How to save offline Google maps. How to download Google maps on Android devices

Many people use Google Maps. But basically this is done with the Internet connection turned on, which can be expensive if it is limited or takes a long time - if it is slow. However, you can download part of the map to your device and use it offline. Here's how to do it:

Step 1. Download the map

Note. Downloaded cards can be stored in the device memory or on an SD card. If you decide to change the storage location, you will have to download the map again.

  1. Open the Google Maps app on your Android smartphone or tablet.
  2. Make sure that your device is connected to the Internet and that you are logged into your account.
  3. Find a place that interests you.
  4. Click on the name or address of the desired location Download. If you are interested in organizations or establishments, click Download map.

Step 2. Set up storage of downloaded maps on the SD card

By default, downloaded maps are stored in the internal memory of the mobile device. To change the storage location to the SD card, follow the steps below. On devices with Android 6.0 and higher, downloaded maps can only be saved to an SD card that is configured as a removable storage device.

  1. Insert the SD card into your Android mobile device.
  2. Open the Google Maps app.
  3. In the top left corner, click on the menu icon Offline maps.
  4. In the top right corner, click on the settings icon.
  5. In the Data Storage section, select Device-> SD card.

Step 3. Save battery and mobile data (optional)

When working with offline maps, you may use applications that require an Internet connection.

  1. Open the Google Maps app on your Android device.
  2. Click on the menu icon and turn on the mode Only via Wi-Fi.

Notes:

  • Without an Internet connection, only one type of route is available - car routes.
  • However, you will not be able to find alternative travel options, view traffic data, or select a lane.
  • Bypassing toll sections and ferries, as well as other route settings, will be unavailable.

Using offline maps

  • Downloaded maps can be used in the same way as usual, that is, when the device is connected to the Internet.
  • If you are not connected to the network or the data transfer speed is too low, then offline maps will be used for navigation.

Notes

  • Without an Internet connection, only one type of route is available - car routes. However, you will not be able to find alternative travel options, view traffic data, or select a lane. In addition, bypassing toll sections and ferries, as well as other route settings, will not be available.
  • To save mobile traffic and battery power, select the “Wi-Fi only” mode. If your device is not connected to Wi-Fi, Google Maps will only use downloaded map data. Don't forget to download the maps you need in advance. To enable this mode, open the Google Maps app and turn the Wi-Fi Only switch to On.

Previously, we looked at free GPS navigators for Android. Today we will select a navigator, focusing on offline operation - to work with maps without the Internet, by activating the GPS connection on the phone. Let's focus on the offline functions of navigators and maps that come with Android applications.

Offline navigators - review participants:

Benefits of offline maps

By default, all mobile navigators work online and may behave unstable without a direct Internet connection. If there is no Network, navigators do not display maps and do not build routes. All this can become a serious problem.

The problem can be easily resolved by downloading offline maps to your gadget. They will work offline: in Russia, neighboring countries and Europe. Offline maps are indispensable for navigation if you have expensive mobile data or if you open a map in a place where there is no Internet access.

Google Navigator: enable offline maps on Android

Saving offline maps

  1. Connect to a WiFi network, open the Google Maps app on your mobile device.
  2. Make sure you're signed in to your Google account in Google Maps.
  3. Find the city or place you want to save as an offline map in your GPS navigator.
  4. Click on the bottom bar of the Google Maps application - the name of the location will be displayed here.
  5. In the upper right corner of Google Navigator, a menu will be available with the option to save an offline map.
GPS navigator Google Maps allows you to download free offline maps (one of the best in detail)

Some features of Google Maps offline maps:

  • You can pan and zoom the map before saving it. The largest offline map size is about 30 square miles.
  • You can save an offline map under any name. It is convenient to give a clear name so that you can delete the file or check whether the desired city is in the list of saved maps.
  • For each map, its expiration date is indicated: it is advisable to check the relevance and update the files as needed.
  • After deleting the card, you will not be able to use it without the Internet until you download/update it again.

Viewing saved offline maps in Google Navigator

  1. Open Google Maps on Android through your previously used account;
  2. Go to the main menu of the application through the sidebar by clicking on the button with horizontal stripes;
  3. Go to the “Offline maps” section;
  4. For each offline map, the following actions are available: Download, View, Rename, Delete.

Waze is a free GPS navigator that works without the Internet

The Waze Android app doesn't have the obvious feature of saving maps offline, say, like Google Maps. The navigator requires an Internet connection from time to time for full operation. However, there are some workarounds to download offline offline maps.

