Nokia To Make GPS Navigation Free On Smartphones

mliu writes "In what is sure to be a blow to the already beleaguered stand-alone GPS market, Nokia, the global leader in smartphone market share, has released a fully offline-enabled free GPS navigation and mapping application for its Symbian smartphones. Furthermore, the application also includes Lonely Planet and Michelin guides. Unfortunately, the N900, which is beloved by geeks for its Maemo Linux-based operating system, has not seen any of the navigation love so far. With Google's release of Google Navigation for Android smartphones, and now Nokia doing one better and releasing an offline-enabled navigation application, hopefully this is the start of a trend where this becomes an expected component of any smartphone."

Navigation on Nokia phones works very well

[Tillmann]

My experience has so far been rather positive. Even an old N82 is an adequate replacement for a dedicated GPS, IMHO.

Re:Outdated

[AuMatar]

You overestimate their loss of marketshare. The smartphone market is a tiny part of the overall phone market, and its only there that they've lost anything at all. They're still the 800 lbs gorilla.

Re:What about live traffic updates

[zaax]

They still change you for it (even though they get it for free), but Google don't.

Re:Offline is less important than real-time update

[Kessler]

Ovi Maps does real-time online map downloads just fine, along with real-time online traffic updates, weather, events, location sharing, etc. However, by allowing you to store maps on the memory card (a few gig can cover the US and most of Europe) you aren't *forced* to be online to use it. Handy for those treks into more rural areas (where 3G coverage, not to mention road signs, is a luxury and offline nav becomes really beneficial). Also nice when you're off-network and don't want to pay crazy data roaming charges.

Re:Not listed phones works too, i.e. Nokia E51

[Night64]

Yes, you can download it for non listed phones. But just the software. The license for navigation isn't free for non listed phones. I have an N95 8GB. Did you saw it in the list? Neither did I...

Re:Outdated

[INeededALogin]

The problem is, will Nokia keep on updating their free directions?

You do realize that Nokia owns Navteq which re-sells the map data to other companies. Free doesn't mean that it can't be monetized and profitable.

Re:Offline GPS?

[TheRaven64]

You can download the OpenStreetMap maps for offline use. There's a rather neat Java app that creates a J2ME app with a selectable subset of the data for you. How much space you need depends on how large an area you want. I put everywhere within about an hour's drive of my house on my old phone. With a bigger flash card it's pretty easy to fit the whole UK on (around 150MB, as I recall).

My e71 already does this

[mpapet]

Seriously, you don't know what you guys are missing with Nokia/Symbian phones.

-Media players play DRM free files.
-Easy 802.11 access/use
-Decent 'office' application. Opens my text files, that's all I care about.
-SMTP support. I know they HAD crackberry support on my old communicator. I assume it's still available.
-Apps for a sysadmin.
-Solid mobile java support
-GPS, directions, and all that. However, you need windows as an intermediary between the phone and nokia's maps.
-Symbian is years ahead of Apple or Google's OS. Multiple apps open at the same time, global cut + paste.

I assume later model phones will do all of this too. It's just that Nokia appears to have a very hard time in the U.S.

Re:What about live traffic updates

[mgblst]

Exactly, the best camera is the one you have on you at the time.

Re:Not listed phones works too, i.e. Nokia E51

[blackpig]

N95 8GB is on the list at... http://europe.nokia.com/support/product-support/maps-support/compatibility-and-download [nokia.com] Check the drop down box after 'Start' and select N95 8GB and this will take you to the download page for Ovi Maps 3.0. After that you download the map loader. It's listed as a free download. This seems to differ from the link in the original article in that more phones are listed.

Re:Will never buy standalone again.

[Anonymous Coward]

(Replying to self, sorry.)

It seems on closer googling that others are way ahead of me. Hopefully it will make it to extras-testing soon.

Re:Offline GPS?

[Meeuw]

http://gpsmid.sourceforge.net/ [sourceforge.net]

Re:Not listed phones works too, i.e. Nokia E51

[Night64]

I've not only checked that page, as I also tested it buy downloading the software. As I said before, you download the software, but no navigation license. I have an N95 8GB. I really would love to be wrong. Unfortunately, I'm not.