TeleNav, one of the largest back-end providers of GPS navigation services for smartphones and other in-car turn-by-turn navigation systems, has announced the upcoming release of a free HTML5-based voice-guided GPS navigation service that works on your iPhone through the Safari Mobile Browser.

“This is an enormous amount of added value for any mobile, location-based website or app focused on travel, shopping, local search, deals and more,” said Sal Dhanani, co-founder and vice president of products for TeleNav. “With one line of code, you can give your customers one-click access to premium, voice-guided turn-by-turn directions to any location, including hotels, restaurants, merchants or deal locations. Customers never need to leave your app.”

As mentioned, the service will be completely browser-based allowing it to run on just about any smartphone, including the iPhone 4 and iPhone 4S. Developers will have the opportunity to add just a single line of code to their existing website or apps, which will allow users to jump directly into the browser for turn-by-turn navigation from within any app, or directly from Safari itself.

If all goes according to plan, we should start seeing it in apps come 2012.

Source: TeleNav

Gogo Navigator supports real-time turn by turn navigation throughout the United States and Canada at a decent price. I recently looked at Garmin StreetPilot for iPhone which is currently priced at $34.99. While the app had a great interface and offers turn by turn navigation, I found it had one huge down side. StreetPilot does not store maps natively. This means if you’re out of range of a signal you won’t be able to access maps since they can’t pull from the servers.

Gogo Navigator uses native maps for navigation. Regardless whether you have a signal or not, you can still get turn by turn directions. They offer maps in regular view as well as real-time 3D view. You also have the features you’d expect from a good GPS app like favorites and places of interest (POI). Gogo Navigator is currently priced at $29.99 in the app store which is a great deal for a decent GPS app. It’s a much lower price point that most and I found it did the job just as well as some of my other GPS apps. Hit the jump for some screens!

iTunes Link

Looks like Verizon iPhone users will be getting access to the same Verizon Navigator app that other Verizon smartphone users have been enjoying for a while now — but our sources at Verizon are now telling us it will only cost $4.99.

Sweet deal if you like subscription-based online maps. If the price proves to be true, anyone going to be taking them up on it?

Magellan RoadMate for iPhone has just been updated to version 1.3 and that means a it’s received several new features to help you better and more enjoyably navigate from point A to point B:

• Location-based offers and coupons – First branded GPS App to provide relevant offers on-screen while you route to your destination. Users can re-route to the sponsoring store’s location or save promotional coupons for redemption at a later time.
• iOS 4.0 support – Multitasking capabilities enable navigation with turn-by-turn instructions and continuous routing to run in the background while using other applications.
• LifeTime real-time traffic information – Included free in the version 1.3 update, users can avoid traffic congestion by comparing current and proposed alternative routes, making well-informed decisions ahead of traffic delays.
• Sharing points of interest – Users can easily share destinations and POIs via email using the RoadMate app.

To celebrate the update Magellan RoadMate is currently on sale in the iTunes App Store: Magellan RoadMate North America is available for $44.99 (regularly $59.99); Magellan RoadMate USA is $34.99 (regularly $49.99); and Magellan RoadMate Canada is $29.99 (regularly $34.99

They’ve also given us three (3) promo codes to pass on to you, our awesome readers. Details and screen shots after the break!

[iTunes link]

To enter the give-away just leave a comment in the thread below telling us which of the new features you like best. Make sure to leave a real email address (it won’t be public but we’ll need it to contact you if you win). As always, promo codes only work in the US App Store (Apple’s rule, not ours!)

Your votes have been counted, your voices have been heard, and we’re proud to announce the 2010 TiPb Readers Choice Award for Favorite Navigation App goes to… NAVIGON Mobile Navigator!

NAVIGON MobileNavigator has been at the forefront turn-by-turn navigation apps since Apple brought the functionality to the iPhone. Now, with iOS 4′s multitasking background location services, and the latest updates and enhancements to MobileNavigator, not only does it rival traditional dedicated GPS units, but in many ways surpasses them.

“We’re honored that the TiPb.com community voted NAVIGON MobileNavigator as their favorite iPhone navigation app. This award recognizes our dedication to delivering innovation and quality products to consumers now and into the future. The iPhone has been and continues to be an extremely important platform for NAVIGON. It has allowed MobileNavigator to significantly move the category of navigation applications forward; delivering a solution that is the most feature rich navigation application available.” – Bernd Hahn, Head of iNavigation at NAVIGON

Congratulations to NAVIGON MobileNavigator, our 2010 TiPb Award Favorite Navigation App!

[iTunes link]

The 2010 TiPb Awards have begun and it’s time to vote on all your favorites. This time it’s for iPhone turn-by-turn navigation apps. With Apple adding background location to iOS 4, almost every navigation app has had an outstanding update this year. Combine that with refreshed UIs and tons of extra features and the category is stacked.

But there can only be one 2010 TiPb Award winner, so head on over to our iPhone App Forum and vote for your favorite now!

• AT&T Navigator/TeleNav [iTunes]
• MotionX GPS Drive [iTunes]
• NAVIGON MobileNavigator [iTunes]
• TomTom [iTunes]
• Waze [iTunes]

Ready, set, vote!

AT&T Navigator for iPhone — powered by TeleNav — has just been updated to version 1.7i and here’s all the new stuff you get:

• Lane Assistance: Need to know what lane you should be in? Lane assist will help you with exactly that, making easier to know where you should be to prepare for your next maneuver.

• Traffic Camera Alerts: Want a heads up before heading into the next traffic light? Traffic Camera Alerts gives you exactly that – a simple way for you to know what’s coming up ahead at the next traffic signal!

• One Touch Speech Recognition: Now, with AT&T Navigator 1.7i, you can now with just one button speak in commands to quickly find the information you’re looking for! You can say things like “Search for the library” or “Drive to Las Vegas, Nevada.”

• Battery Saver Mode: Is there any bigger bummer than finding our your cell phone’s battery has died? With Battery Saver Mode, when you’ve arrive at your destination or have been stationary for a while, this feature will give you peace of mind by turning off your GPS – and helping to save your battery.

• Multitasking: Big fan of iOS4? Then without a doubt, multitasking is an important feature to you.

• Smoother 3D Animations: In the new version of AT&T Navigator, we’re now using a new “OpenGL” engine that allows us to use higher frame rates, better transition animations, and renders faster when panning in 3D maps! What does that mean for you? A better navigation experience!

If you want to see it in action, there’s video after the break. If you want to win one of three (3) free one year subscription, head on over to the iPhone App Forum now!

[iTunes link]

NAVIGON has been on the iTunes App Store for one year, and to celebrate the anniversary they’re offering 50% off their turn-by-turn navigation apps and in-app purchases, including MobileNavigator and MyRegion:

To kick off its second year in the App Store, NAVIGON is celebrating for four days (August 12-15) with a half-off promotion for all North American MobileNavigator apps and most other country versions. The In App Purchase options Traffic Live and Panorama View 3D are also 50 percent off. The additional maps in the MyRegion app get a discount of more than 30 percent.

I recently tried MobileNavigator for the first time when I took a trip up north. We were going to be going through areas of no cell coverage so I couldn’t use the built-in, online Maps app (because they wouldn’t load without data). MobileNavigator puts all the maps on your iPhone so even if you lose data, you still have GPS and it can still display the maps. Sure, it makes for a big download (over 1.5GB for all of North America) but I must say it was amazing. It was very smooth and we never noticed when we dropped from 3G to EDGE or offline — it just kept navigating. It even reminded us about a side trip we’d forgotten about on the way and helped us find a restaurant we just couldn’t locate (we had to trust it though, our own sense of north and south had betrayed us!)

All in all I was very happy with it so if you’re looking for an on-board, offline navigation app for your iPhone, and NAVIGON interests you, this is a great time to try it out. (If you do, make sure you tell me how it works for you).

Here’s the app pricing:

• MobileNavigator North America (includes maps for Canada & US): $39.99 instead of $79.99
• MobileNavigator USA: $24.99 instead of $49.99
• MobileNavigator Canada: $29.99 instead of $59.99
• MobileNavigator US MyRegion East, Central or West: $14.99 instead of $29.99, additional regions $11.99 instead of $14.99.

