V2X

With so many navigation apps available for the iPhone, I never considered downloading one to try until I heard about Waze from a Twitter post a few nights ago. Since I have not downloaded any other gps apps to compare with Waze, I will just give you my initial review of it and not a comparison review.

Finding the app and downloading it was easy and setting it up was as well. I did find the 8 page prompt to introduce you to the app wasn’t necessary, but may be for the tech challenged user. Registering to use it was fast and it was nice to not have to fill out a multiple questionnaire form for a free app.

The interface is clean and when I logged in, I found several users in the area, which was nice since I’m not in a large city. Actually, I was impressed to see people actually using it in my area, so I told my wife to go get Waze, and upon logging in we could see each other immediately. This being really cool at the moment may not be such a great thing down the road with us being able to track each other, but you can turn the ping option off.

On my drive in to work this morning, I purposely drove in on the back roads through the country thinking I could introduce the mapping interface to some un-mapped roads, but I never could trick it. Again, I was impressed with its navigation and tracking capabilities.

I never thought I would need an app like this, but after one day of use, I find it really fun to have on my phone. It may be more fun to use when I am the passenger and I can watch it as we drive through town, but it is an addictive little pleasure to have.

The interface is beautiful and easy to use. One thing that did throw me off is that I couldn’t narrow it back down to show me on the map, but after fumbling around, I realized it was zoomed out after I tapped on another user on the map.

Other than some slow updates while driving, I couldn’t find much negative to report. In their defense, my phone’s internet connection doesn’t work well in the area that I commute, so I can’t fault Waze at the moment.

A great idea for the Waze app would be the fun your kids can have while traveling and watching your progress on the road trip. It may cut down on the “are we there yet” questions, as they will be able to know from their phone, as long as you’re in coverage.

I think there is going to be a strong need for apps like this as social networking keeps growing, and the vehicle navigation market is still developing products to bring to market. It would be nice to see one of the larger gps companies implement this into their devices without using your smart phone’s data package.

I will be telling more of my friends to try Waze, and it will be a lot of fun seeing them pop up on the screen while I am out and about on the road. I will eventually look at some other navigation apps in the future, but for the moment, I am quite happy with this one. I look forward to seeing how they progress.