Google Maps really this much better than built-in Nav?

[Arsenic17]

With Google Maps now showing state of charge and integrating charging stops, it has become my go to for navigation for the following reasons:

• Somehow despite the Ford Nav presumably understanding the efficiency of the car better, Google Maps is consistently way more accurate in terms of range and usage. It's usually spot on in terms of my arrival SoC for all trips. Ford is just embarrassing. It seems to be particularly terrible when elevation changes are involved, but even on flat ground its horrid.
  • For example, had a trip the other day starting near 10k feet elevation and going down to 5k feet. 140 mile trip. Started with 49% SoC. Ford Nav wanted me to stop for a ~30% charge in the middle of the trip and had me getting to end with 15% or so. Thus thinking I would use like 64% battery on this trip. Google had me stopping for a ~10% charge and had me getting home with 15%, thus thinking I would use 44% for the trip. I know from experience Google made way more sense so I went with that routine. For most of the drive the cluster was showing my projected range was significantly below how far it was to my charging stop. What a joke. Let's just say I made it home with 13% battery and didn't charge at all. Using a total of 36% to go 130 miles, with a new elevation loss of ~5k feet.
  • Had same experience on a largely flat roadtrip a few months ago. Ford constantly showing I would have no hope to make it to the next charger. Google showing I would have plenty of buffer. Google always steered me right, and even Google is somewhat conservative and often depletes faster than reality.
• Ford Nav constantly routes me to stupid chargers at dealerships. I haven't been able to figure out how to exclude networks and such on either platform, but at least Google takes me to actual public DC stations and not awkward stealerships, often ones that aren't even Ford.
• Ford Nav has some really annoying quirks in the Denver area. If you disable HOV lanes in the nav settings, often it will then completely avoid highways which have only 1 HOV lane of the 3 or 4 total lanes. There are a lot of highways here like that. So in order to not have it totally avoid highways, I have to leave HOV on and it constantly tells me to exit and enter HOV. Super annoying. None of this happens with Google.
• Google real-time traffic is way more accurate. Ford seems really hit or miss. Either it is low temporary or spatial resolution, or both smeared together.
• Only benefits I know from Ford Nav are:
  • It will precondition the battery as you near your DC station. Doesn't seem like Google does that.
  • Ford Nav UI is better and more usable in the car. The view of exit lanes and such is nicer. The charger details are nice.

Surely I am not the only one that feels this way? Ford needs to get their shit together. I would blow my brains out if I had to rely on the Ford Nav daily for any reason.

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[AZBill]

I have Google natively in my GM vehicle, it is the best EV trip planner/nav out there. Very accurate with elevation changes and provides accurate SoC targets at charging stops. It also is kept up to date with all the new chargers and even presents energy saving alternate routes (with a percentage savings number).

I know many people like ABRP, personally I found it inaccurate, but Google is 10x better. Google also now provides the incident reports just like Waze.

 

[AZBill]

Also, Ford simply needs to add a manual pre-conditioning button for fast charging, like all the other EV manufacturers have.

 

[Colorado MME GT]

I know many people like ABRP, personally I found it inaccurate, but Google is 10x better. Google also now provides the incident reports just like Waze.

Since there is still not a perfect solution for Mach-e owners using CarPlay, I'm still using the "all of the above" option. My day-to-day navigation is exclusively Google Maps since its toolset is heads above anyone else's. I charge at home and don't need DCFC except when road tripping. My road trip planning, however, starts in ABRP as a baseline, but I manually key in my next charge stop into Google only after verifying the validity of the charging station through PlugShare. It may sound like overkill, but since we have time while the vehicle charges, I prefer not to be surprised. ABRP can be accurate if you set up the assumptions correctly, mainly the kWh consumption you are actually seeing. It is not a solid nav option, IMHO. I had it freeze up at the most inconvenient point when I was testing it on a trip - at an intersection of two interstates in rural Kansas. I'll use the Ford app only in winter, when I need to precondition. But again, I'm manually entering the next charge station.

 

[TheRock]

Google Maps should precon before arriving to a lvl 3 charger. At least on Android.

I just wish it was possible to exclude from the list some big brand chargers because they are to expensive in Maps.

 

[SuperD]

• Only benefits I know from Ford Nav are:
  • It will precondition the battery as you near your DC station. Doesn't seem like Google does that.
  • Ford Nav UI is better and more usable in the car. The view of exit lanes and such is nicer. The charger details are nice.

Surely I am not the only one that feels this way? Ford needs to get their shit together. I would blow my brains out if I had to rely on the Ford Nav daily for any reason.

IF you're on android on your phone, google maps WILL precondition your battery if you have a DC fast charger as your next stop. I don't believe it will on an iPhone. Can probably find more details via some searching on this forum as it's been discussed before.

I use google maps almost exclusively (occasionally using waze only because it's traffic/crowdsourcing seems better) and never use the ford app.

 

[Colorado MME GT]

Google Maps should precon before arriving to a lvl 3 charger. At least on Android.

I just wish it was possible to exclude from the list some big brand chargers because they are to expensive in Maps.

Only on Android. It doesn't work on Apple devices.