And in-app purchases

• Traffic Live: $12.99 instead of $24.99
• Panorama View 3D: $4.99 instead of $9.99

[iTunes link]

NAVIGON dropped us a note to let us know that new, feature-filled, iOS 4-friendly version of MobileNavigator they previewed for us back at WWDC 2010 has hit the App Store and is available now. It includes:

• Live Weather
• Clever Parking
• Destination Information Display
• iOS 4 integration (including multitasking)
• Enhanced Retina display buttons and icons for the iPhone 4
• Latest NAVTEQ Maps
• Pedestrian Mode Voice Guidance
• Enhanced Reality View™ Pro and display of street names in the map view

What’s more, NAVIGON is offering limited time, promotional pricing to help ease new users into the new version — $49.99 for MobileNavigator North America and $17.99 for MobileNavigator US MyRegion is available for $17.99 (additional regional map can be accessed as an In App Purchase for $12.99).

[iTunes link]

A double dose of NAVIGON today as they’ve put out a video showing off MobileNavigator on iOS 4 making use of background location. Fast app switching, saved state, and the Location API for taking a call while still receiving navigation directions are all on display.

We’ve also got a video interview with MobileNavigator for iPhone product manager Bern Hahn taken during WWDC 2010 for your viewing pleasure. He tells TiPb what he thinks of Apple’s iOS 4 multitasking, the iPad, and of course, iPhone 4.

Video action after the break.

Multitasking with NAVIGON MobileNavigator iPhone and iOS 4

YouTube link

NAVIGON talks MobileNavigator, iOS 4, iPad, and iPhone 4 at WWDC 2010

YouTube link

Tom Murray, SVP of Marketing, TomTom sat down with me to discuss their turn-by-turn navigation app for the iPhone. Announced at WWDC 2009, over the last year TomTom has managed to get the app to where all its core functionality is in place and they can give iPhone users a really first-class tool to get them from point A to point B. Now, with iOS 4 and its multitasking API for location, they can start getting them in style.

Since TomTom does everything from owning their own maps to selling their own devices, they’re uniquely positioned do things like crowd-source changes in roads or analyze patterns in routes and get that fed back into their system so their 40 million users can share local wisdom whether they’re improving their daily commute or driving in a new city for the first time.

With the iPhone, Apple is providing the device (and the GPS) but TomTom still offers a car kit to supplement and extend the built-in hardware. (I asked if the existing car kit would be compatible with the just-introduced iPhone 4, but they hadn’t had a chance to get their hands on it yet so they’re waiting to whether it fits, whether it requires an adapter, or whether some reengineering will be in order).

No word on an iPad version yet, unfortunately, but turn-by-turn navigation on smartphones is still growing. With free-as-in-Google and open source map apps now on the scene, TomTom is investing in the quality of their service and the trust in their data.

Check out our video interview, after the break!

[TomTom on iTunes]

YouTube link

NAVIGON is getting ready to celebrate WWDC 2010 (and no doubt the background GPS API in iPhone OS 4!) with sale of their MyRegion app. Whether you’re off to San Francisco for WWDC itself or just touring the bay area for fun and frolic, you can grab MyRegion for half off — $14.99 from June 1-11, 2010, with additional maps for sale for $9.99.

MyRegion gives you the power of choice by letting you pick the map region/regions you need but still includes the features known from the award winning North American version, MobileNavigator. It is the first iPhone navigation app that lets users upgrade to additional regions within the app and on the go, providing cross country navigation by choice. The total U.S. map is downloaded upon purchase of the first “MyRegion,” which allows activation of additional map regions via a seamless In App Purchase from within the application. NAVIGON MyRegion allows premium navigation at a reduced price including functions such as Reality View Pro, Google Local Search, Lane Assistant Pro, Enhanced Pedestrian Mode, NAVIGON MyRoutes and much more.

If on-board maps and options are your thing, check it out and let us know how it does for your summer travels.

[iTunes link]

NAVIGON’s new MyRegion is a customizable version of their turn-by-turn MobileNavigator app for iPhone that basically lets you buy just the navigation you need, when you need it, and expand via in-app purchase later.

Three “regions” are available in the US — Western [iTunes link], Central [iTunes link], and Eastern [iTunes link]. Each region is currently on sale for $24.99 until April 12, at which point they’ll be regularly priced at $29.99. Getting an additional region via in-app purchase will cost $12.99 on sale ($14.99 regularly).

What’s included?

NAVIGON MyRegion includes all the features and capabilities as MobileNavigator 1.4 plus NAVIGON MyRoutes. This new feature will be added to MobileNavigator North America via an upcoming update to 1.5.0 due this spring. NAVIGON MyRoutes is an industry first feature that learns from the users driving style to provide customized and better route recommendations. The feature also offers up to two alternative routes clearly displayed on a map including ETA, distance and driving time. This lets user choose the route that best serves their individual situation.

If you don’t already have MobileNavigator and on-board maps are a must-have but not necessarily a have-all, give MyRegion a shot and let us know what you think!

Yesterday Navigon MobileNavigator received a pretty nice update, today Telenav released a update of their own for AT&T Navigator that includes some very nice new features. They are as follows:

• Shake-to-Go(tm): Users can now shake their iPhone at any time while in an AT&T Navigator menu screen and it will automatically initiate a route to a pre-designated “home” address the user has set.
• Speed Limit Display & Alerts: Navigation screen includes speed limit information and provides visual alerts if the limit is exceeded.
• Last Trip Origin: Once a trip is completed, users can easily return to the origin of their last trip by accessing the “Recent Places” menu.
• Nighttime Maps: The brightness levels of map screens are adjusted for nighttime driving for easier viewing.
• Improved Route Avoidance Options: Drivers may now choose to avoid routes that make use of high occupancy vehicle (HOV) lanes or choose to avoid routes that include toll roads.
• Improved Pedestrian Mode: Users will be able to clearly identify when they are navigating in pedestrian mode with the introduction of a new pedestrian icon on the map screen.

AT&T Navigator version 1.5i is now available to download within the App Store. The app is free to download with a subscription cost of $9.99 per month, or $69 for a year.

Check out this latest version in action after the break!

(Ndrive Navigation for iPhone Forum Review by cjvitek. For more Forum Reviews, see the TiPb iPhone App Store Forum Review Index!)

NDrive USA [$32.99 - iTunes link] is a new GPS app which features turn by turn direction, entering the already crowded marketplace. NDrive prides itself on a simple interface, and when looking at the map, that is readily apparent. The map itself has little of the clutter that some of the other apps have – no different colors for different land types, no buildings popping in, no markers for POIs, etc. Just you, the map, and the route. Some people may prefer this approach, others may not. I will point out that in some locations, you do have 3D buildings appear – certainly not in Edinburg TX, however.

The primary menu of NDrive is also focused on simplicity – four buttons, one for mapping, one for settings, one to “find” something (address, POI, etc), and one for “My NDrive”. This is one of the best things about NDrive. The buttons are easy to hit, easy to use, a key feature in any GPS app.

My Ndrive lets you create and store itineraries, define your home location, and other user focused activities. Once you get into some of the detail menus, however, the simplicity seems to vanish. In the settings menu, you have a lot of options of the screen, requiring you to really focus on adjusting things (often with a small plus or minus button to adjust the settings). This detracts somewhat from the great menu buttons in the original screen.

Like many of the recent apps, NDrive loads the maps onto the phone so no data connection is required. The maps themselves are multitouch active, so the commands you have learned (such as pinch and zoom) still work. The keyboard when typing directions is their own, and it is not qwerty. This may not be a problem for some, but for people who are getting used to the iPhone keyboard, it may prove difficult to adjust.

While using the app, the routes it suggested in town were reasonable, and the ETA’s seemed pretty reasonable as well. It did recognize Terlingua, TX (my mystery small town) so the maps seems pretty accurate. It also had my home street, which (being new) some maps are missing. The turn by turn directions didn’t say the street names or anything, simply giving distance and the direction of the turn. While driving, there is a lot of information on the screen – ETA, miles till the turn, distance left, speed. I liked having my GPS app display this information, although I also like being able to adjust it on my own, something that is not possible in NDrive. The map did occasionally stutter a little bit, but this only happened a couple of times during use.

In my mind, however, the main benefit of NDrive is the price. Many of the major GPS apps (which are also downloadable maps, not pay per use/month) are around the $70 to $100 price range. At $32.99, this is by far one of the cheaper apps. Give the features that it does have for this price, it is almost a no brainer for people who have been holding off on some of the more expensive apps because of the price.

