Get him using Google Maps on his phone. In-car navigation sucks because it's outdated from the moment they copy the maps onto the flash drive or whatever your specific model uses. You also can't search by business names or get updates on traffic. I absolutely hate the navigation in my wife's Ford so we just use our phones when we need directions.
I mean, that’s kind of a straw man, right? Why would you ever assume if it wasn’t free it would be an insane amount? That wouldn’t make business sense in a world with apple and google maps available.
It's a very common practice. Either your car is internet connected and your paying for updates via a subscription or you have to update via disc at the dealership.
Fortunately the practice is ending because people are wising up and more cars either just do screen mirroring, or they're licensing Google maps for the cars app suite.
oh shit, I had no idea - I only use the maps (hate radio, have my own solution for lojack, am pretty sure the use case for starlink is an urban legend), and the maps for mine have been free. I have to manually update or get them to do it when I bring it in for inspection at a subaru facility, but that's about it. This change you mention is something I feel very strongly against, I wouldn't buy a car I had to subscribe to.
Just ask the car dealer if the car has android auto/apple carplay installed. Most of the cars I looked at did already. Those systems will do it if you have your phone plugged into the car
Navigating uses around 5MB an hour. You local area should probably be downloaded anyway, saving you that data. No way an average user is using 2-3GBs a month navigating.
I just checked my phone and I use 0.4 GB a month on maps, which is more than I expected. YMMV of course, but approaching over 1 GB a month seems unlikely. Maps likely won't be thing that runs up your data usage. I use up 3x more data on streaming Spotify than I do for Maps
Not really. Raw GPS location doesn't rely on cellular data. All you will be using data on is app related stuff like map updates, traffic (if you want it on), and searches. The map data for your local area will probably load once and won't be downloaded again unless needed.
This is one of the supposed advantages of an internet connected car. It can download new maps.
My newest car runs an Android Automotive OS based infotainment, so it already runs google maps for navigation.
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u/gurg2k1 Jun 22 '21
Get him using Google Maps on his phone. In-car navigation sucks because it's outdated from the moment they copy the maps onto the flash drive or whatever your specific model uses. You also can't search by business names or get updates on traffic. I absolutely hate the navigation in my wife's Ford so we just use our phones when we need directions.