UKH

After a bit of advice from  anyone who uses a satnav on a phone as opposed a stand alone one in the car.

So I've just bought a brand new octavia and as its the entry level model which is very well speced but one thing its missing is a built in satnav. To complicate it further it also dosent come with a standard cigaret lighter in the front meaning i can't find a sat nav that charges of one of the 4 usbc charging points that come in it.

so looks like my only option is to get a satnav app for my i phone that i can play on the display screen that comes on the dashboard.

I'm using the basic maps on the i phone which work not to bad but want one that has voice commands as well.

a quick look online docent seem to show any satnavs that charge using the new usb c ports on any usb for that matter.

so anyone recommend an app and it docent have to be free just reliable and accurate.

the display scree in the car is fine in size and has apple CarPlay so should be ok i guess.

thanks Buzby.

I just use google maps. Seems to work fine for me

does it have voice commands ? 

Try Navmii - it's free to use, but has a lot of payable add-ons, such as speed camera locations, so there may be one for voice activated

Google maps for me, never got on with Apple maps. Although I’m certain Apple maps also has voice commands (if you mean that it speaks directions) - might be worth checking the settings. Unless you mean that you can give it voice commands, in which case I have nothing to suggest that’s more sophisticated than “hey Siri, take me home”

Google Maps for me too. My car does have an inbuilt sat nav but nothing comes close to Google Maps. My car has Android Auto so I can get Google Maps on the large centre display in the car instead of using the actual phone screen. 

Google Maps is updated regularly, the live traffic data has never let me down and it's generally a good app to use. Pretty much the exact opposite of the inbuilt Volvo sat nav in my car. 

yep sorry when i say voice commands i mean it voices directions so you don't always need to be looking at it.

Yeah it does 

You have a 12v vehicle battery (i guess?) And the cig lighter socket is 12 volts. You can buy a socket and some wire with in in-wire fuse mount and make your own. Just drill a hole the right size in one of those blanks reserved for expensive optional extras like parachutes and cruise control and put the socket in it - voila, you now have a cig socket.

Waze for me for general driving as it gives speed camera and speed notifications.

Just checked Apple maps - start it navigating, then drag the bottom bar up to reveal the options, go into “audio”, and you’ll be able to turn the voice directions on. 

Yes, and I really don't like them so turn them off! Lol.

Also, if you don't want to go with the DIY route, the answer about what app to use depends on whether you want the program to need signal or not.

Things like Google maps will allow you to download specific bits ahead of time so you can nav in an area with no mobile signal but you need to know ahead of time and if you get caught out, it's a problem. If you want the whole UK available offline then you are probably looking at another app and you need a LOT of space to store all that data - not something modern phone are known for by the time you add up all the preinstalled bloatware, photos and user data that piles up in no time at all.

thanks , yeah i was wondering about the signal, I've never not got a signal on a standard satnav and also wondered if its using big amounts of data if a phone app is used for a long time.

I use Google Maps. The lady shouts at me about when to change direction. It is fine. 

My car does have a Sat Nav built in but as it was last updated in 2005 I find Google Maps has more actual roads on it. 

Google maps does use a fair chunk of data. Certainly noticeable on a PAYG contract.

You're thinking of two different things here. A standard satnav will have the maps for say, the UK, preloaded. In contrast, Google/Apple Maps download them as you need them, based on location, over the mobile network. This is the signal that's being referred to above.

You're thinking of GPS (GNSS really, most units use more than just the GPS network) signal. You'll have no problem getting this anywhere, aside from tunnels, caves, and under the sea. Given that you'll only visit one in your car (hopefully), this isn't much of an issue. 

Edit: to add - getting the maps over the mobile network will of course use data.

ah of course i am, thanks .

I also have an Octavia. 

I have offline maps on my phone and use Google maps on the app onto the screen. It works REALLY well. Rerouting as needed. I only have 2 GB of data and rarely use it all.

With apple cart play you should be able to say things like, navigate to....

That's how it works on android 

You can pre-load maps in Google maps; the option used to be called offline maps and I assume it still has the functionality. I used to use it if I was going for a run in an area with poor signal for when I almost inevitably got lost.

Really?  I'm a little bit surprised they all don't run off USB these days.  Mine does. (It's a Tomtom erm..  hang on..  "Go 5200" which I've had for about 5 years or so.)

When it's in the house updating itself on the wi-fi I plug it into my phone charger to make sure it won't conk out halfway through downloading a new map or something.

I've spent a bit of time recently driving a supermarket delivery van, and their sat-nav is an app that runs on a handset along with various other bits of software.  (It's basically a beefed up Android phone with a bar-code scanner.)  Not quite 100% sure, but I think the navigation app integrated into that is the lorry version of 'CoPilot'.  There's a sort of byway in Bakewell where it always wants to go off-roading (I almost fell for it the first time), but apart from that it seems very good.  I've never tried it on my own phone mind. There's a subscription but it don't think it's particularly expensive for a car: https://copilotgps.com/en-gb/#get

My satnav has a sim-card inside it and also uses a 3g phone signal to receive data.  (It's a Tomtom, and I think they use the Vodafone network.)  The maps are pre-loaded, but it uses the data to receive information about traffic, roadworks, road closures etc., and modify the route accordingly.  It also connects to the wi-fi periodically to download updates to the maps, software patches and the like.