On a side note, I was very happy to see that included with the “calculate alternative” you can choose to avoid or block certain roads. This is a great feature, especially if you simply don’t like driving on a certain stretch of road, and I wish more apps utilized this.

Conclusion

All in all, while NDrive seemed to lack a lot of the bells and whistles that some of the other maps have (such as lane assist) the simple interface, cheap price, and inclusion of some key features (like speed limit warnings) really make it shine. Some drawbacks include the second layer of menu options (especially in settings) which don’t make it easy to make changes quickly, but the main menu is a thing of beauty for GPS apps. At $32.99, the price is great compared to others, and that is one of the primary reasons for the four star rating. If you are looking for a lot of bells and whistle, you may want to look elsewhere, but if you want a reliable, usable GPS turn by turn app without breaking the bank, look at NDrive. Four out of five stars.

Pros:

• Competitive price
• Great menu
• Simplicity in action

Cons:

• Settings menu is difficult
• Lacking some features found in more expensive apps

TiPb Review Rating

NAVIGON dropped us a note to say that, as promised, their latest update to MobileNavigator [$89.99 for North America - iTunes link] for iPhone is now available via the iTunes App Store, and it includes Traffic Live as an in-app purchase (currently on sale at an introductory $19.99, $24.99 thereafter). Here’s how it works:

Traffic Live utilizes crowdsourced real-time speed data from over 1.3 million drivers including other NAVIGON app users (who opt. in to participate), commercial fleets such as trucks and taxis, as well as regular drivers with a GPS system. So if for example several vehicles on a road report slow speed, the system recognizes congestion and provides an alternate and faster route.

If you add the Traffic Live service, let us know how it works for you.

UPDATE 3: As pointed out in the comments, there’s no sign of ad support in Google Maps Navigation (at least not yet). It’s just free as in free.

UPDATE 2: According to Gizmodo, Google:

implied they are working closely with Apple now on [Google Maps Navigation].

iPhone 2.2 saw Google Street View, could iPhone 3.2 see Google Maps Navigation? Let the drooling begin!

UPDATE 1: Replaced video with official version, moved TechCrunch preview below the fold. Enjoy both!

ORIGINAL: Just a few hours ago TiPb posted about the rumors surrounding a free (with ad support, of course) Google Navigation app, and now TechCrunch has the goods — it’s real, and it’s (so far) exclusive to Android 2.0. And we quote:

• Search in plain English. No need to know the address. You can type a business name (e.g. “starbucks”) or even a kind of a business (e.g. “thai restaurant”), just like you would on Google.

• Search by voice. Speak your destination instead of typing (English only): “Navigate to the de Young Museum in San Francisco”.

• Traffic view. An on-screen indicator glows green, yellow, or red based on the current traffic conditions along your route. A single touch on the indicator toggles a traffic view that shows the traffic ahead.

• Search along route. Search for any kind of business along your route, or turn on popular layers such as gas stations, restaurants, or parking.

• Satellite view. View your route overlaid on 3D satellite views with Google’s high-resolution aerial imagery.

• Street View. Visualize turns overlaid on Google’s Street View imagery. Navigation automatically switches to Street View as you approach your destination.

• Car dock mode. For certain devices, placing your phone in a car dock activates a special mode that makes it easy to use your device at arm’s length.

To quote our own editor-in-chief, it looks “bad@$$”, and so far it also looks exclusive to the US, and to Android 2.0, at least for now. But come on Google, you want to give it to everyone outside the US too, right?

[via Chad!]

Google already provides the free Google Maps service (with Street View, pictured above), but could they be planning to step up to full on turn-by-turn navigation? Forbes thinks so:

Google, which generally gives its software away for free and recoups its investment through advertising, would likely sell ads within the navigation application rather than charge users, experts say. The ads could be particularly valuable because the program would know users’ precise locations and destinations, allowing advertisers to pinpoint specific kinds of consumers. Google recently started running sponsored link ads in Apple’s ( AAPL – news – people ) iPhone map application, which it helped build.

Forbes cites competitors who think Google will enter the “small but lucrative” space, and it would be a great value-add to Android, extending Google’s control over the software to an area some carriers still want all to themselves (with the monthly subscription feeds that go with it).

Before international readers get too excited, however, like Google Voice, it might be US-only, especially at first. That, and other factors have potential competitors already getting their shots in:

“Millions of customers use our service because of its reliability, ease of use and additional features,” [Mary Beth Lowell of TeleNav] says. [Steve Andler of Networks in Motion] contends the mobile market is different from the Internet, where “everything’s free and always in beta. People are willing to pay a premium to have something work all the time on their phones.”

Translation: they won’t try to compete with Google on price.

But what about you? Would you let Google monitor your GPS coordinates and activities, and send you targeted ads, in exchange for free navigation?

[via Fierce Mobile Content via Engadget Mobile]

(iGo My Way 2009 – North America For more Forum Reviews, see the TiPb iPhone App Store Forum Review Index!)

iGo My Way [$79.99 - iTunes link] is the fourth turn-by-turn app I have reviewed. As with the other three, I have used the app around town as well as planning for a long trip (the same trip I have taken with the others). It generally suggested very reasonable routes, it had the vast majority of POI’s that I was looking for (in fact, I don’t recall a single instance where I couldn’t find something). So how did it compare in the long distance travel?

In the interest of full disclosure, I received a promo code for this app.

Let me start off by saying that I found the interface a little difficult at time. When you start, there is a screen with three main buttons and a map. Tapping the map at the top brings you to your current route and directions. The other three buttons are destination (to program a route), my route (for details on your current route), and settings. Maybe it is just me, but at times I found the layout a little less that intuitive. If I wanted to alter my route, for example, I kept going into “destination” instead of “my route”. While I am sure I would have eventually learned the different buttons, it didn’t strike me as the most obvious layout.

To program a route, you can go into desintation. From there you can select an address, a point of interest, a location on a map, of a list of favorites. In addition, you have your route history at the bottom of the screen. Unfortunately, there was no contact integration. I did find the interface for choosing a destination based on address to be very straightforward – you choose the state, city, street, etc. At any point you can go back and change any of the options. The POI database was very complete (as complete as any of the other apps I have seen), and choosing a point of interest was another straightforward process.

Once your route is calculated (based on preferences), you can make changes like selecting various route alternative. It includes shortest, economical, easiest, and fastest. One really nice feature is that it shows you the distance and the driving time for each of these, and you can select back and forth to see how they look on the map. I wish the display map had more details instead of just a red line showing your route – city names, highway names, or things like that would be appreciated. One nitpick – I had a default “shortest route” option selected. But when I compared with other routes, sometimes the fastest route was listed as many as 10 miles shorter than the shortest route (see the image below). Ummm…need to work on those routing programs!!

You can also choose to look at places around the destination, where it will give you a list of POI near your planned destination. Lastly, you can change any of your route settings (such as vehicle from car to taxi, bicycle, bus, etc). You can choose different preferences (avoid toll roads, avoid ferries) at this point as well. At any time, you can come back to the “my route” screen to get these options again.

Unfortunately, there were limited options to preview or browse your route. You couldn’t do anything aside from viewing a simple over view map – no listed directions, no detailed summary, nothing like that. There was an option to preview the trip, but it would simply plan an animation of your route – not something you had a lot of control over. You didn’t have any option of travelling “via” a specific road, highway, or city, so you couldn’t plan a multiple itinerary trip.

The settings button allows you to change default settings – sounds and warnings, regional settings, etc. Many of these are things that you only need to access once, but the settings also included the default routing options (route type, avoid/use highways, avoid tolls, etc).

When actually driving, I found the iGo app very good. The maps that are displayed are very detailed, to the point of telling you at times when you may need to switch lanes for an upcoming turn. The app (in general) avoids giving you specific distance estimates, instead telling you that you have “more than 50 miles to go” or “turn in more than 1 mile”. I found this to be beneficial sometimes (like when I am just starting a new leg) but at times I wish they gave me more detailed distance (like when I have five miles or less until a turn). Because there is no way to preview the direction in advance, you also can’t look ahead to see what you will do after the specific leg of the trip. You had limited option for data to display on the map – you could choose from distance left, time left, or ETA (or all three). There was supposed to be an option for an audible speeding warning, but I never heard anything so it was not very effective.

