Beta Yourself - Find Your Way

Gawping at a smartphone might not give you a sexy explorer vibe. But when you need to get somewhere, Stuff team recommends clever apps over paper maps every time…

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THE BASICS

■ Use your brain

Don’t be that ‘drove into a lake because an app said to’ person. Map apps can have outdated info – or prioritise twisty routes down narrow lanes over a nice A road if it’ll shave half a nanosecond off your journey time. So if in doubt, re-route – the app will catch up and make adjustments soon enough.

■ Plan your journey

It might sound old-school to map out a journey in advance when apps have turn-by-turn navigation, but it can be useful when heading somewhere new. Double-check your destination’s location, in case your app has it wrong. Use Google’s Street View to clock landmarks that’ll help while driving or walking.

■ Pay attention

When driving, keep your eyes on the road and not the app (and fingers off the screen, unless you want a fine). And when you’re on foot, marching along with a grand’s worth of phone in front of your face is inviting problems unless you live in Barbie Land. So use turn alerts – haptics will send nudges to your smartwatch telling you when to turn.

■ Use several apps

You might have a go-to map app, but head beyond the usual suspects for certain tasks. Waze can be great for city and motorway driving, as it offers granular info about current conditions. And if you’re heading into the wilderness, AllTrails is going to be more useful than anything Google or Apple provides.

■ Do your bit