Google Maps App for iPhone – iPad Version Expected Soon

Three months after Apple removed Google Maps and replaced it with their own map solution, Google Maps for iPhone is now available in the App Store.

Apple was widely criticized for replacing Google Maps with a built-in app that provided inaccurate information and offered no street view. The incident lead to a rare apology from Apple CEO Tim Cook and subsequently two executives were terminated.

Apple even went as far as recommending other third-party map apps to iOS users. The return of Google Maps on the iPhone should quite critics while Apple makes improvements to their own in house maps.

The revised Google Maps app includes voice-guided turn by turn directions, Street View, live traffic conditions and public transportation information. Currently, the app is available for any iPhone or iPod Touch with iOS 5.1 or higher.

Google is also releasing a Google Maps SDK for iOS and a URL scheme that will allow other iOS apps to use and link to Google Maps.

Get Google Maps for Free at the Apple App Store.

Google Maps for iPad

Currently, Google Maps are only available for iPhone and iPod touch devices. Of course, the app can be downloaded on any iPad or iPad mini, but the app has not yet been designed for the larger screens. This means the app will run on iPads using the iPhone screen size or in 2X mode, which produces a less than ideal result. We expect that Google will update the Maps app to support iPads in the near future.

If you have a jailbroken iPad, you can use FullForce or RetinaPad to run Google Maps in fullscreen mode. However, since Google is currently putting the finishing touches on the iPad version, I would recommend using the web version of Google Maps or the built-in maps with iOS 6 until the official iPad version of Google Maps arrive.