My biggest complaint with the app was starting it up. Multiple times, at least 70% of the time, the app seemed to “freeze” when starting. If I rebooted my iPhone and went right into iGo, I had no problems. But if I ran another app, ANY other app first (voice memo, iPod, anything), the app would freeze and not load about 70% of the time. I don’t know if this is a problem with my iPhone (it is jailbroken) or with the app itself. Right now I don’t seem to be having that issue – but it happened enough times, on multiple days to make it a major concern. I did get around this by installing backgrounder and having the app run in the background. Then, when I wanted to go back into the app, it was already running so I had no problems.

The app also seemed to lose the GPS signal more than any other GPS app I have. It usually found it again within a minute or so, but that didn’t happen to any other GPS app I have tested. The ETA’s seemed to be off for longer distances – at one point it said I had about 70 miles left, and the trip would take about 2.5 hours. Unlike some of the other apps, the screen blank was disabled, meaning the app stayed on even without me doing anything (which I think is good). And like some others, this app could be viewed in landscape mode (a big plus!).

Conclusion

All in all, while I felt the user interface was a little less polished than some others, the quality of the maps, the good POI database, and the options for trip planning were nice pluses for this app. However, the problems with the app starting up prevent me from giving it a high rating. This may be due to my iPhone, and thus may not be an issue everyone else is going to experience, so take that into consideration. But if I can’t even get into an app to run it, pluses (like good maps, nice options) and minuses (no contact integration, shortest route isn’t always the shortest) take a back seat. At $79.99, this is a pricey app, so caution should be used before purchasing (check others to see if they had the same startup issues). As it is, I give it three out of five stars – if I didn’t have the startup problems, I would probably give it three and a half or four stars out of five. (I welcome and will post any comments from the app programmers in response to this review)

Pros

• Very detailed maps
• Great side by side comparison of routing options
• Good POI database

Cons

• No “travel via” option
• Some problems with starting the app
• Route options aren’t logical
• Limited trip overview options

TiPb Review Rating

(Goviko Navigator for iPhone Forum Review by cjvitek For more Forum Reviews, see the TiPb iPhone App Store Forum Review Index!)

Gokivo [$4.99 - iTunes link] is the next GPS application in the increasingly long list of iPhone GPS turn-by-turn apps. First off, when I started the app, I got a little confused because it looks almost exactly like Google Maps (in fact, it may literally be the same). But the interface expands beyond Google Maps. When you put in a term for searching, you get an expanded list of options – including using local Yahoo lists, categories, your contact list, etc.

To use the app, you simply choose your destination (either as an address, contact book entry, local business, etc). From there you can choose to “Bo Navigate” (which is the Gokivo app). Warning – don’t choose “directions” – this is the Google map directions. I had a slight problem once where I went into “directions” and actually got into Google Maps, and I couldn’t get back to the Gokivo app. There are no settings initially to choose route types or preferences – those can be adjusted later.

The directions provided seems pretty straightforward. It didn’t have some of the features that the other apps has (like speeding warning) but it did have traffic warnings. You can also view standard options like ETA, distance to arrival, etc. The POI database appears to be based on local Yahoo data, so it is pretty robust. I put in some obscure locations and it was still able to find them with relative ease. The choice of routes was pretty standard, no real problems or anything, although as with all the apps the ETA was slightly longer than I have seen in reality.

You can review your directions before you take the trip, either in a list form or in a simulated trip form. It does have text to speech, so it reads the road names for you (a feature that I think is great). Because the maps are (seemingly) based on Google maps, there is little footprint on your iPhone. So you do need to have a phone (or internet?) connection to use the app – the maps aren’t stored on the device. You can also play your music while in the app.

The app use is very nice – the voice is clear, the directions are announced in plenty of time before the actual turn, and the map itself is easy to read. There wasn’t any option I could find to add an interim destination, but all destinations are saved in recents, so you can easily reroute yourself if you change your plans. The maps are very clean – not a lot of clutter making them very easy to read while using the app.

So let’s discuss the pricing plan, which has it’s plusses and minuses. The price is only $4.99, and this gives you 30 days of access. However, unlike the AT&T Navigator, you don’t automatically get rebilled for a new month. You can choose to purchase a new month, or you can wait until you need it again, then purchase a new month. Each month that is purchased is $9.99 [Gokivo has announced this will soon drop to $4.99 -- Rene]. This is, IMO, better than the automatic billing of AT&T Navigator, but ultimately I still prefer to have an upfront cost and not be billed every month. But if you would be using a GPS app sporadically, this may be an ideal solution for you – provided you will have phone coverage where you are going.

Conclusion

All in all, I think Gokivo is a strong competitor in the GPS turn-by-turn market, giving it’s variation on the monthly pricing scheme. I still don’t like the fact you need to have a data connection, and I found the menus to be a little difficult to use while in the car (unlike the apps that have very large, easy to hit “buttons”). But for people who will only sporadically use a GPS app, this might be a top solution. Combined with their use of Yahoo for a POI database, it holds its own in the market. For a $9.99 initial price (for one month, too bad they don’t give you two months or something to start!), I give it four out of five stars.

Pros

• Text to speech
• Simple interface
• Pay as you go
• In app song control
• Uses Yahoo for POI

Cons

• Pay as you go
• Buttons for in car use not intuitive
• Need to have data connection (maps no on device)

TiPb Review Rating

TomTom has finally gotten around to revealing the price point for their much anticipated iPhone car kit, which provides its own GPS as well as iPhone charger, loud speaker, and hands-free dialing.

TomTom car kit for the iPhone will have a recommended retail price of EUR 99.99 or USD 119.95.

The TomTom car kit will be available this October and will be sold separately from the TomTom app. It will be compatible with the iPhone 2G, 3G and 3GS.

When you add in the price of the TomTom iPhone app, that more than $200 for the combo, not exactly a bargain compared to a stand-alone GPS device. Then again, this saves you having to carry around a second device just for GPS, so does convenience trump cost, or does TomTom need to rethink their business model here?

Could they offer a second version of the TomTom app — one that only works with the car kit — at a greatly discounted price for those who shell out for the car kit? More importantly, should they?

[Via GPSTracklog via TUAW]

NAVIGON North America [$89.99 - iTunes link], just let us know that, fresh off adding text-to-speech for street names, they’ll soon be adding real-time speed information from actual drivers on the road, traffic messages, road sensors and cameras, and historic traffic flow data to reroute iPhone users around problem areas.

Billed as NAVIGON Traffic Live, it will be available in October and sold as an in-app purchase to existing MobileNavigator users. The added functionality will run $24.99, but go for $19.99 special introductory pricing at launch. And as with the main app, there’s no monthly subscription cost.

Will iPhone users be willing to pay more to get more? That remains a question. We’ve asked before for premium apps, and said we’d pay a premium price for them, and this is certainly an example of that kind of App Store model.

However, by aggressively adding new features so rapidly, NAVIGON is setting the pace when it comes to turn-by-turn GPS navigation on the iPhone. Users of up-front, subscription, and even crowd-sourced mapping apps will all benefit from that.

(Sygic MobileMaps US for iPhone Forum Review by cjvitek For more Forum Reviews, see the TiPb iPhone App Store Forum Review Index!)

In the turn by turn wars, Sygic has entered the fray with their Mobile Maps US. They also have versions for a number of other countries. Like all turn by turn apps, this one allows you to create navigation routes, utilize points of interest (POI), and assists in the actual driving of the route by giving you turn-by-turn directions. So how does it compare? Read on to find out.

In the interest of full disclosure, I received a promo code for this app.

First thing I want to say is I love the interface. Probably this was my favorite of all four apps I have tested so far. The buttons are clear and large, meaning they are easy to read and easy to selection. The options make sense (such as “route”, “settings”, “navigate to”). I never found myself trying to figure out what button I needed to hit.

The routing overview options are great – you can see the instructions, see the route as images, see a summary, see a demo of the route, and even show a large map with your route. Likewise, when choosing a navigation point, there are a number of clear options – point on a map, GPS position, city center, address, POI, etc. Unfortunately there is no integration with your iPhone contacts – something that I would consider almost essential for any turn by turn GPS app.