Think the OP meant USB C on the car end. Thinking about this, a cable with USB C on the one end and whatever pin the sat nav needs on the other end *should* do it.

Fair enough - not something I had ever seen before!

Oh right, I see.  Yes, if I wanted to run my sat-nav off that I'd need an adaptor or a different lead.  Perhaps the newer ones are supplied with one now, dunno.  The sat-nav itself has a micro-usb connector, so I just plug my phone charger in while it's indoors doing its thing updating the maps on the wi-fi.

It's very good.  If, for example, I asked it to take me from Sheffield to Manchester right now it wouldn't try to take me via my usual route over the Snake Pass because it's closed at the mo.  It needs that these days really, or it would probably be a no-brainer to use a phone app instead. 

What do you do for a living?

yeah its the car that has the newer usb c connections, to be honest its really hard to get info on satnavs that tell you what charges it. The limited info i could find says usb won't do the job of charging from your car.

I work for openreach.

Ok so you use your own Octavia for work?

nope private use only

I guess that’s why I’ve not come across it as a bespoke feature as such, because like you say it’s built-in to phone apps. I like to have as few a devices as possible, and have used phone navigation for as long as I can remember owning a smartphone with maps as a feature!

My go-to solution is usually one of my kids...I'm pretty lost where e-comms are concerned...they had iphone carplay up and running in no time (while I was still trawling through endless pages of the on-line manual)

Yes, almost any sat nav will work - just buy the correct cable for a fiver on ebay. 

Although Google maps is amazing for traffic. 

Apple CarPlay + Google or Apple maps matches the satnav in my car, with the bonus that generally times are more accurate. If you save your destinations or are a bit prepared the phone can be nicely tucked away. Recommended. I wouldn't have had the car one if I had known.

I tried the Tomtom app which worked reasonably well (it's free to install and you get ~100 miles free per month but have to pay a subscription after that) but now use Google maps all the time. It's improved quite a lot over the last couple of years - in particular it now shows speed limits fairly reliably which for me was the main thing missing before. I think it does voice commands but I've never bothered with them.

In which case Navmii includes that free with a male and female option. You can pay extra to have comedy voices, such as Homer Simpson!

Should have said to start with that Navmii doesn't use your data, once you've downloaded the country maps you need. I've used it loads on holiday abroad.

For many years I made good use of the TomTom app which was a really good navigator. Then came the “update” to TomTom Go and ruined it all, and I moved to Apple and Google Maps. Both work well for my use everywhere in Europe, including voice assisted turn by turn navigation. What I miss from TomTom is the speed limit warnings and this summer I got blitzed on the highway outside of Berlin where the speed limit changed from “unlimited” to 130...

Sygic was on special offer recently. Works well for me. Download all maps so no data required.

By "signal" I mean, mobile phone signal for the data. A standard satnav has all the maps stored internally so it doesn't need a data signal.

GPS signal is different, that just gives your position on the surface of the earth and you don't have to worry about losing it, generally that only happens in a tunnel.

So the real question becomes - do you ever need to navigate where you can't check emails and Instagram? 

I've not paid much attention to how much data gets used by something like Google maps but I think it's generally pretty small. On any kind of standard plan I don't think it would be a problem. If you are going to somewhere outside your plan though data tends to be absolutely insanely expensive, so phone data switched off entirely is essential.

I am in exactly the same situation and use TomTom on my iPhone. It’s great. 

My go to system is my wife and a £5 road atlas.

A wife and a road atlas is significantly more expensive than a phone and a TomTom subscription... And at least you can mute the TomTom?

... Try the chicken drumsticks, ladies and gentlemen; I'm here all week.

I have a TomTom (Start 50 £99 5 years ago) dedicated unit, which I have stuck with (annual sub for camera updates £20/yr, it's still getting map updates/dowload at home over Wifi but who know for how much longer TomTom will do map updates: there seems to be a flexible view on what constituted "lifetime" map updates when it comes to "lifetime"!).  I have stuck with the TomTom up to now becuase of

1. the camera/speed notifications (Google maps and Waze are now moving into this functionality, I believe, so must check it out)
2. the onboard/downloaded maps (no need to use mobile data)

My car (Peugeot 308) has an onboard satnav which is not much use, but the onboard digital radio has traffic alerts.

I have recently changed my mobile phone and moved to giffgaff (much more monthly data for much less pounds), and am starting to use Google maps on the phone for driving directions.  I like the awareness of traffic on the route.  I am considering trying Waze (owned by Google) to see how it handles speed and camera alerts.