Offline GPS for iPhone
 

Mrs Oneant and I are leaving for Paris next weekend for a week. Our Garmin is a discontinued model and the Euro maps aren't available for it. We're both bringing our iPhones, but will be disabling data roaming due to ATT's ridiculous charges.

We'd like some sort of GPS while we're there, and we're looking for the best one to allow downloading of a local Paris area map for offline use (just using the GPS chip).

Obviously, this isn't free, and we're ok with that.

Preferrably, we'd like something that will allow us to add the points of interest we plan to hit, so that we could navigate to them on foot.

Any recommendations?

I used MyMaps during our recent trip. Allows you to download different zoom levels. Every street - even pedestrian only small streets were downloaded at the highest zoom levels. You can highlights all places to visit using Google maps on your computer and then this app can download those points of interest.

Try offmaps, you can download two area maps for free and then you will have gps maps capability without using data.

There is a Paris street map app on the iTunes Store which costs a couple of bucks and works offline with GPS.

Very useful thread, I didn't realise that offline maps were possible. Very handy

I use MotionX GPS. It allows you to download maps over a range of zooms that you specify, and lets you do it with street maps or satellite images (select MotionX maps instead of Google or Bing maps). When landing in a new location, it can take quite some time to get a GPS fix if you don't have a WiFi or cell phone connection, but I think this is an issue with what GPS satellites the GPS chip (incorrectly) assumes are nearby rather than the program itself. I think that if you pull up a pre-stored map of your new location

MotionX GPS lets you record tracks, mark waypoints, and so on. I've recorded dive sites in the Philippines with it, recorded mountain bike routes, and measured my speed on the Shinkansen trains in Japan. It works really well. The same outfit also makes a turn-by-turn automobile GPS application which costs $20/year, and now I leave my Garmin at home and just make sure I have my car power adapter for the iPhone.

Likely, the Apple users will not like my comment, but I have ditched the Garmin GPS and a laptop and now travel only with my trusty Nokia quad band E71. It has free offline world maps (and free updates for life) for 180 countries and and about 200 cities; this includes voice navigation for driving and screen directions for walking. The only place that I have found lacking, map wise, is Japan; however, I have Google maps loaded to cover these issues. The E71 is available for about $180 from Amazon. Other more expensive Nokia phones include free Lonely Planet and Michelin guides.

Regards, Bill

Here is a sample of using google maps on computer and then using My Maps to view the points of interest.

Google Maps

http://img41.imageshack.us/img41/7505/63927412.jpg

Saved map now shows up in MyMaps app on iphone after linking to google account


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http://img641.imageshack.us/img641/1538/photo2q.png

http://img801.imageshack.us/img801/6836/photo3f.png

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Also, don't discount the possibility of finding free wireless internet hotspots where you can use Google Maps in a bind if needed.

I've used the tomtom europe app for the iphone. You can also use the wifi at your hotel and download a general area on maps program.

One thing you might be aware of is that the GPS may need an initial cellphone connection once you get to europe. What I would do... is turn off the airplane mode and let the phone find a network and use a wifi network and find your initial GPS position. Then pull the sim card.

After all the suggestions, we went for MyMaps, but then saw the ratings.

We settled on MotionX and it's precisely what I was looking for. It may not integrate with Google or Live maps to import our specific destinations, but I'm ok with doing that manually.

I set the circle to emcompass all of our spots, and it downloaded--with full min and max zoom--at 500MB. Not too bad.

As for the connections, we will have voice and text message service the whole time, mainly to check in with family who is watching our 14mo old, and we'll have free wifi at the hotel and elsewhere around the city.

I just needed something that used the GPS chip alone, with downloaded maps (like your standard Garmin, etc), that would allow us to navigate smartly throughout the area without having to carry a paper map.

Of course, all this is preliminary. I'll only know for sure how well it works once we get there and try to use it.

In the end, our hotel balcony looks out onto the Eiffel Tower, so GPS or not, we're happy. :)

Does it have a limit on how many downloads you can do? Several of them I tried had extra charges after 5-10 downloads.

I don't think that MotionX has a limit on number of downloads. Again, the only maps you can download are the MotionX maps; I presume that copyright issues prevent you from downloading the Bing or Google maps, but really the MotionX maps are just as good as far as I've been able to tell. MotionX will let you see the Bing and Microsoft maps while on a cell or WiFi connection, but not download them.

MotionX works pretty well, but remember the phone can have data OFF but the phone side needs to be ON for the GPS to work. Make sure you are aware of incoming call charges and if you don't answer what your VOICE mail alert fee will be before doing. I also delete all my VM's prior to turning on the phone when abroad as one gets dinged the fee PER ALERT, not per time the VM's alerts go off. YMMV, but if you don't want to pay 2-4$ a round turn depending on country visiting, then you have to leave the phone off and the GPS doesn't work then.

I started using YouMail a few years back so that I wouldn't get charged minutes for the VM's being left, and so that I could find a wifi spot and check messages on a laptop. Pretty handy tool.