When creating a route, you have some nice options I haven’t seen in some of the other apps. You can choose shortest and fastest (pretty standard), but you can also choose economical, pedestrian, and bicycle. Unfortunately you need to choose these in the settings, and can’t adjust them on a trip by trip basis. You do have the option of requesting an “alternate route” once your route is created, but it will still use your existing preferences. You can also choose to add an intermediate point (travel via…) if you want to go by a specific city or town. You can also choose to avoid an upcoming segment (the next mile, the next ½ mile, etc). Unfortunately, you can’t do this in advance to avoid a specific segment of the trip, it only avoids the next immediate segment. Lastly, you can choose to avoid traffic delays, but I am not sure if this downloads actual traffic data, or bases it on travelling through a city center (or historical traffic data). I tried it a couple of times, but didn’t find any change in my planned route.

When driving, you can have a speed warning option turned on, that will warn you when you are going over a speed limit by a user-defined amount. There is supposed to be an audible warning, but I never heard one. In addition, the speed limits seemed somewhat variable – sometimes they were accurate, sometimes they were wrong, and sometimes they were missing. You have the option of defining some of the data that appears on the screen – ETA, distance remaining, speed, time remaining, etc. I like this a lot because it enables everyone to choose what information they would find most valuable. The driving interface is nice, pretty standard with views like “night time view”, and it can be viewed in landscape mode as well. The turn by turn directions are good, although it doesn’t read the street names (it does read highway route numbers, though). The voice also includes little qualifiers like “turn immediately” if you need to make a quick turn following another turn. I find information like this helpful when driving. You can also see the POI on the map as you are driving (and can choose which icons you are able to see). Unfortunately, I couldn’t find anyway within the app to disable the screen off function, so my screen kept turning off as I was driving.

So those are some of the good features about the Sygic app. Unfortunately, there were two really big flaws that were glaring. The first is when it comes to routing options – the routing options make no sense. Just like the other apps, I used this app to plan a route from Edinburg, TX to Terlingua, TX. A trip that I know is about 600 miles. I choose the shortest route, and it had me driving up THROUGH San Antonio – adding about 100 miles to the trip. I tried to hit “find alternate route”, and it took me up through Fort Worth…adding another 150 miles to the trip. So if I followed these directions, a 600 mile trip would have turned into a 700 or 850 mile trip. It was only after driving for about an hour on what I knew was the shortest route (or at least a shorter route) that the app finally gave me the instructions I wanted (which was calculated out to be shorter than the 700 miles it had suggested originally).

In addition, if you go off route, rather than trying to calculate a new route based on your current location, it seems to try to only get you BACK on to the previous route. So this app was telling me, at various times, to take a u-turn, drive back another 15 miles to the point where I went off the planned route, then continue from there. If I cancelled that route and created another one, that’s when it would then give me the best route from my current location.

Lastly, the maps seem very out of date. One of the first things I noticed was that the map for my home town didn’t have my street on it. Now, my street is fairly new (within the past 5 years) so maybe that was a simple mistake. But when I was planning my trip to Terlingua, TX, Terlingua didn’t even come up as a town in Texas! So in addition to missing roads, the app is missing whole towns. This may not be a factor if you are living in a large metropolitan area, but if could be a concern if you are living somewhere less developed (or travelling somewhere like that).

Driving around town I had no problems with this app. It seemed to have most of the POI that I was looking for (although the database was a little bit lacking). It also generally suggested reasonable routes to take (even if they weren’t the exact same ones I would have suggested). The real problems with this app came with the long distance travel.

Conclusion

All in all, there are many things I like about this app, but in the end the two glaring problems prevented me from giving it a strong recommendation. This app may be fine if you live and travel only in large, well known areas. But if you plan to go to smaller towns or visit newer roads, you will have a hard time using this app. These facts, combined with a few other flaws (lack of contact integration, poor route planning) leads me to reduce the rating, despite the great user interface and some nice features and options I haven’t seen on other TBT apps. For $39.99 [on sale, typically $59.99], I would expect to get accurate maps and better routing instructions. Three out of five stars. (I welcome and will post any comments from the app programmers in response to this review)

UPDATE

I just received an email from Sygic – contact integration and text to speech (reading road names) are going to be in the next update.

text-to-speech, i.e. voice guidance announcing the name of the next street or road in North America, Australia and New Zealand, the ability to choose addresses straight from iPhone contacts and navigate to them, smooth fading out of the music playback before the voice instructions, enhanced GPS lock, smoother position display when moving on the route. Also, the navigation will automatically resume after completion of phone call, without the need to tap the ‚Accept’ button anymore.

Pros:

• Includes nice routing options
• Can avoid upcoming route segments
• Nice interface and customization options

Cons

• No contact integration
• Maps out of date
• Sometimes route choices are questionable

TiPb Review Rating

(Co-Pilot Live 8 for iPhone Forum Review by cjvitek For more Forum Reviews, see the TiPb iPhone App Store Forum Review Index!)

With CoPilot Live North America [$34.99 - iTunes link] The march of GPS Turn-by-turn apps continued. (See the App Review master list, above, for reviews of AT&T Navigator, Navigon Mobile Navigator, iGo My Way, and Sygic Mobile Maps). In the interest of full disclosure, I received a promo code to review this app.

GPS Turn-by-turn apps all want to achieve the same goal – become the ultimate navigation assistant to help you when you are driving. So far the apps I have reviewed have had strong points and some weak points – each having some features that are nice, but no one app dominating the competition. CoPilot Live falls right in, with some compelling features but also lacking some features to put it over the top.

Let’s start with the interface. I love it. In my mind, a GPS TBT app should be easy to use and operate – large button, easy to read screen, easy to program, etc. For the most part, CoPilot live does a great job. When using the menu, the buttons are large and easy to read (and hit). The features are clearly outlined, and there is a systematic approach to the layout (I had very little hunting around trying to find a specific feature). Having said that, some of the buttons were a little small – including the button to get to the menu. Like some of the other apps, when typing in an address or name, this app would try to anticipate what you wanted, providing a list of matching names. I find this type of interface very helpful, as I don’t have to type out the entire name myself.

This app did have contact integration. One interesting thing about the contacts – not all of them were listed. I think it only lists contacts that have an actual address – which makes sense, if you think about it. The five or six I checked matched that criteria, but I didn’t check all the missing contacts. If that is accurate, I say kudos to CoPilot Live for including this feature which makes sense, but is missing from other apps!

The POI interests can be viewed while traveling, and entered as a destination as well. Like Navigon, the POI database seemed a little sparse – it didn’t have the school I work for listed as a POI, and it is the tenth largest University in Texas (or something like that). Hopefully this will be something that can be added to in future updates.

I liked the use of the app as well. It was quick to pick up a signal, and I didn’t lose it once. You can choose POI to be displayed. There is supposedly a feature for lane assistance, but I couldn’t get it to work – possibly due to the fact I live in the outskirts of civilization here in Texas. WHen you have a map created, there were also options to choose an alternate route, and the option to avoid certain segments of your trip! Something I have been looking for in the other apps. Unfortunately, I tried it out, and it didn’t seem to make any different in the trip plans (the route was still listed as the same). It’s possible that I needed to actually REACH that road to avoid it, but I am not sure (especially since I asked to avoid a 163 mile segment of highway…I would have thought it would recalculate a large portion of a trip in that case). Unfortunately, there is no option to indicate a preferred road.

There are a number of live features that are supposed to be added – including weather (where you are, or your destination), traffic, and friends (which I assume finds contacts in the area?). However, the traffic and friends options were greyed out. The traffic is listed as being a premium extra that you have to pay for in future updates. The weather worked very well.

Another nice feature that I have only seen sporadically is the ability to add stops during your trip. You can even optimize them and plan for rest locations. While driving, you have various settings you can tweak – including when the app will warn you about an upcoming turn, how the map is viewed (2D, 3D, or 2D with next turn). You have preview options of seeing the whole trip, running a simulation of the trip, seeing an itinerary, or even going through the trip turn by turn. Nice options there. The screen itself also allows for two displays – you can have things like speed, ETA, distance left, etc. I didn’t see any option for speed limit warning, although other reviews have mentioned them. I might be blind, or it might be limited to other maps (UK or Europe, for example).

