I just tried out the latest version of the new

TomTom GPS Navigation for Android

...last night and I'm very impressed. Last time I tried it was when it was first available on Android several years ago, and at the time it had some bugs, although it had the best voice guidance of any nav app like it.

They've totally revamped the UI since then, and are using the same UI on the latest TomTom "Go" series hardware PNDs too. Among other improvements, it uses a single-line address entry like all the online map sites.
No more, first the 'state,' then 'city name,' then 'street name.'

TomTom has a google.com/maps style trip planning site
that allows routes to be sent to mobileOS device running the TomTom app or to their newer PNDs.

The TomTom GPS Navigation app is well worth a look if you have an Android device.
It has a unique fully functional trial: free for trips totaling up to 50 miles per month.
So that's a different kind of trial period: limited in distance, but it renews.

My only complaint is, beyond that trial it uses a subscription model: $22 for 1 year or $50 for 3 years. That makes it more a lot more expensive over time than ALK CoPilot or Garmin StreetPilot.

...

Here's a review that concludes: "Verdict This is the best GPS navigation app on Android."

FYI:

ROUTES created and saved on the TomTom trip planner website are sync'd between the trip planner and any mobile devices logged into the same account. But it's a one-way sync for routes. Routes created on a mobile device are not accessible from the trip planner website. But that's not a big drawback either IMO.

Saved PLACES are sync'd both ways between TomTom trip planner website and mobile devices logged in.

It happens very quickly too.


ref.: Routes created on TomTom GPS Nav (Android App) don't show up in mydrive account

The Nuvi has had this for awhile, at the top of the search page. But it's just as slow as the old method and doesn't seem to work very well. However the iOS StreetPilot app has something called "Local Search" as a separate icon on the Where To screen. I *think* this uses Google, because the old (discontinued) Nuvi connected models (1690, 1695) had something similar called "Google Local Search".

Anyway, you can type whatever you like into this and it seems faster/better than the traditional (painful) Garmin search method. Also works great to paste coordinates into this.

I should check out the TomTom iOS version if it's changed. Got very frustrated with Garmin the other day, they had an update that completely broke the app so it wouldn't open. The fix they suggested was to delete and re-download. Did that and it worked, but forced me to download the maps again (which takes hours) and it also erased all my waypoints.

I tested the TomTom Android app (probably in 2013) soon after they (finally) made it available after it was delayed from when it was supposedly going to be available. It still had a few bugs even then, and like most of the other PND-makers' apps, it was basically a port of a TomTom PND UI.

The new TomTom app is totally different than it was back then, but the new "Go" PNDs also have the same all-new UI, too. I have a few nits to pick with the UI, but all-in-all the new TomTom UI is way better than the others (like CoPilot) that will do what it does (like provide good, clear, accurate audible directions and visual junction views when needed).

The new TomTom app provides full functionality - FREE - for up to 50 miles per month. After that they charge a subscription. To me, that's the main drawback. Those who bought the old version which supposedly would have lifetime updates) sort of go screwed...

(from Wikipedia): "TomTom for Android devices
There is an app for Android, called TomTom GO Mobile. It replaced the old app, which had similar features to the iOS app. In March 2015, TomTom announced the new TomTom GO Mobile app for Android with a freemium subscription model for maps with the first 50 miles/75 kilometres per month being free, including all the maps that are available, TomTom Traffic and Speed Cameras. The previous app, which had promised "free lifetime updates", is not available for purchase on Play Store anymore and it's maps are not updated since October 2015. TomTom claims their definition of lifetime map updates is "the period of time that TomTom continues to support the app with updates". Previous customers of TomTom's Android navigation app are offered a discount on the subscription in the new app for three years. There is no provision for users who want to keep using the old app under the conditions it was sold with lifetime map updates."

...but I guess that's no different that CoPilot, which provides free map updates for "LIFE" (meaning the life of that VERSION of CoPilot). CoPilot 10 was just released for iOS, and i t looks like yet another very incremental improvement, but once which will leave existing customers with no more map updates. Of course, mobileOS CoPilot (non-truck) is only ten bucks, so....

