Waze is a crowdsourced GPS navigation tool. How does it work? Waze provides you with voice-enabled GPS directions to guide you to your destination by recommending the best route. It incorporates information about current traffic conditions and route type (highway vs. street) to suggest the quickest way to reach your destination. What’s interesting about this BlackBerry 10 app is that it also collects information from the Waze community. Waze pools data from its users, incorporates this real-time information with map data. It’s this combination of information that allows it to truly suggest the current best route for you.
When using the app, you’ll have the map displayed with little anonymous Waze user icons that show you where other Waze users are as you drive.
You are also an important contributor of information for this app. As a Waze user you provide information about the road conditions. Report an accident, police activity, heavy traffic and confirm other users’ reports of the same. Keep everyone updated! As Waze Inc. describes it, “It’s all about contributing to, and benefiting from, the ‘common good’ out there on the road.”
Here’s a break down of the features:
- Live routing based on community-generated, real-time traffic and road info
- Community-contributed road alerts including accidents, hazards, police traps, road closures and more.
- Complete voice-guided navigation.
- Automatic re-routing as conditions on the road change.
- Learns your frequent destinations, commuting hours and preferred routes.
- Find the cheapest gas station on your route.
- See Facebook friends also driving to your destination.
- Notify someone you’re on your way by sending a live ETA and a link showing you as you drive
- Earn points and move up the ranks in your community as you contribute road info.
- Live maps, constantly edited and updated by Waze community map editors.