The biggest issue I had with CoPilot live was the choice of routes. Again, for small, everyday routes, the directions seemed very accurate. If the road was listed (there were a few times where newer roads weren’t on the map – my home street was not listed for planning directions), the route was very straightforward. However, for longer routes, I had some problems. You can choose between a quickest, shortest, and economical routes (with specifications for avoiding tolls roads and similar options). Now, I plugged in the same trip I have been doing for all the apps – Edinburg, TX to Terlingua, TX. About 600 miles as I drive it. The shortest route came up with the standart shortest route (by miles) at about 590 miles. However, the quickest route had me going about 100 miles out of my way, up to San Antonio. And the ETA’s for both of the trips was, well, insanely wrong. The trip has taken between between 10 and 12 hours. The estimated travel time for the quickest route (690 miles) was 18 hours. For the shortest route (590 miles) it was over 20 hours. Now, I could understand if it was driving back roads the whole time, but we are talking about driving on highways with a 70 or 75 mph speed limit!

As I previously said, I tried to “tweak” my route by indicating sections of the road to avoid (hoping that it would get me a route that I have taken in the past), but the map didn’t appear to change – despite the fact I said I wanted to detour around 163 miles of highway. Maybe some of these issues are due to the fact I am not trying it out in a big metropolitan area, and if you live in an area like that you won’t have any of the problems. But ultimately the app is supposed to be for anywhere in North America, so I should still be able to use it here, out in the middle of no where.

Conclusion

All in all, this app had some very strong points and some areas that clearly needed work. The interface and some of the options were absolutely great, but ultimately it is about driving and the routes. As such, given that it estimated a trip I know only take about 10 hours as a 18 to 20 hour trip, I can’t help but question the accuracy of it’s route choices for long distance trips. Some of the features (like road detours) didn’t seem to have any obvious effect on the routes and maps, but it could be that the effect would only be obvious when I got to that segment of the trip. At $34.99, the app is far from the most expensive, and for that money it delivered a reasonable GPS experience. But until the routing issues are fixed, I can only give it three and a half out of five stars.

Pros:

• Great interface
• good integration with contacts

Cons:

• POI database is lacking
• Some features appear to be disabled or don’t work
• Trip time estimation is way off

TiPb Review Rating

UPDATED: Here’re the US deets: TomTom US & Canada [$99.99 - iTunes link], TomTom Australia [$79.99 - iTunes link], TomTom New Zealand [$94.99 - iTunes link], TomTom Western Europe [$139.99 - iTunes link]

ORIGINAL: TomTom [iTunes publisher link], the long-anticipated turn-by-turn navigation app for the iPhone is beginning to appear in international App Stores, starting with New Zealand and according to our tipsters, rolling across Australia and the UK.

Cost wise, the different versions (US & Canada, Western Europe, Australia, New Zealand) range in price from NZ$105 (US$70) to NZ$179 (US$120).

Hopefully it will hit all the stores, including the US (and Canada!) sooner rather than later. If you find it in your local App Store, drop us a note in the comments. (Still no word, however, on the accompanying dock that was announced at WWDC 2009…)

[Thanks to Tyler from App Advice, David, Niall everyone who sent this in!]

(Navigon Mobile Navigator for iPhone Forum Review by cjvitek For more Forum Reviews, see the TiPb iPhone App Store Forum Review Index!)

MobileNavigator North America [$69.99 - iTunes link], by Navigon, is the second GPS TBT app I examined. This one requires you to download all the maps in advance (1.5 GB for the US version, 1.67 for the European version) so make sure you have space on your iPhone. The advantage of this is that you can get GPS directions even if you do not have an AT&T signal. In addition, the actual “routing” process seems a little faster since it is not downloading directions OTA.

The map interface is very clean and flows very well, clearly showing direction and the upcoming street name. Unfortunately since the app doesn’t read the street name, you need to continually look at the app to see where to turn in areas when there are lots of streets next to each other. One nice feature is you can see POI on the map itself – not just a little dot or something, but an actual icon for the POI. When driving by a McDonalds, you can see the golden arches on the map. If the POI doesn’t have an logo, it just shows a general icon (gas station, food, etc).

To create a route, you can choose a variety of options in the route profile. These include fastest route, optimum (I believe for driving in cities), shortest, and scenic. You can also choose type of vehicle (including pedestrial), allow/avoid highways, toll roads, ferries, resident only streets, and HOV lates. I like the inclusion of a scenic route, although I am not sure the parameters. Will it take you ½ hour out of the way to see a nice waterfall? What about an hour?

Creating a route is very easy. The app has large buttons to press, and takes you through the step by step process (first state, then city, then street, etc). You can also choose to “take me home” where it will take you to your programmed home destination. At the bottom you can choose to select recent location, search your contacts, or select a favorite location.

Unfortunately you can’t specify roads that you prefer or want to avoid (like if you want to go a specific route, or travel by a specific town). In addition, sometimes the route choices seem…well…preposterous. When driving home yesterday, at one point the optimum route told me a certain way to go and get home by 8:07pm. The “shortest” route told me a similar route and got home by 8:08pm. The “fastest route” had me going to Corpus Christi, back down on a highway, and then backtracking – and getting home at 8:56pm. It made absolutely no sense what so ever.

When starting on the trip, I found the ETA to be generally reasonably accurate. An 11 hour, 630 mile trip was predicted initially as 12 hours. When looking at the map, you can tap the screen to see an overhead view, and also get a map summary. Unfortunately, there is no way to get a turn by turn summary of the whole trip.

Within the trip you have a lot of options. You have a speed option. The app comes with speed limits built in, which were accurate at least 90% of the time. You can program if you want the app to warn you if you are speeding (5 mph over, 10mph over, etc). Obviously you can’t rely on it, but it is a nice feature to have. In addition, you have the option of creating interim destination – basically a multi stop trip. This is one way to finagle choosing a specific route – just choose a city as an interim destination that is on the road you want to take! The app then tracks both trips, in terms of ETA and miles to go. You can also add a POI along the route (although I am not sure how far “off route” it searches – ½ mile? 1 mile?). You have a night map option and can also change your route profile (fastest to scenic, for example).

Searching for POIs is easy as well. First choose the location (nearby, a specific city, or statewide). You can preprogram three “auto” categories for quick searches as well – I chose gas, hotels, and food. Like other apps, you can’t define your search radius for “nearby”, but it looks to be about 5 miles or so. The POI library is somewhat lacking, however. While I can understand it for some out of the way hotels, there were some times that a McDonalds (or something similar) was mislabeled on the maps or couldn’t be found with a POI.

All in all, I found this to be a solid app, with lots of nice features added in. While the route choice was at times baffling, for the most part I had little to quibble about. The built in speeding warning is a nice feature to have, although you can’t rely on it because it is not always 100% accurate. The POI library was lacking somewhat, and I wasn’t really sure if I was missing some possible POIs along the way because of that. At $69 (on sale, normally $99) the app is not expensive, but still cheaper in the long run than a monthly fee system. Four out of five stars.

Pros:

• Easy POI lookup
• Maps on device
• Nice graphics and interface
• Lots of options for customizing
• Speed limit warnings!

Cons:

• POI database is lacking
• Doesn’t read street names
• Some routes are wildly inaccurate

TiPb Review Rating

Navigon just sent word that their turn-by-turn GSP navigation solution, MobileNavigator for iPhone [$69.99 on sale - iTunes link], North American edition is now live in the iTunes App Store.

Previously available in European flavor, the North American edition features the same NAVTEQ maps, Reality View Pro, Lane Assistant Pro, Speed Assistant and Day & Night Mode component, points of interest (POI) along the route, and a host of other features.

Pricing is set at $99 — on sale for $69 through August 15. So, if you prefer to pay up front rather than entering into a subscription service, and you give MobileNavigator North America a try, let us know how it works for you.

G-Map from XRoad sent us a postcard from their drive up highway 3.0 and let us know they’ve come back with great new features like real-time voice guidance and turn-by-turn arrows.

And as always, since G-Map 1.3.1 downloads its maps to your iPhone, you don’t need a data or Wi-Fi connection to use them, which comes in handy when in-between cities and off the grid.

Both G-Map East [$34.99 - iTunes link] and G-Map West [$34.99 - iTunes link] are currently on sale at a reduced price in the App Store. So, if no-subscription, download-to-your-iPhone turn-by-turn GPS navigation appeals to you, and you decide to give it a try, let us know if it gets you where you’re going.

First push-Instant Messenger (IM) apps, now Turn-by-Turn Navigation? Can our long standing dreams finally become reality?

A few days ago we mentioned Gokivo + Yahoo! Maps had made it into the App Store. Now it’s joined by:

AT&T Navigator [free - iTunes Link] provides an iPhone front end to AT&T’s $9.99/month subscription service.