Links:
https://www.tomtom.com/en_us/drive/car/

TomTom GO Mobile for Android review

....

[The back story is that I've been extensively testing google maps, and kept finding circumstances where you'd need an internet connection to make the hand-off to the googlemap app, and their scheme makes storing a national map offline completely impractical (maybe not even possible). However the googlemap app will look up addresses in the saved offline map area, and you can choose POIs in the map view (for the first destination anyway). So for most people that's probably more than enough... right up until the stray outside their saved map area... because that's not something most people are going to keep track of. They just want it to work. GoogleMaps works pretty well for people who mainly need to take short trips that begin now, mainly in their home area, assuming they usually have good mobile data connection. Others have very different needs.]

BTW, if you download the tomTom app (it's free, why not try it?)
One little gotcha:
The maps are arranged by regions.
If you do like I did and download a single region to be able to try it out sooner,
then, even if you later download other regions, any search you do will be confined to ONE region at a time!

So next I downloaded the entire US, and that map is 5GB

Since I already had ~2GB of google 'offline areas', ~500MB CoPilot maps, ~300MB Here map, I had to get rid of most of those to have enough room for 5GB, on the (faster) internal storage of a 16GB tablet.

16GB is now practically the minimum but there's also not too many 32GB Android tablets, but now I'm wishing/hoping they become more common.

Just looked at this, definitely worth a try. I'm getting annoyed with Garmin's "crippleware". TomTom looks like they are serious about making a full featured app. And imagine this, they even have a comprehensive user manual. http://download.tomtom.com/open/manuals/GO_Mobile_app_for_iPhone/refman/TomTom-GO-Mobile-RG-en-us.pdf

The StreetPilot app doesn't even have a manual, and the TomTom manual puts the Garmin Nuvi manuals to shame. My internet connection is dog slow, rarely even get 1mbit/set. So I will wait until bedtime and do the download. I have a 128gb iPhone 6s+ with over 50gb free, so space shouldn't be an issue.

50 miles of driving (any use of the app, not just routing)… that would be like a regular day for me, LOL. In my rural area, it's a 30 mile trip to the grocery store. But I don't have a problem with that. Can check it out for free and see if I want to purchase. The Garmin app cost $80 then in-app purchases for traffic and pedestrian navigation took it up to about $100. That would buy 5 years of TomTom, sounds reasonable to me.

Thanks for pointing this out.

That appears to be the newest manual too. I stumbled across some older ones before I found the 2016 android app manual.

Yep, and that's really been the drawback all along. The PND makers were the ones who had the experience to do it but didn't want to jeopardize their hardware PND business by creating apps with comparable functionality, and didn't see the writing on the that they were going to lose that anyway. Now google has skimmed off the bulk of the need, at least in areas with good data coverage.

WOW!

At 1mbit/sec., 5GB will take about 12 hours (probably more than that)

------------------

BTW, one problem I'm having right now is I can't figure out how to get a multi-stop route from the trip planner site into the TomTom Go mobile app (or Go PND). They show up in the list of routes but one the start and end are there.

The manual and the UI itself makes a point of differentiating between tracks and routes, and there's a Wikipedia article that goes into more detail. All I know is, I need to plan a trip - with stops - and have the same route and all those stops transfer easily and reliably to a nav device that will work without a data connection.

If I'm only going to get 'tracks" (no stops), I'd have to add the stops separately as saved places, then rebuild the route. That defeats the purpose.

That was one great thing about planning a trip in Furkot and then exporting a CoPilot .trp file: it opens into CoPilot with the entire route & all the stops. Too bad CoPilot isn't that great at giving directions from it.