How to Save Maps Offline Using the Waze App

To download the Waze offline map, you need to:

  1. First connect to the Internet;
  2. Open the Waze app on your phone;
  3. Enter the address that you want to save for offline operation;
  4. After finding the specified location, Waze will store the data in the cache.

You can use the offline map when traveling in Europe or Russia. Please note that in offline mode you will not be able to update your data until you connect your mobile device to the Internet. Traffic information will also not be available offline.

How to load traffic information into Waze

  1. Make sure your mobile device is connected to the Internet;
  2. Open Waze GPS and enter the location where you want to go;
  3. Waze will calculate routes to your destination and display them in the app as you navigate;
  4. Click on the Waze icon to open the menu, find the “Settings” icon in the new pop-up window;
  5. To save your current traffic information, go to Waze > Advanced Settings > Data Transfer > Load Traffic Information > Enable.

In addition to traffic information, Waze will display how much data the app has already downloaded and cached.

Yandex Navigator in offline mode (without Internet connection)

Free vector maps can be downloaded through the main application settings. This option is available to owners of both Android and iOS versions of the Yandex navigator. True, the list of offline maps is limited to the CIS countries and a number of adjacent territories. For most of Europe, alas, offline maps are not available.

Navitel is a popular navigator with offline function

Offline Android Maps transforms your phone into a full-fledged GPS device. At the same time, you don’t need to spend money on mobile traffic, which is often quite expensive.

Not all users want to spend time downloading individual locations (as described above). You can download a one-time set of detailed maps for a specific country or region. One such solution is Navitel Navigator. It is available for smartphones and Android tablets, iOS devices, car navigators.

In the “Buy” section on the developer’s website, special packages of offline maps are posted. And not only for Russia, but also for neighboring countries, Europe, the USA, and Latin America.

In terms of the quality of map detail, this is perhaps the best offline navigator for mobile devices.

Sygic – offline navigator for Europe and the USA

Sygic is a GPS navigation application. Supports free 3D offline maps for Android, you can travel anywhere with them (at least > 200 countries). Offline maps display Points of Interest - gas stations, cafes, shops, attractions. All that is required to use the maps is to first download them to your mobile device.

Realtime functions work only in online mode. In particular, Sygic offers the most accurate traffic information based on data from 500 million users worldwide. Information is also provided by global automakers, operators mobile communications, providers of mapping and traffic information.

During the first 7 days, you can test all navigator features (including those available with a Lifetime Premium subscription). After 7 days, Sygic leaves only basic capabilities, but this is quite enough for full-fledged work.

Maps.me – GPS navigator for your phone with OSM maps

Maps.me is an excellent free navigator for users who need offline operation and .

Maps.me supports offline OpenStreetMap maps, which are characterized by good detail. Ordinary users participate in the development of maps. Some maps are qualitatively better than Google Maps. It comes to the point that a shop or path that is not in other navigators can be marked on the Maps.me map.

Working offline is convenient: in fact, you can get directions without having an Internet connection on your phone. To work offline, you must first download the map to your device through the Maps.me navigator menu.

Maps.me: detailed offline maps for Android

The second option is to go to the desired location and zoom in on it. The map fragment of interest will be loaded into the phone cache. Offline maps take up only a few tens of megabytes.

Which offline navigator is the best?

Let's summarize.

If openness and free maps are important, all offline navigators are good except Navitela. If you are willing to pay about $30 for quality, Navitel Navigator will be an excellent solution and, without a doubt, will be worth the money invested. This GPS program holds its own and is popular.

Navigation Google Maps works without an Internet connection, but there is still a limitation for Android and iOS versions: you can save only certain sections of the map (one or several cities) for offline use, while motorists most often need more detailed sections of the maps .

Waze– a promising navigator with a large community. But keep in mind: not all traffic information will be available offline, and maps are not always perfect in their detail.

Sygic: GPS Navigation displays 3D offline maps for 200+ countries. The application will be convenient when traveling around Europe and the USA without the Internet.

Advice. Install not one, but two navigators on your phone. Download offline maps and test each option. Leave the app you like best.

If you find yourself out of reach, it doesn’t matter, because you can search for objects and create routes in Google Maps offline.

Our instructions are suitable for latest version Google Maps for Android and iOS. In earlier versions of the application, menu item names may differ slightly.

Saving Google Maps on iOS

  • Open the Google Maps app on . At the top of the search bar, enter the name of the desired city or region.
  • To get as large a section of the map as possible, zoom out. Don't worry, in the offline version you can enlarge the map to the size you need.
  • Click on the search bar and enter “ok maps”. You will see the Google Maps logo with a loading bar. Usually the map loads in a couple of seconds, after which it is saved in the application cache. If the partition you select is too large, you will see a notification.
  • Disable internet access and restart Maps. Now you can search for addresses and build routes to saved areas offline.