MobileNavigator Europe ($94.99 – iTunes link) features Reality View Pro, Lane Assistant Pro, Speed Assistant and Day & Night Mode component as well as the opportunity, to show POIs along the route. (See YouTube for the gist)

What’s interesting from a user-perspective is the ranger of options we’ll likely be seeing: either free or $0.99 up front and ongoing subscriptions, or more expensive up front (will $100 be the price point?) and no subscriptions — though will we have to wonder about charges for updated maps eventually?

What’s your preference?

TiPb had the opportunity to test drive Gokivo Navigator ($0.99 + In-App Purchases – iTunes link) over the last couple of days. This is one of the first iPhone 3.0 specific apps in the App Store, so first off it was great to see turn-by-turn navigation working (even in Canada!), and second it was interesting to see how Apple handles in-app purchases.

Getting this going is a little bit of work. You start the app and type in a destination. I found Apple Canada in my contacts so hit that. Similar to the built in Maps app, Gokivo will show you your location on a map. Instead of Street View, however, you have a green GO button. Hit that and you’re on your way to turn-by-turn.

If you don’t already have a subscription, Gokivo activates the aforementioned in-app-purchase engine, and once you login with your iTunes ID and buy a month of service ($9.99 in the version we tested) the GO gets going.

It takes time to acquire a good GPS signal, and will advise you if there isn’t one to be had. Once it locks on, however, you’re in for a pretty smooth turn-by-turn experience. Arrows point your way and a synthesized female voice tells you when and where to turn and, and preps you for upcoming turns. We repeatedly went the wrong way, and were impressed with how quickly and accurately Gokivo recalculated and tried to get us back on track.

Note, Gokivo isn’t free just for the app because Apple doesn’t let developers do in-app purchases for free apps. Hence, $0.99 will likely be the foundation for what TiPb considers iPhone “scaleware”. Whether the $9.99 monthly fee — or other in-app-purchasing options — suit your needs and budget you’ll have to tell us.

Gallery after the break!

It was a long time coming, but as part of yesterday’s WWDC Keynote, TomTom co-founder Peter-Frans Pauwels demonstrated their company’s solution to turn-by-turn GSP navigation for iPhone 3.0, and interestingly, it comes in two parts:

• The TomTom navigation application for iPhone; an Apple version of TomTom’s award-winning turn-by-turn navigation software, including IQ Routes and latest maps from Tele Atlas;

• The TomTom car kit for iPhone; a specially developed car kit for secure docking, enhanced GPS performance, clear voice instructions, hands-free calling and in-car charging.

No word on pricing or availability yet, though it will be at some point later this summer, after the iPhone 3.0 release on June 17.

Was it worth the wait, and what kind of pricing are you anticipating (or hoping for)?

As we reported earlier today (before the Apple event, even), the iPhone 3.0 update will allow real, turn-by-turn directions on the iPhone. It looks like Apple isn’t bothering with enmeshing themselves in the confusing licensing issues surrounding turn-by-turn and is instead simply lifting the SDK Ban on turn-by-turn directions. The first app may very well come from Sygic (that’s what they’re claiming, anyway), which we had the chance get some eyes-on time with during Mobile World Congress.

Apple is simply allowing 3rd party apps to extend their access to CoreLocation (the iPhone’s built-in location service that includes GPS, cell tower-based, and WiFi-based location) to include turn-by-turn. Of note: Apple says that developers need to “BYOM” (Bring Your Own Maps). What that implies is that the licensing issues referenced above prevents Apple from allowing developers to use another new iPhone 3.0 feature: embeddable maps. iPhone 3.0 allows (almost) any app to include embedded Google maps, complete with pinch, zoom, and the like, within the app itself. Using that embedded map for turn by turn directions, however, is verboten. Instead developers will either have to require a large download of maps and/or provide them over-the-air as TeleNav does.

It’s also possible that developers will be able to use the new in-app purchasing feature of iPhone 3.0 to allows users to purchase maps as well. It’s unclear who else besides Sygic is getting a turn-by-turn directions app ready, but you can probably rest assured we’ll see such apps from the big players in short order once 3.0 is released this summer.

Update: TeleNav is still staying quiet about their plans.

Dieter gave us our first eyes-on look at Sygic’s Turn-by-Turn GPS solution for the iPhone 3G, but we wondered if Apple — whose iPhone SDK specifically forbid providing such navigation — would ever allow it.

Seems Sygic thinks they will:

Sygic is entering the AppStore to be the first on the market that offers full turn-by-turn navigation for Apple users. “We believe Apple users will benefit soon from Sygic Mobile 2009 turn-by-turn navigation worldwide – the same as all of our customers on different platforms” said Michal Stencl, CEO and founder of Sygic.

Could this be part of a new Premium App Store launch later today? Our tipper, antonioj, seems to think it will…

Only 2 hours left, so be sure to join us for our live meta-blog coverage and hopefully we’ll find out together!

A few weeks back we introduced you to a little Jailbreak app called xGPS. This is the first app available to bring turn-by-turn directions to your iPhone. It has just been updated to version 1.2 and seems to be much more polished overall. The biggest improvement is this version is of course, voice instructions support. To those of you who have not interested in Jailbreaking, are you tempted now?

Everybody would say: Finally! Yes, xGPS 1.2 has been released. The version has been sent to the MMI repository and will be available within some hours. It should be in everybody’s Cydia as the MMI repository is installed by default. Just do a refresh within some hours and xGPS should pop up. This version of xGPS has required us a lot of hours of work. We have tried to bring the most advanced and stable navigation software for the iPhone / iPod touch. However, even if we have made our best, you have to keep in mind that this software is free but not bug free. If you experience such a bug feel free to ask in the forum but do not say “It doesn’t work, it’s crappy”.

It’s important to remember, this application is only available to those of you who are Jailbroken. For all of the details be sure to stop by the xGPS Blog!

[Thanks to all of you who sent this in!]

There you see it, folks, a real live native iPhone app that provides turn-by-turn GPS directions with voice prompts, points of interest, support for multiple countries, maps stored in-memory instead of streamed from the internet, the whole nine yards.

Working off a tip/reminder from antonioj (thanks!), I scurried off to the TeleAtlas booth at the close day here at MWC to visit Sygic, a company that makes (you guessed it) downloadable GPS apps for smartphones and PDAs. They had promised a demo of their iPhone app at MWC09 and, well, they delivered.

Read on for more!

Sygic, as we said, looks to be a full-featured GPS app that stores all the maps on-memory (about 2 gigs for Europe). It uses TeleAtlas maps as a base — whether that means that they’ll be able to successfully navigate both the legal briar patch surrounding turn-by-turn on the iPhone and manage to make Apple forget about their SDK explicitly prohibiting such apps remains to be seen. For now (although I didn’t drive around with it), I can say that Sygic works and seems snappy enough. It took the software shown about 30 seconds to load up and initialize, however, which didn’t fill me with glee.

Otherwise, you can pretty much see the featureset from the gallery below. Sygic says they will submit to the app store and see how it rolls, there’s no real intention of just releasing it as a jailbreak app. What do you think, will Apple accept the app or are they still holding out for a cut of that sweet, sweet TeleNav subscription fee? Or is the hold-up with turn-by-turn something else entirely?

Our sibling site, Android Central, has posted up a story about TeleNav making a turn-by-turn GPS navigation app for Google’s Android G1:

The TeleNav software will include full color 3D graphics, speech recognition, one-click rerouting, traffic alerts, weather updates, gas prices, and restaurant reviews.

Sure, it’s not all roses. After a 30-day free trial, you need to fork over $9.99 a month, $99 a year, or $249 for four years to keep the service, but at least they have the option.

So what’s happening with the iPhone app? We asked, and this was what we got in response:

We have to stay mum at this point on an iPhone app other than to say that we’re working on it. Please stay tuned!

If it’s hard to stay mum, imagine how hard it is to “stay tuned” after months and month (and months) of waiting.

Dieter mentions that Apple, flush with success battering around the music industry and Google, may not know how to zip their lip and make nice with the map licensors. Could that be the hold up?