OK, it almost looks like what I want is what TomTom refers to as an "itinerary" which according to THIS article:

HOW DO I CREATE AND SAVE AN ITINERARY?
How do I create and save an itinerary?
An Itinerary is a plan for a journey including more locations than your final destination.
Note: This feature is not supported on all devices.
To learn how to plan an itinerary, click on the name of your navigation device below:
GO 2000 series, VIA series, GO LIVE series
GO x40, GO x30, GO x20, GO x10, GO, XXL 540, XL 340, XL, ONE, ONE 2nd edition, RIDER

is a feature is not supported on all devices, including, or so it would seem, any of their latest PNDs, or their trip planning website, or their mobile app.

If that's true, that's pretty wacked !

OK, looks like my suspicion was correct.

Once I figured out that TomTom calls a route with stops to be an "Itinerary" which is a capability it has implemented in some of its hardware PNDS...

...the TomTom itinerary files have an ".itn" suffix

...evidently what it has NOT done is allow the online trip planner site to CREATE itineraries!

...nor is the mobileOS app capable of importing ".itn" itinerary files

...and evidently TomTom has no trip planning software that will create itineraries or save .itn files.

Not surprisingly, once I searched on the right keywords, discovered a torrent of threads about this:

Great App let down by lack of ability to IMPORT itineraries

...and of course NO Itinerary planning

Itinerary with Tomtom Android

Itinerary import

Itinerary?

Some of these have posts implying that the feature just hasn't been implemented yet... should be soothing... until you notice the dates stretch back 2 years.




One thing I did learn: apparently all the newest TomTom PNDs can import itinerary files.
The above statement in the previous post about "not supported on all devices." must be old.

More clues:
Here:


So here's a trip planner (mainly for businesses) and the developer just calls it a ROUTE, even though they export it as .GPX or .ITN



And a further explanation from here about how GPX fits in to this:

"GPS eXchange formatGPX files are used by many GPS devices and navigation apps. They contain a combinations of waypoints, routes and tracks. The exact content of the exported GPX file depends on the export options.
tracks routes


A single route with one routepoint for each trip stop

Waypoints representing trip stops and GPX tracks representing trip course. One track for each day

Waypoints representing trip stops and routes based on trip course. One route for each day. The number of routepoints depends on the points per route value.

Waypoints representing trip stops, tracks and routes representing trip course. One track and one route for each day. The number of routepoints depends on the points per route value. When Furkot exports waypoints corresponding to stops that have been tagged, the tags are exported as categories defined by the Garmin Extension Schema."



So it looks like only Garmin PNDs can import .GPX routes that have STOPS in them.


TomTom has their own format that isn't too widely supported, and in any case, the TomTom mobile app will not import .ITN files

OK, so I now know that although it's possible to build multi-stop routes on the TomTom trip planner website,
it is NOT possible to export that trip - WITH the stops - to a mobile device running the TomTom mobile nav app.
Places do export (and sync between the website and the device) just fine, and quickly, but not intermediary route waypoints.
That being the case, I decided to build a multi-stop route in the TomTom mobile nav app (Android).
It is possible to do that, but it is a fairly cumbersome process.

More on that in the next post, because the accuracy of the TomTom trip planner website,
compared to the other most popular counterparts (google, Bing, Here, mapQuest & CoPilot) needs to be examined first.

The test route is one I've used many times before. About a decade ago, it used to trip up S&T,
but IIRC the later versions avoided the problem that you'll see below. It's a route I've driven many times,
and there's really no doubt which one is the best one, assuming no adverse weather or roadwork.
It's by no means a be-all and end-all. If anyone else has another one like this in mind,
please feel free to check it out and report the result.

First, here are TomTom's competitors' routes for a regular automobile (not RV or truck):

google.com/maps = 886 miles, 12:28


Bing.com/maps = 889 miles, 13:33


wego.here.com = 889.7 miles, 13:24


mapquest.com = 895 miles 13:01


CoPilot (Android) = 888 miles, 14:16


For this test, I'm not really concerned about the variations in driving time.
Evidently google only includes actual driving time, and its estimates are almost always too short for long trips after accounting for stops.

What's noticeable is that all of these got the correct route and their estimated distances are all very similar.


