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Google Maps is beginning to roll out speed limits to more users across the US.
It doesn’t appear to be available for everyone, nor available for those in the beta. It appears to only be available in select cities – and those cities are not listed anywhere.
In Google Maps now, you will see a speed limit sign in the lower-left corner now, depicting the speed limit on the street or highway that you are currently driving. This will make it easier for drivers to know how fast they should be going, especially if they are in an area that they have never driven in before.
Apparently, the speed limit signs only appear when you are using Google Maps for navigation. So unfortunately, if you are using Google Maps to get a general gist of where you need to go, it won’t show you the speed limit on those streets. Though it does make the most sense in the navigation portion of the app, since most people do use Google Maps when they are going somewhere they haven’t gone before.
This is another feature that Google has added, that Waze has had for years – even before Google bought Waze back in 2013. It’s a very popular feature on Waze because it does allow users to see how fast they should be going. It also shows how fast you are going, and will alert you when you are over the speed limit. Google Maps does not quite have that functionality yet, but that might be coming in the near future. For now, Google needs to roll out speed limit signs to everyone first.
Google Maps has steadily been adding new features to its Android app in the past few weeks. It has had a pretty busy 2019, and we’re not even three weeks into the new year. Google Maps recently got Google Assistant support, allowing you to ask the Assistant to play music, get you directions to the nearest gas station and more. Now speed limit signs are appearing in Google Maps. It’s something that users have wanted for quite a while. It was one of the more impressive features of Waze, which Google also owns. But for some reason it took its sweet time coming to Google Maps.
With speed limit signs now in Google Maps, one has to wonder how much longer Waze will exist as a separate mapping service. Seeing as Google Maps has added most of the features that Waze has available. The only real missing feature now is the crowdsourcing features for accidents, police traps, and such. Which are arguably the most popular features of Waze, and would work great in Google Maps – seeing as hundreds of millions use Google Maps every day.
As mentioned, this does appear to be a location-based rollout. People in Los Angeles, New York City and Minneapolis have all gotten the update. However, we have not gotten the addition of speed limit signs, and we are also in the beta. Not to mention that Google has not pushed out a Maps update for a week or so now. So it’s likely a server-based, location update.