Using offline maps on Android

  • Open Google Maps and select the area you want to save.
  • Go to the application menu (three bars next to the search bar) and go to the “Offline maps” section.
  • Then everything is simple: click the “Select map” button and confirm the marked area by clicking “Download”.
  • Just like in iOS, you will see how much space the saved map will take up. If it is not enough, try reducing the selected area.

My Maps: processing maps using Google Drive

You can also access your maps using the Google Drive app. Then you won't have to waste a lot of memory to save maps from Google Maps.

  • Open the Google Drive page and sign in to your Google account.
  • Click "New" - "More" - "Google My Maps".
  • Here you can edit and save routes, make notes on maps, and add layers.
  • You can also share maps with friends via Google Drive.

When in a good navigator everything is in one place.

Any iOS device comes with an application Cards. And although Apple is actively developing its own mapping service, due to a number of features of its operation, users from the CIS countries prefer third-party navigators.

A service from Google has won its place in the sun – Google Maps. Three months ago, the mobile version of the application received the long-awaited app, which at first worked exclusively on Android and only recently reached iOS.

Convenient, economical, practical... But it turns on, to put it mildly, in an unobvious way:

Note: for working with offline mode availability account Google is strictly required. Before enabling offline access Log in to the Maps app.

  1. Open Google Maps and in the search bar find the locality or address you are interested in.
  2. Call up the settings side menu (tap on the three lines next to the search bar) and click on the item Downloaded areas.
  3. In the window that opens, click on the " + ».
  4. Google will prompt you to download a map for the area, region, or city you entered. By changing the scale you can significantly reduce the final size of the map (more zoom - smaller map). Once you have decided on the card size, click Download.
  5. Name the card with any convenient name and click Save.
  6. Wait until the download completes. The finished map will go to the section Downloaded areas.

The peculiarity of the offline mode in Google Maps is that the saved image is available within 30 days from the moment of downloading. After the expiration date, Google recommends updating the added area map from the appropriate section.

By the way. If you don't have enough memory on your iPhone, try this this is it .

Offline mode allows you to use the application as a navigator (including a voice assistant), but displaying current traffic jams and the current traffic situation (if there is no connection) will not be available. You cannot download country maps.

For detailed settings, see the explanatory video:

Google Maps is one of the most popular and reliable navigation services, but it is not without its drawbacks. One of the main complaints from users about Google Maps is that navigation only works with the Internet and requires a very good signal to draw the area. Fortunately, Google Maps can be used offline, but this great feature is useless if you don't take into account the points described in the article. So, are you getting ready to go on a road trip or heading out into uncharted territory? Then these instructions for using Google Maps offline are for you.
Before you can use Google Maps offline, you need to download the area or region you are interested in. An offline map of the area must be downloaded before you move away from the Internet source.

It is worth noting that the cards that you can save offline have quite large volumes. For example, you can completely cache large cities such as Kyiv, Minsk or Moscow. They also take up quite a bit of space in flash memory, sometimes 1.5 GB, depending on the downloaded region. There is a way to download this data to an SD card to save space on your phone's memory. To do this simply go to Menu > Offline Areas > Settings > Storage Settings and switch from Device to SD card.

It's also worth noting that the cache of these cards expires after 30 days. This happens because the maps themselves are updated, they are dynamic and require adjustments. For example, a new restaurant has appeared in the city, or a dam has blocked the river and it is no longer on the map. Google wants you to have the latest version of Maps for the best user experience.

So that your “saved maps” do not need to be downloaded again, simply activate “automatic update of offline maps” in the settings. Now your card cache will be be updated regularly and you will always have the latest version of Google Maps. Also in the settings you can set the update only via Wi-Fi to save the gigabytes of your mobile Internet provided by your telecom operator.

How to download and save offline Google Maps

  • Open the Google Maps app
  • Find the area or area you want to download
  • If you searched for a specific location, a name bar should appear at the bottom of the screen. If not, simply press and hold a button somewhere on the map to show that section. Click on it to display other options
  • Then click "Download"
  • You can now zoom in and out, making the loading area larger or smaller.
  • After selecting the area you are interested in, click the "Download" button in the lower right corner

After downloading your maps, you can navigate and find directions using GPS just like in the online version, but without using the Internet. As you can see, everything is quite simple and convenient. It is also worth noting that not all elements with online maps will be available in offline Google maps. For example, some walking and cycling routes are not transferred when the map cache is saved. Everything else works as expected. You can find the addresses you need, find companies, and easily navigate on the map.

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