In comparison, the TomTom online route planner did not do as well:
mydrive.tomtom.com, Step #1, Default route is not the best route.
At 944 miles it's over 50 miles farther, and neither of the other routes are correct either:

mydrive.tomtom.com, Step #2, Chose the alternate route that's closest to the correct one (enlarged area shows the problem that needs to be corrected):



mydrive.tomtom.com, Step #3, Zoom in to add a waypoint to force the route where it needs to go.
No option to add a "Via Point" so I have to add a stop and then ignore those directions during the actual trip.


mydrive.tomtom.com, Step #4 = 892 miles, 12:50 The corrected route is now similar to all the others.



While this was not too hard to do on the TomTom trip planner site, it was not as easy as it would have been to make a similar change on any of the other websites above
(due mainly to the relative slowness of the TomTom site).

But of course, the problem is that corrected route had multiple intermediary stops (actual stops, not route diversion stops used because there are via points aren't available),
those actual stops would be omitted when the route is sent to the TomTom mobile app, because the TomTom trip planner site does not export ".itn" (itinerary) files
that TomTom devices need, and because the TomTom mobile app can't import .itn files (although most newer TomTom PNDs will .itn files)

So that means that planning a trip like this on the TomTom trip planner site is pretty much useless if the intention is to use it with the TomTom mobile app.

And as my next post will show, although it's possible to build a long multi-stop route in the
TomTom mobile app, it is a WHOLE LOT MORE TROUBLE than it is on their trip planner site.
...

If you haven't already tried the "Here" mobile app, I'd give that one a shot too.

While the Here mobile app will not do multi-step routes, the website WILL do multi-step routes, and the places on a multi-stop route can be saved, and automatically sync'd with, a mobile device signed into the same account.

Unlike google's saved places, Here allows saved placed to be organized into user-named "collections." This means that one viable way to plan trips on wego.here.com is to save each waypoint as a numbered step with all steps in any one trip organized in a named collection.

Another thing Here will do (unlike google) is allow you to download maps, state-by-state, that don't expire.

Given the drawbacks I've found with the TomTom app's lack of route import capability, and the fact that they haven't even claimed that is forthcoming, Here is looking better all the time.

Here's one key advantage Here has over CoPilot is the routing instructions are generally better, and Here's "detailed" (last quarter-mile) routing accuracy is better too.

But the Here app doesn't have junction view and it won't even announce street names without the Hi-Fi voices, which Here no longer offers. But those voice files still work, and I do have them. Let me know if you want them.

...download the TomTom app (it's free, why not try it?)


A guy walks into a bar and sees a funny shape bowl on the floor.

He asks the bar man "What's that on the floor?".

The bar man tells him it's a spitoon.

Our hero, always up for a bet, says to the bar man - "I bet $100 I can drink some of that". Bar man says "OK - you are on".

So he lifts the spitoon to his lips and gulp, gulp, gulp.

Barman says "That's gross - OK - you win $100".

But the guy just shakes his head and carries on - gulp, gulp, gulp.

The barman says "Man, stop you are making me feel sick".

But our man just carries on - gulp, gulp, gulp.

And finally one last gulp and the man puts down the empty spitoon.

The bar man says "It was $100 to drink just some of it - why did you drink the lot?"

"Cause it was all in one lump."

I tried to install TomTom on my Android phone but I didn't have sufficient storage because the maps for Australia are all in one lump - 540MB.

Like you guys I am always on the lookout for the perfect satnav app so I have just installed Here We Go (after uninstalling TomTom to clear storage).

It is able to download state maps (279MB for WA) rather than in one, you know - Christine says my joke will get me banned so I won't repeat the word - 879MB file for the whole of Oz.

However, Indonesia, where I have just got back from, is only available as a single 540MB download whereas, maps.me allowed me to select just Bali (plus some islands to the east such as Lombok).

I would like to get the voices for the Here We Go app. How do you propose to make them available? Possibly upload them to OneDrive or Gdrive and share them.