The Mountain View giant recently announced the new features that will be deployed by the end of the year on iOS.
Areas filled with people
Area Busynesswill work a bit like the graph of busy times for places of interest, by combining this data with the popularity of places close to a targeted address.
So, thanks to Area Busyness, you will be able to knowif an entire district of a city will be more or less busyat a specific time of day. We imagine different practical cases. You have to drive through town and discover that at 1 p.m., an area on your route is usually packed with people. It is then better to avoid it with a detour via a much less frequented route at that time.
This can also be convenient for tourists, who can know when the area of the city they want to explore is quietest depending on the day of the week or time of day.
Directions indoors
The second new feature that will soon accompany Area Busyness in the Google Maps app on iOS is calledDirectoriesin English. This is a new feature ofguiding users in closed places, such as stores, airports, metro or train stations. More precisely, Directories will, for example, be able to indicate the rest lounge in the airport, a specific store in shopping malls, or even find directions to the car park or the toilets in a train station. This is a feature already present in Apple Maps, but which is still missing in Google's alternative.
Finally, let's not forget to mention other more minor, but still attractive, improvements coming in the coming weeks in Google Maps: the possibility for users to more simply add the prices of dishes to restaurants and new information on order pickup for stores and restaurants that allow it.
Editor-in-chief for iPhon.fr. Pierre is like Indiana Jones, looking for the lost iOS trick. Also a long-time Mac user, Apple devices hold no secrets for him. Contact: pierre[a]iphon.fr.
