Waze is great for shaving minutes off your commute and avoiding those pesky speed traps, but it’s always been just a few steps behind Google Maps. One small feature that can be surprisingly helpful is traffic light icons along your route. Waze may finally be getting this feature, too.
Waze appears to be testing out traffic light icons on the map while using the turn-by-turn navigation. This is a feature that’s been around for a while on Google Maps and Apple Maps, but has evaded Waze. As discovered by GeekTime, just like in Google Maps, the traffic light icons only show up along the specific route you’re following in navigation mode. They don’t appear all over the main map—which is probably a good thing.
But why is this useful? Obviously, you shouldn’t need to see a traffic light icon on the map to know you need to stop. That’s not what this is for. I’ve found the traffic light icons in Google Maps to be helpful when figuring out which road to turn on when you’re in a dense area. Think of them like landmark indicators. When I can see that my next turn is at an intersection with a traffic light, I can drive past all the roads before that without any ambiguity.
All that being said, it’s important to remember that this is still in the early stages of testing and hasn’t been spotted on many devices. There’s no official word yet on when Waze plans to roll this out more widely. However, since this is already a feature on other map apps—especially Google Maps (Google owns Waze)—it seems very likely this will be officially added in the near future.
Google has spliced several Waze features into Google Maps over the years, but it’s not as common to see the sharing go in the other direction. Waze is still a very powerful and useful map app, even if it’s not as ubiquitous and flashy as Google Maps. I’m glad to see it’s still getting new features.
Via: 9to5Google
4 Reasons I Choose Waze Over Google Maps
I first discovered Waze back in 2014 when traveling to a tech event in Colorado. I flew into Denver and had a 120-mile journey to my destination. It seemed like a simple trip, most of my time would be spent on a single interstate, and the resort was only a few short miles from the exit. About an hour into the trip, Waze suddenly told me to get off the highway at the upcoming exit. I knew I had just over an hour left on this highway, but needing a pit stop, I followed the directions.