 

[benk016]

I used Google Maps for a road trip last month. It seemed to work until I got to some chargers that were offline because Google decided to route to a charger with a status of "Unknown"

Luckily I was able to get to the next town over that had a Tesla charger that was compatible. But I learned to double check the status of chargers before just going if you're using Google Maps.

ABRP has never done this to me so I went back to using it exclusively on road trips.

 

[AEGinMD]

Very timely thread, which I might have initiated myself! With apologies & warning for this long post, here goes:
I just returned from a road trip from DC suburbs to Lake Champlain in far-upstate NY not far from the border near Montreal. I was toggling between Google, Ford Nav & ABRP to get a sense of how they stack up these days. Ford Nav was the biggest disappointment, by far. I was quite annoyed by, as the OP noted, Ford Nav's propensity to direct me to "stupid chargers". A couple of years ago, I had concluded that Ford Nav was better than Google at getting me to a good public charger -- no longer.
For example, having had several good experiences as high-speed ChargePoint machines in upstate NY, I took Ford's suggestions on the return drive and found myself both at a charger on remote business property that was behind locked gates (on a Sunday) and next at a municipal parking lot with only Level 2 chargers -- despite having enabled the filter for high-speed only. In Ford Nav, there is crazy fine print (indicating whether a charger is open 24/7 or on weekdays; or actual charging speed) on each potential charger that is way too extensive to read while driving on a highway -- so selecting without pulling over to read it all will (and did) lead to multiple false detours. Additionally, it's very confusing to interpret the screen graphics of exactly where & how far away each potential charger actually is. The vector arrows point in every possible direction from your car -- often indicating you could be backtracking great distances. Wanting to find the CLOSEST FAST CHARGER AHEAD OF ME THAT IS ACTUALLY OPEN TO THE PUBLIC (seems like a reasonable request!) was a futile effort on Ford Nav.
As for ABRP, it's quite good for pre-departure planning but unless you have paid for premium membership, it will not tie into the car's screen for navigation. Ooops -- didn't check that before departing. Won't bother to pay now, since Google does the job so well. But I'm keeping the ap.
Responding to one of Arsenic's comments about stupid chargers, I did learn that some car dealerships have excellent public charging. Particularly nice when the dealership is closed but the lot is not gated.
My one complaint about Google was its conservative range estimate. I was directed far off the NY Thruway and deep into the Adirondacks on winding (but spectacular) roads at sunset, whereas it turned out I could have pushed on to Plattsburgh with ample charge. But as a side note, EVolveNY (part of the NY Power Authority) has been developing a very good network of high speed chargers in rural upstate locations.
A note about public charging generally that everyone knows: prices are all over the map. Best experiences were in small towns in the Hudson Valley of NY that seem to subsidize public charging (talking to you, Red Hook!) where a 35 minute charge even beyond 80% cost about $9 for 37 kWh. Compared to several WalMart Electrify America chargers , where one exceeded $35 for 52 kWh (talking to you, E. Brunswick NJ). Though not breaking the bank, the differences are stark.
A final note about Ford's Plug-n-Charge program: It makes most public charging easy, but it's hit-or-miss (mostly miss) with ChargePoint. Having the ChargePoint phone ap was useful for the high-speed chargers I encountered in upstate NY.
Hope this helps other vacation drivers plan their journeys!

 

[67 Stang Convertible]

I guess some of Ford Nav is a "Connected Service" that apparently, I am no longer paying for. It has all the stuff related to finding chargers Grayed Out.

I'm happy using Apple Maps or Google Maps. After reading the 1st few replies I will try Google Maps more frequently, but I believe Apple directs you to chargers as well.......but that is off the top of my head......could be mistaken.

 

[benk016]

A final note about Ford's Plug-n-Charge program: It makes most public charging easy, but it's hit-or-miss (mostly miss) with ChargePoint. Having the ChargePoint phone ap was useful for the high-speed chargers I encountered in upstate NY.

Plug and charge only works on Electrify America and Tesla. All others have to be manually activated from fordpass or the charge networks app or credit card terminal.

 

[lightningandmache]

I have used the ford nav with success, but verify and swap out stops I don't like. I've never tried it with major elevation changes though.

 

[Sikkun]

Calibrated ABRP is the only one I’ve got to actually be accurate.

All the rest seem to think I am going to run out of electrons going over the mountain despite me showing up at my house with 20% on the same trip multiple times.

 

[Hartland]

Is this only in USA although can use Google Maps in Car Play innUK doesn’t seem to have any integration in UK or am I doing something wrong

 

[Firefly Ship Works]

Only on Android. It doesn't work on Apple devices.

This is timely for me as well since I've had my new Mach-E GT for 6 days now and have been testing various charging scenarios. I come from the Tesla universe and accustomed to getting scolded by the Tesla app for not pre-conditioning. But I have yet to see any messages about pre-conditioning on any of the Mach-E screens, whether I have randomly connected to a public charger or set a specific charger as my destination before getting underway. So, firstly, my apologies for not searching the forum first, but this seems like a good place to ask: how do I know if my Mach-E is pre-conditioning, whether using Ford navigation or Google Maps (my assumption when we refer to Google Maps here is that I'm using it via Android Auto. I don't have any Apple products).

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