Is it worth buying the new maps?

[Krellan]

I noticed TomTom is now selling maps as a quarterly subscription, instead of as a large yearly update.

Question, is it worth buying these new maps?

Roads don't seem to change all that much from year to year. Especially, since I live in California, we're having a bit of a budget crisis at the moment, I don't expect many road-building projects to be started!

I was thinking I'd buy a new map maybe once every five years or so, or when a major intersection changes that happens to be near an area I drive frequently. Or probably just replace the GPS in five years, who knows what great features they will have by then? Honestly, I think quarterly updates are a bit of overkill.

And, will TomTom's "map corrections" feature serve to hurt their own market for map updates? If I can just crowdsource map corrections, and keep up with map changes that way, then there wouldn't be a real incentive for me to pay for an official map upgrade.

 

[crgator]

I can't really say if it's worth it or not. Yet. But, I did subscribe for a years update, so we'll see over the coming months.

Also, one year subscription costs far less than the old cost for a map upgrade. I would have waited at least two years before udgrading my maps under the old way (or just upgraded my unit). With this, a two year subscription is not much more than one map.

Others more knowledgeable than me will better be able to answer your question about crowdsourcing with mapshare, but I don't think that helps with new streets, interchanges, extensions, etc. The corrections can change speed limits, directions (i.e. one way, etc), blocked streets, street names, etc. But if a new street is added, you won't be able to do anything about that.

I don't think the map corrections will hurt their market, but rather enhance it.

 

[drledger]

I guess this is like the debate over the color of automobiles....what do you want? In my area there is little change taking place in road construction and the maps are fairly accurate. I probably will not subscribe to the quarterly updates and as noted by the other comment I would probably upgrade only one every two years. In some case you may well be considering new equipment also. If I were in a rapidly expanding area and relied a great deal upon the precision of exact maps then yes upgrade as often as possible. Just my thoughts.

 

[69gm]

I guess this is like the debate over the color of automobiles....what do you want? In my area there is little change taking place in road construction and the maps are fairly accurate. I probably will not subscribe to the quarterly updates and as noted by the other comment I would probably upgrade only one every two years. In some case you may well be considering new equipment also. If I were in a rapidly expanding area and relied a great deal upon the precision of exact maps then yes upgrade as often as possible. Just my thoughts.

i think this is the best point. "your mileage may vary", as they say. i think if you lived in las vegas, as an example, you might want to keep up with new maps. they seem be to be ever expanding. seems everytime i'm there, there's some new construction project going on!

 

[mvl]

At the moment, tomtom/teleatlas maps have lots of errors/inaccuracies, since they're relatively new to North America. I'm finding that some new/changed roads are in newer maps, but most importantly the new maps are quickly catching up to the real world that has existed for years. Also, tomtom IQroutes is only months old, and is significantly improving with each map update in North America. Each user that buys a tomtom and turns on "submit anonymous data" is providing tomtom with info on new roads and new road speeds which greatly enhances future tomtom maps.

Mapshare reduces the need for new maps, but it doesn't permit some key correction types. You can't add a new road, and you can't change time-of-day speed data. Also, tomtom reserves the right to limit mapshare updates to 1 year from the map purchase.

Tomtom is probably realizing how GPS features are slowing hitting a plateau, and new-user adoption is starting to level off. So they are probably attempting to switch as much of their revenue stream as possible to subscriptions from device sales.