I used to live by Google Maps for several years, until I moved to China. I knew it'd be worse than other options, but I really didn't expect the gap to be so gargantuan. And I also felt like the move exposed a lot more of some of the problems brought up in the article and comments.
To be sure I wasn't remembering things wrongly, I just opened it up and confirmed that the points below still stand today.
- There are insane amounts of businesses shown/advertised on Maps, even though Google doesn't have a presence in mainland China. I can confirm that lots of them are correct, as I pass by them frequently. There are many that are outdated, as in Maps showing a given business at location X, but the place has become something else. This is most likely due to Google being unable to update the information in a timely fashion so I don't really blame them, but still adds to the app being considerably less useful.
- It cannot show public transport information, even though it says it can. This makes the app completely useless for me, and I'd believe for most others here, as I think foreigners are more likely to try using it than Chinese people, and it is a lot less common for foreigners to drive here.
- Even with a VPN on, it still cannot find most information about anything. Even some driving/walking directions seem wrong.
Conversely, Apple Maps actually does as well here for me as Google Maps did before I moved to this country. The funnier part of that is how it feels like Apple only cares about the US in regards to Maps data and features, but it does a pretty good job here. No fancy stuff like 3D mapping, look inside, etc, but I can count on one hand the number of times Apple Maps messed up in the several years I've been here.
For your first pain point, have you taken into account that China mandates that Google maps deliberately obscure exact locations by being off as much to several hundred meters? If you look at road crossings from Hong Kong to mainland, you'll notice that sometimes the bridges seem to drop straight into the water.
That could be related, yes. But most of the businesses I recognize are placed close to where they actually are/were, however a lot of them are now different businesses. I think it's due to Google being unable to update it because they don't have a presence in the country.
To be sure I wasn't remembering things wrongly, I just opened it up and confirmed that the points below still stand today.
- There are insane amounts of businesses shown/advertised on Maps, even though Google doesn't have a presence in mainland China. I can confirm that lots of them are correct, as I pass by them frequently. There are many that are outdated, as in Maps showing a given business at location X, but the place has become something else. This is most likely due to Google being unable to update the information in a timely fashion so I don't really blame them, but still adds to the app being considerably less useful.
- It cannot show public transport information, even though it says it can. This makes the app completely useless for me, and I'd believe for most others here, as I think foreigners are more likely to try using it than Chinese people, and it is a lot less common for foreigners to drive here.
- Even with a VPN on, it still cannot find most information about anything. Even some driving/walking directions seem wrong.
Conversely, Apple Maps actually does as well here for me as Google Maps did before I moved to this country. The funnier part of that is how it feels like Apple only cares about the US in regards to Maps data and features, but it does a pretty good job here. No fancy stuff like 3D mapping, look inside, etc, but I can count on one hand the number of times Apple Maps messed up in the several years I've been here.