu.

The move from Maps 9.13 to 9.14 should eventually hit the ay Store, but as always you can grab it now from A Mirror.

y this matters: is never content to leave its apps alone, though its changes are usually for the better. The key to get more out of Maps is to use all the different menus informational cards to see what else pops up, as sometimes changes roll out from ’s servers without an update to the app itself.