The Best Turn-by-Turn Navigation App for iPhone

The iPhone long-suffered from no default turn-by-turn navigation app and only a few good third-party options. Then, Apple released their own version that nearly drowned in criticism. Google came to the rescue with the Google Maps, our new favorite turn-by-turn navigation app. Why? It works really well.

Google Maps

Platform: iPhone
Price: Free
Download Page


  • Free voice-guided turn-by-turn navigation
  • Easy location search
  • Pretty much the best traffic estimates you're going to find
  • Plenty of good route choices
  • Intelligent re-routing when you make a mistake
  • Enormous database of nearby locations you can search for
  • Public transit, driving, and walking directions
  • Google Earth integration
  • Swipe ahead in your directions to see what's next

Where It Excels

While no navigation app is perfect, Google's attempt comes pretty close. You can find anything with a quick search, get several suggested routes that integrate traffic information, and listen to directions from a computer voice that actually sounds relatively human (and is easier to understand than, say, Siri). When you make a mistake, Google Maps intelligently re-routes you. You also have access to public transit and walking directions, unlike most other offerings on the iTunes App Store (which only provide a single type of directions). Ultimately, there's little to complain about and a lot to praise. Google Maps just works really well and it's the navigation app you should be using on your iPhone.

Where It Falls Short

Google Maps doesn't integrate with Siri and doesn't run in the background quite as elegantly as Apple Maps. Why? The usual reason: Apple doesn't give its third-party developers access to the APIs it uses to try and have an advantage over them. Basically, Google Maps falters where any app would. It's not Google's fault.

One issue that is Google's fault, however, comes in the form of traffic estimates. Often times the app will provide you with a route that claims to suffer from heavy traffic when that heavy traffic only affects a tiny, tiny portion of your trip. Because you get to take a look at the actually traffic on your route before confirming it, this isn't a big deal. It just seems silly to warn you about traffic when it will likely have no effect on the trip as a whole.

The Competition

Waze (Free) is our former favorite, and it's still pretty great. While the app sometimes feels a bit cluttered and some feel its directions aren't as good as other options, it does provide a remarkable feature set that you can't really get anywhere else—plus it's free. Waze offers some of the best traffic information you can find, because it's user-reported, plus you can find out about accidents and nearby cops trying to bust people for speeding. Waze can also help you find gas stations on the way to your destination and even offer exclusive discounts. It offers a lot of perks that are worth considering.

Apple Maps (Free with iOS 6) isn't as incredibly awful as the hype. It's not great, and certainly has its various problems, but if you're in the US you'll find directions to be reasonably accurate (no more or less than the other competition here) and it, naturally, integrates with iOS 6 better than anything. That said, Apple Maps is far from perfect. Heavy criticism exists for a reason. Outside of the US it's pretty terrible. The mistakes it makes everywhere are often bizarre. Traffic information is generally useless and poorly displayed. You can't jump ahead in directions if navigation is active. When you get directions, it often assumes which route you want rather than asking, and the choices aren't great in general. Complaints about Apple Maps could fill an encylopedia, so we'll give it a rest. It is improving, however, and hopefully some day in the future it'll compete head-to-head with Google.

CoPilot GPS (Cost Caries) and CoPilot Live ($20+) both offer solid turn-by-turn navigation with downloadable maps. While waiting for a huge set of maps to download can take a fair amount of time, you only have to do it once. With the maps ready on your device, fetching directions and getting you ready to drive doesn't take nearly as long as it might with a map that relies entirely on the internet (such as Google or Apple Maps). CoPilot GPS offers maps and route planning for free, but if you want to add any fancy features (like voice-guided navigation, traffic alerts, etc.) you'll pay some pretty hefty in-app purchase fees. If you just go with CoPilot Live, however, you'll pay $20 up front for maps of the US and Canada and voice-guided navigation. It also makes use of Wikipedia, Yelp, and Google to find information about points of interest. You can get live traffic information and fuel prices, too, but each will cost you. CoPilot won't disappoint when you use it, but figure out the total cost of everything you want before you dive in so you don't surprise yourself with a large bill from the app store.

Navigon USA ($30 + $14 for live traffic), popular GPS maker Garmin's addition to the turn-by-turn navigation app pool, was very good. It offers a live traffic option (for a price) and maps you can pre-download. The pre-downloading of maps is a little annoying at first, because it takes awhile, but it seems to allow the app to operate much faster than apps that download information on the fly (like Waze). Of every app tested, Navigon was the fastest to respond with driving directions and was consistently telling me where to go with plenty of advance notice. The automated voice was also one of the best. The problem with Navigon, however, is that it's really only better than Waze in that regard and on-par with Waze when it comes to traffic and general directions. Waze provides for free what Navigon prices at $44, so it's hard to recommend that as a better option. While none of the GPS apps make it simple enough to quickly find the location and get directions (like the built-in Maps app does), Waze was much faster. Navigon required quite a few taps to get started each time. That said, if you don't like Waze and want a paid app with pre-downloaded maps, Navigon is a good choice.

Garmin North America ($50) is also pretty good. It costs more, but the amount of time it takes to figure out to decide where you're going and start the navigation is much faster than it is with Navigon. Maps are built-in to the app download so once you have the app it is ready to go. You can purchase live traffic for $15, bringing the total app cost up to $65. It's pricey, but the user interface and experience is a step up and the rest of the app is pretty similar in quality to Navigon. It's also a good choice if you want to shell out some money, although we have a hard time recommending the cost when the free options you have are pretty solid.

Gokivo Navigator (Free) is a good free alternative. It's very simple—you just input where you want to go and it navigates you there. When I intentionally missed turns to see what it would do, it reacted pretty quickly and tried to get me on the right route. When I went in the wrong direction it had trouble keeping up with me, however, telling me to run right on every street I passed but not getting the words out in time. To be fair, however, I was trying to make it mess up. Overall Gokivo held its own and provided solid navigation. If you're not into Waze or spending any money, Gokivo is worth a look.

Navfree GPS Live USA (Free) is the only free option we tested that requires map downloads in advance. This isn't necessarily a downside, as having the data in your phone ahead of time can make loading the maps a little bit faster. What slowed things down, however, was Navfree's user interface. It feels like a GPS rather than an app. You have to tap a lot of icons and give it a lot of specific information before you can get going. Just inputting everything was unnecessarily frustrating. Navfree is also ad-supported, which is reasonable because they're giving you a free navigation app, but ads are harder to deal with on navigation apps because screen real estate is especially important. It's a serviceable free option, but definitely not the best.

MapQuest 4 Mobile (Free) was my favorite free turn-by-turn navigation app in the past, but using it again now was surprisingly disappointing. While it provided decent navigation, for the most part, as soon as I missed a turn it just completely gave up. I do remember it being slow to react when I tested it in the past, but either I didn't remember how slow it actually is or it has gotten worse. Either way, you have multiple free options that are a better choice so I'd pass on MapQuest for now.

Note: Despite our best efforts to get review copies, we were unable to test Tom Tom and AT&T Navigator. It should be noted that these apps were not considered in our evaluation because we couldn't test them.
