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Any ones which tries to avoid realtime traffic, especially in India? Also ones which detects some shortcuts as narrow, meandering roads that will be extremely s

Any ones which tries to avoid realtime traffic, especially in India? Also ones which detects some shortcuts as narrow, meandering roads that will be extremely slow.

eisa01 3mo ago
There’s actually work ongoing on live traffic support from various public sources! https://codeberg.org/comaps/comaps/projects/21877 https://codeberg.org/comaps/comaps/projects/21877
- harkdif 3mo ago
  This looks really solid. It's the thing that would make me switch over. 90% of the time I know exactly where I'm going but need Google Maps to tell me what's unexpectedly in the way while I'm trying to get there.
  - dexterdog 3mo ago
    My problem is that more often than not the road or business name I'm trying to find us just not in the database. If I'm at home I'll try to add it but if I'm driving that is not going to happen and I'll just use something else.
    - harkdif 3mo ago
      Yeah, that's a great call-out. While I can reckon my way most places, memorizing cross streets isn't my strength. Not having at least decent recency on top of traffic makes it tough.
    - zaik 3mo ago
      Thank you for contributing! The task of mapping every street and business in the world sounds impossible, but openstreetmap.org does really well.
ryukoposting 3mo ago
I'll preface this by saying I can't speak for India. I live in the US. Use your own discretion to decide what here might apply to you. I've been using Organic Maps for almost 3 years. I lived in Chicago during this time, as well as some smaller American cities. I go back and forth between Organic Maps and GMaps depending on the situation. I've found that Organic Maps' lack of traffic data isn't a big deal for me. It doesn't always give you an accurate ETA, sure, but it isn't any worse at actually getting you to your destination. The thing with GMaps is that everyone has traffic data, so nobody has an advantage. Google's alternative routes end up equally saturated as the main routes, meaning a "dumb" maps app that always takes the main route will get you to your destination in basically the same amount of time. This is backed up by my own personal experience, and some academic research [1]. Now, when I do need an accurate ETA, I go back to GMaps. I'll also use GMaps to route to businesses sometimes, because OSM doesn't have up-to-date info about businesses throughout most of middle America. [1]: https://trid.trb.org/view/1495267 https://trid.trb.org/view/1495267
- nekusar 3mo ago
  I prefer Google Maps cause they'll tell you where pigs camp out. Saved me a lot of speeding tickets on the interstate.
  - greentea23 3mo ago
    It would be really cool to see the social situational awareness sharing feature be implemented in an open client over an open censorship resistant protocol. Because to me Google maps is just mass surveillance by the pigs even if it does happen to help you today, the long term incentive for big tech is to erode user freedom and collude with corrupt governments.
  - roysting 3mo ago
    Waze is way better for that and where Google gets its data, but delayed it seems, because they’re both Alphabet.
    - seb1204 3mo ago
mbirth 3mo ago
There’s Magic Earth which uses OSM map data but also integrates live traffic information. Not sure whether it works in India, though. https://www.magicearth.com/ https://www.magicearth.com/
- embedding-shape 3mo ago
  Have they tried/are there any plans of upstreaming that somehow? While I rely on proprietary services for car navigation today, if I move to a OSM-based services next, I'd want it to be similarly structured to actual OSM, not some proprietary bolted-on-top-of-OSM startup that will disappear/enshittificate within years.
  - mbirth 3mo ago
    Magic Earth is 10+ years old by now. Only recently they've introduced a (very reasonable, I think) Premium subscription to cover their costs. I guess the live traffic data is bound to some licenses so they can't just "upstream" that.
  - ihatehn 3mo ago
    M.E. is closed source and some would argue somewhat enshittifying

Any ones which tries to avoid realtime traffic, especially in India? Also ones which detects some shortcuts as narrow, meandering roads that will be extremely slow.

eisa01 3mo ago

There’s actually work ongoing on live traffic support from various public sources! https://codeberg.org/comaps/comaps/projects/21877 https://codeberg.org/comaps/comaps/projects/21877

harkdif 3mo ago
This looks really solid. It's the thing that would make me switch over. 90% of the time I know exactly where I'm going but need Google Maps to tell me what's unexpectedly in the way while I'm trying to get there.
- dexterdog 3mo ago
  My problem is that more often than not the road or business name I'm trying to find us just not in the database. If I'm at home I'll try to add it but if I'm driving that is not going to happen and I'll just use something else.
  - harkdif 3mo ago
    Yeah, that's a great call-out. While I can reckon my way most places, memorizing cross streets isn't my strength. Not having at least decent recency on top of traffic makes it tough.
  - zaik 3mo ago
    Thank you for contributing! The task of mapping every street and business in the world sounds impossible, but openstreetmap.org does really well.

ryukoposting 3mo ago

I'll preface this by saying I can't speak for India. I live in the US. Use your own discretion to decide what here might apply to you. I've been using Organic Maps for almost 3 years. I lived in Chicago during this time, as well as some smaller American cities. I go back and forth between Organic Maps and GMaps depending on the situation. I've found that Organic Maps' lack of traffic data isn't a big deal for me. It doesn't always give you an accurate ETA, sure, but it isn't any worse at actually getting you to your destination. The thing with GMaps is that everyone has traffic data, so nobody has an advantage. Google's alternative routes end up equally saturated as the main routes, meaning a "dumb" maps app that always takes the main route will get you to your destination in basically the same amount of time. This is backed up by my own personal experience, and some academic research [1]. Now, when I do need an accurate ETA, I go back to GMaps. I'll also use GMaps to route to businesses sometimes, because OSM doesn't have up-to-date info about businesses throughout most of middle America. [1]: https://trid.trb.org/view/1495267 https://trid.trb.org/view/1495267

nekusar 3mo ago
I prefer Google Maps cause they'll tell you where pigs camp out. Saved me a lot of speeding tickets on the interstate.
- greentea23 3mo ago
  It would be really cool to see the social situational awareness sharing feature be implemented in an open client over an open censorship resistant protocol. Because to me Google maps is just mass surveillance by the pigs even if it does happen to help you today, the long term incentive for big tech is to erode user freedom and collude with corrupt governments.
- roysting 3mo ago
  Waze is way better for that and where Google gets its data, but delayed it seems, because they’re both Alphabet.
  - seb1204 3mo ago

mbirth 3mo ago

There’s Magic Earth which uses OSM map data but also integrates live traffic information. Not sure whether it works in India, though. https://www.magicearth.com/ https://www.magicearth.com/

embedding-shape 3mo ago
Have they tried/are there any plans of upstreaming that somehow? While I rely on proprietary services for car navigation today, if I move to a OSM-based services next, I'd want it to be similarly structured to actual OSM, not some proprietary bolted-on-top-of-OSM startup that will disappear/enshittificate within years.
- mbirth 3mo ago
  Magic Earth is 10+ years old by now. Only recently they've introduced a (very reasonable, I think) Premium subscription to cover their costs. I guess the live traffic data is bound to some licenses so they can't just "upstream" that.
- ihatehn 3mo ago
  M.E. is closed source and some would argue somewhat enshittifying