Maps for road tripping
May 10, 2022 11:11 AM   Subscribe

My mom and a friend are going to road trip across the country -- most likely staying in Canada, but possibly dipping into the Northern US -- and would like to have offline maps available on her phone to them for the segments where cell service is sketchy at best. Is there an ideal app for that?

We're looking for a digital solution here, not literal paper maps, but one that doesn't rely on a data connection to load.

Google maps would be ideal because that's what she's used to using, and it lets you download maps of specific cities for offline use, but not, like 'all of canada' or even 'everything near this very long driving route' near as I can tell. It's not really the cities that are of great concern, because they'll have data in cities. We're more worried about small towns where they might stop for lunch or overnight or making sure they don't get thrown off by construction-related or forest fire detours. But maybe there's a way to do a better download along a route that that we just haven't found?

She has an iPhone, so an Apple maps method would also work.

Or another app that's more road trip friendly?
posted by jacquilynne to Travel & Transportation (16 answers total) 3 users marked this as a favorite
 
maps.me lets you download maps, but I am not sure if it is any better than google maps for large areas. I was able to use google maps offline in Ireland after downloading the whole country. I think they would be also fine downloading sections at a time when they are in the cities.
posted by soelo at 11:25 AM on May 10, 2022 [3 favorites]


I use CoPilot GPS as a backup offline GPS appliaction. https://copilotgps.com
posted by WizKid at 11:36 AM on May 10, 2022


Assuming adequate space on her phone, Google Maps does a pretty decent job of this, and allows multiple maps. For example, I can make a map that covers my home in Chicago, going all the way southwest 300 miles to St. Louis and encompassing Evansville Indiana and eastern Iowa. If they overlayed 10 or so of those offline maps they could cover off most of the country.
posted by AgentRocket at 11:38 AM on May 10, 2022 [7 favorites]


I doubt Google maps would let you download the entire Canada. I guess it will let them download stuff around a medium-sized city, but there's no way to force it to blanket a whole region. They may be better off with one of the standalone GPS devices, and rely on a WiFi hotspot within a city to download additional maps as they move along to supplement the standalone GPS.
posted by kschang at 11:44 AM on May 10, 2022


I use CoPilot GPS as a backup offline GPS application.

Yeah I have a Garmin GPS and it's nice because it can be mounted on the dash, you can get them with Canada and US maps and it doesn't use up your phone's charge and you can then use your phone for other things. You can get older ones for very cheap and the maps are still mostly good.

But yes, Google maps is also really pretty good for this but you have to do it in chunks.
posted by jessamyn at 11:46 AM on May 10, 2022


Depending on the level of detail required, the low-tech solution is to just screenshot the maps from the app before losing cell service. Obviously this won't help much in like, downtown Toronto. But like, there's not a lot between, say, Moose Jaw and Swift Current, SK. Even better, screenshot them from a desktop, then email them to the phone, and save them to the Cameral Roll.
posted by kevinbelt at 12:26 PM on May 10, 2022


I've used Roadtrippers in the past and been pretty happy with it, and it appears that they support offline maps, although I've never tried them myself. Looks like you'd have to pay for their subscription however.
posted by cgg at 12:31 PM on May 10, 2022


The best offline maps and navigation I have used on both "Windows Phone" and "Apple iOS" devices is 'HERE WeGo" - which AFAIK used to be owned by Nokia.

It works very well for cross-Canada and/or northern US trips - I have also used it going from Ontario to Florida, Alberta to Arizona, within Australia and Europe.
posted by rozcakj at 12:43 PM on May 10, 2022 [1 favorite]


I use Pocket Earth. I paid something like five or ten dollars for a detailed street map of the world. I used this even before I got a smart phone, as it works even on a wifi-only ipad or ipod touch when used with a GPS receiver. You have to download the maps while you have good internet access.
posted by metonym at 1:19 PM on May 10, 2022


inRoute is my choice. Downloading maps is non-trivial, unless you make a route of where you’d like to go , and then telling the app “I expect no service, fetch these maps, please” is possible. I don’t remember the exact invocation off the top of my brain, but they also have great support.

But I use inRoute for all sorts of this where standard maps is deficient. It will let you pre-specify a turn-by-turn route, or pre-specify “avoid this piece of road” so the routing can still cope with detours, and will avoid that stretch if at all possible.
posted by DaveP at 1:30 PM on May 10, 2022


I take back my recommendation for Roadtrippers. Just tried to download maps myself account and they only have specific areas, mainly tourist destinations. And nothing in Canada.
posted by cgg at 2:11 PM on May 10, 2022


Open Street maps
Osmand+
Is a bit less good in terms of ui than Google maps, but EVERYTHING works offline.

They should get it and play around with it until they learn the quirks, but I've used it for long road trips, hikes in the Arctic, long bike trips etc for years.
posted by Acari at 6:33 PM on May 10, 2022


I’ll second maps.me. I’ve used all over Europe as well as in the US. It has maps that you download for the specifics cities or sections of the country you are visiting. It can do turn by turn navigation even when I had Data turned off in the UK. It also has lots of info about hotels,restaurants and other businesses.

It is free, but it is one of only two apps on my phone that I voluntarily send money to make sure they stay in business.
posted by jvbthegolfer at 11:37 PM on May 10, 2022


But maybe there's a way to do a better download along a route that that we just haven't found?

On road trips where I've wanted to avoid using data, I've downloaded Google Maps to my phone. The limitation is that the app makes you download map data in "tiles" of a fixed geographical size; one is about 250 km x 450 km and the other is about 700 km x 200 km. (Which one you can do depends on whether you're in portrait or landscape mode.) But there's nothing stopping you, other than the storage capabilities of your phone, from downloading as many such tiles as you want.

So the way I would do this is:
  1. Search for a city near the start of your trip.
  2. Pull up the information pane about the city that appears at the bottom of the window, click on the three dots at the top right, and select "download offline maps".
  3. In the screen that says "download this map?", zoom and pan the map until the highlighted region covers as much of your trip as possible.
  4. Download the map.
  5. Repeat with another city further along the route, until you have covered the entire route to your satisfaction.

posted by Johnny Assay at 5:29 AM on May 11, 2022


Seconding Pocket Earth. I've used it a lot and really like it.
posted by kristi at 1:22 PM on May 12, 2022


Response by poster: In the end, none of this mattered, because they always had data when they needed it. They did make sure to download the next day's route at the hotel the night before, as well.

I did download MapsMe to my mom's phone as a backup, but they never used it.
posted by jacquilynne at 7:45 AM on August 12, 2022


« Older Drinking Up The Larder   |   Details about the Institut für... Newer »
This thread is closed to new comments.