We won’t ask if you want turn-by-turn GPS navigation — we know you do — so we’ll just tell Apple and TeleNav to suck it up and get this done (before more people jailbreak just for xGPS), and we’ll leave the comments open for you to do likewise…

So you’ve been on the fence about Jailbreaking recently, maybe this is enough to sway you? Once again, a 3rd party developer has come through for all of us and has delivered a working turn-by-turn GPS solution!

xGPS uses Google Maps and add it’s own real-time navigation readout and a voice. Seriously, how hard could this have been for Google or Apple to add for us? Another nice feature is the ability to download maps ahead of time. So that means even first generation iPhone users can get in on some turn-by-turn action.

So how many of you are going to Jailbreak now? Let us know!

*UPDATE: The newest version with vocalization is expected to be available within the next week. Be sure to check out the xGPS Blog.

[Via Gizmodo via ModMyi]

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iPhone OS 2.2, Turn-by-Turn GPS Navigation, Google hearts the iPhone, and more. Listen in!

Background Reading

• iPhone 2.2: App Rating and Direct Podcast Downloads?
• More iPhone 2.2 Google Goodness: Transit, Walking, Street-View, and Share Location!
• iPhone Firmware 2.2 Beta 2: Google Street-View Enabled + Line-in Audio!
• TiPb Answers: Why is There No Turn-by-Turn Navigation on the iPhone?
• Why You Shouldn’t Hold Your Breath Waiting for Realtime Turn-by-Turn Directions within Google Maps
• Friday Fun Rumor: 3D Turn-By-Turn GPS Navigation for iPhone Post 2.2?

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Credits

Thanks to the the iPhone Blog Store for sponsoring the podcast.

Our music comes from the following sources:

• I Called You — iPhone Remix by Pete Leidy
via Sneakmove iPhone Ringtone Challenge

And special thanks to editor emeritus Mike Overbo for the killer intro!

TiPb loves answering your emails, but we also love sharing our answers with the community in hopes that more people will benefit, and even better answers will present themselves (hey, that’s why we have them forums!). Today’s question comes from Chris:

“Why doesn’t the iPhone have real GPS?! Even the [redacted] Samsung Instinct has turn by turn! Why does Apple add [redacted] like street view [but] not the things users really want?”

TiPb answers after the break!

We’ve covered iPhone GPS and turn-by-turn navigation quite a bit here at TiPb, especially Dieter who lives out in the middle of somewhere and claims he needs it quite a bit. Why wouldn’t Apple add it indeed? Should be a no-brainer, right?

Well, here’s a few things:

1. Apple doesn’t really supply the GPS middlewhere on the iPhone. They have the chip, of course, and they made the UI (Steve’s even boasted about it on stage!), but the App itself is “powered” by Google Maps. So, the functionality of the App is in some ways limited to the functionality provided by Google. For example, we’re seeing street-view, transit, and walking directions in iPhone 2.2 Beta 2. Why? Because Google has been rolling that out across smartphone platforms, starting with Android. Do any devices have Google-powered tun-by-turn yet? Not to our knowledge. And there may be a reason for that…
2. Licensing conflicts. Google doesn’t own the maps they serve. They license them from Tele Atlas and Navteq. Dieter pointed out a while back that Google’s “API only provides Tele Atlas data, it appears that it’s prohibited from serving Navteq data. As early as ‘05 there has been speculation that there was some sort of license fight between Google and Navteq and both sides decided to take their ball and go home.” This looks like a pretty complicated and potentially deal-breaking deadlock (read the whole article for more). And it’s not the only legal problem…
3. Apple’s iPhone SDK agreement currently prohibits 3rd party turn-by-turn Apps. This could be to avoid the licensing issues mentioned previously, to leave the door open for an “officially licensed” version if Apple and Google can come to an agreement with the licensors (who may not want to see a competitive convergent device like the iPhone get that functionality), or because Apple feels they’ll be sued by the first brainiac who tries to switch between turn-by-turn and SMS and back while driving into a lake.
4. Why can’t TomTom or another dedicated GPS manufacturer release an iPhone App directly, using their own Apps? After all, TomTom has already said they’ve made their system run on the iPhone. The App Store has a reported 2GB size limit, so there’s likely space enough for a robust install. Despite the SDK licensing restrictions, however, would a company like TomTom feel iPhone App sales would make up for the loss of dedicated hardware unit sales they’d face? There have been stories about the dedicated GPS players fearing the iPhone (and other convergence devices) would put them out of business. Let’s remember when Popular Mechanics asked the president of a GPS navigation system manufacturer how he felt about the prospect of a GPS-enabled iPhone, the president said he was: “Scared [expletive]-less“.
5. Could all of the above issues be at play? Apple’s head of iPhone Marketing, Greg “Joz” Joswiak, previously said: “there are some murky “complicated issues” preventing driving directions apps at the moment. ‘It will evolve. I think our developers will amaze us.’ “

Huge rumor. No corroboration. Not journalism. Posting this from a first time, antonymous tipster and if it doesn’t pan out… well… I’ll be boiled in clam chowder eventually anyway… But it’s Friday and this is FUN. Of course, Dieter already told us about the complicated legal quagmire surrounding turn-by-turn GPS, but dagnabit, we wants it!

Apple has begun quietly demonstrating an internally developed iPhone GPS Navigator program that includes turn-by-turn, 3d views etc. Visually, it is very similar to Tom-Tom, but with the expected Apple eye candy. They were sketchy about the details, but it seem that this will not be part of the core software (I.E. they intend to charge for it). It was also unclear whether they were using cellular-based data to share traffic information, but some of the screens seemed to indicate that it would.

Our nameless could be friend — might be prankster — says this will be released after 2.2, but in time for the holidays.

Are we getting played? Or is this happening? Again — not news, not reliable leakage, but pure rumormongering at its most unsubstantiated. Take it for what that’s worth.

Running out of things to say about the ongoing (and ongoing, and ongoing, and ongoing) TomTom and general turn-by-turn GPS on the iPhone saga?

Lucky for us, MSNBC’s Suzanne Choney (via MacDailyNews) found out the big industry players certainly aren’t.

Says TomTom:

“We have made our navigation system run on the iPhone; it looks good and works very well. We will have to look more closely to Apple’s strategy before we can say more about what kind of opportunities this will bring us.”

Says Garmin:

“We’re always looking at new phone platforms to expand into for Garmin Mobile, but we don’t have any announcements regarding the iPhone at this time.”

Says Magellan:

“[We do] not have immediate plans for this, but we are looking into it.”

Wow, could Garmin and Magellan sound any less enthusiastic? Sure, they have to play their cards close to their vest (though TomTom is obviously faster and looser in that regard), but how about a little hype-jacking?

No matter. Smart money says we should see turn-by-turn soon-ish. However, given how 3G network connectivity, MobileMe, and some other functionality has rolled out (never mind cut and paste!), turn-by-turn is something that Apple (or TomTom, or whomever provides it), really can’t afford to get wrong. 2.1 has already dropped push notification, so if turn-by-turn was even on the list, chances are it’s been bumped down again. No matter how “complicated” it may be, they have to nail it from launch, or people will be more than just inconvenienced.

That is, depending on how badly we still want turn-by-turn GPS? Dieter is all over it, of course, but how high is it on your iPhone firmware fix wish list?

Greg “Joz” Joswiak, Apple’s head of iPod and iPhone marketing shed some light on the iPhone 3G/2.0 and some of its highly requested, yet still missing functionality, like where’s our ability to select text, cut it or copy it, and paste it?

Apple has a priority list of features, and they got as far as they could down that list with this model

Why isn’t there a constant yet ever-so-slightly-disappointed voice telling us we missed our last ten exists and threatening to “re-calculate”?

[T]here are some murky “complicated issues” preventing driving directions apps at the moment. “It will evolve. I think our developers will amaze us.”

Like TomTom?

With regards to David Pogue’s claim that Apple said the iPhone 3G GPS antenna was too small for turn-by-turn?

Find his answer after the jump!

That’s wrong; the iPhone’s GPS is just like the GPS in other phones, many of which do provide driving directions

We can view Microsoft Office and Apple iWork docs in iPhone 2.0, why can’t we edit or create them?

[T]here might be issues with applications each having their own file space. “There’s no cross-application file structure.”

TiPB is still waiting on DocsToGo as well. What about unspecified technical issues?

[D]idn’t know of any such hold-ups.

Does that mean there aren’t any, there are but they remain unknown, or that the ones he knows off are all very specified?

Time, and future 2.x firmware updated will hopefully tell.