Making its long-awaited debut on Apple’s App Store on December 12, last year, following the (arguable) ‘train-wreck’-style debut of Apple’s own mapping service, (which is now gradually improving, day-by-day), the official iOS client of Google’s own mapping service has this week received its first-ever update.
Released yesterday, Google Maps 1.1 now includes full support for searching your Google Contacts. To use this feature you simply have to sign-in to your Google account. Any addresses you have previously saved to your Google account will immediately show up in the app when you search for friends and family by name, allowing you to then take advantage of these details for mapping out your route and place directions.
In addition, the new update also includes the ability to quickly search for local places. This is achieved by a user first selecting a popular category, (such as: restaurants, bars, cafes, gas stations, etc.), and then selecting the place(s) or POIs (Points of Interest) from the resulting list.
Those who are picky on what units the distance of their route is displayed in, will likely also be pleased to hear that Google Maps 1.1 now, (finally), allows you to choose between distance being displayed in either Kilometers or Miles.
Overall, a welcome little update. Google notes that some features included in this latest version of its mapping client “may not be available in all countries.” Download Google Maps for iPhone on the App Store.
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