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Apple maps ➡️ TomTom Amigo

I’m moving away from American services in favor of European ones. In this article I’m returning to an old favorite: I’ve dusted off TomTom in favor of Apple Maps.

I didn’t realize, but the navigation market is booming. The app stores offer an overload of mapping and navigation apps!

Here in The Netherlands I can safely say we all know Waze, Google Maps, and Apple Maps. But other options include Here (of Nokia fame, now German 🇩🇪), Magic Earth (German 🇩🇪), TomTom (Dutch 🇳🇱) and Sygic (UK 🇬🇧)]. I don’t have time to try them all, and I chose TomTom out of brand familiarity and Dutch nationalism 🌷.

TomTom apps versus Apple Maps #

Two years ago I switched from Waze and Google Maps to Apple Maps because of privacy concerns and a hatred of advertising (Waze is spectacularly horrible with its aggressive and intrusive ads). For this reason I’ll mainly compare TomTom to Apple.

The first thing we have to do when switching to TomTom is figure out their offering. They have two similar apps and I had a hard time understanding the difference.

This is my finding:

  • TomTom Amigo is most like Apple/Google/Waze: online-only and free. It crowd-sources accidents/events on the road in a similar manner as Waze and Apple.
  • TomTom Go is the pro offering. It works with offline maps that are updated regularly. It additionally has lane-guidance (“stay in the second lane from the left”). It costs 20 euro per year.

Both have traffic, speed cameras, live rerouting, places (restaurants, gas stations, parking), CarPlay, no advertising, strong privacy. Strangely, the paid TomTom Go seems to miss calendar integration that Amigo does have.

Is it any good? #

I’ve used Amigo for short routes now and the navigation is decent. In my experience it is as reliable as Apple, with the only major downside being the lack of lane guidance. I’m comfortable with an app that says “turn right”, but it would be better if it said “stay in the second lane from the right”.

As you might expect, the app is not as userfriendly and polished as Apple’s offering. The colors and animation feel rougher. The guiding voice is robotic, both in sound and directions. Apple sometimes gives instructions in a human way, such as “at the next traffic light” - making it feel as though a buddy is giving you directions instead of Commander Data.

Amigo is 100% focused on navigation by car. No walking or cycling routes, no “exploring places near me”. Then again, Apple was also not very good at all this compared to Google Maps. Another missing feature is Streetview.

Is it all bad?

Amigo lacks killer-features to set it apart from Apples navigation, but I do like that it shows me both my driving speed and maximum speed in one overview. Apple is not very reliable in maximum speed indication, and the lack of ‘my current speed’ in Apple’s UI is annoying.

Conclusion #

My conclusion is that TomTom is clunky but reliable. It will get my car and me to where I want.

I cannot fully switch from Apple Maps to TomTom, so will revert back to Apple for other map-activities (such as holiday planning and walking). I might try out Here or Magic Earth in the future.