Using Cell Phone As Your GPS

[d1h]

Do a lot of you use your cell phone as a GPS? I know that using the GPS on your phone runs your battery down faster so generally you need to have it plugged into power at all times. Just wondering if this is hard on your cell phone battery since your battery is constantly charging and screen is lit up at all times. Second question for those of you that have iPhones. Do you prefer Apple maps or google maps.

[2oldman]

When my Garmin 660 messes up, yes. And that's quite often.

[Mickeyfan0805]

I use it now and then locally, but for anything longer I still use a stand-alone GPS. I don't like the battery drain or constant recharging required to use it as a GPS in the daily drivers (which is why we bought them both with integrated GPS), and I don't trust cell networks enough for it to be my only navigation when towing the travel trailer. I need to upgrade the GPS I use for our tow vehicle, but I would do that before I'd rely on cell.

[ScottG]

You may find yourself where there is no cell coverage but there's always GPS satelite coverage.

[Sam_Spade]

GordonThree wrote:
I try not to leave my phone plugged in "all the time" - this is the #1 killer of cell phones.

just my opinions

And in my opinion, totally worthless.

I bet you can't provide a respected source that backs up that outrageous claim.

There is a LOT of bad advice in that post.

YES, use your phone as a GPS and leave it plugged in during the few hours which that might take.....and do not worry one tiny second about ruining anything.

A really LOT of people do it every day and phones are not dying in masses.

[K_Charles]

If I use my phone for a GPS the screen will turn off and the Google lady will still tell me when to turn.

[GordonThree]

I try not to leave my phone plugged in "all the time" - this is the #1 killer of cell phones. Doesn't matter how smart the phone, battery, charger, etc is, charging it all the time shortens the batteries life. Charging it to 100% drastically shortens the life. But that's a different subject.

I use a stand alone GPS as my always on GPS, but I use my phone to navigate to "places". The phone has a much larger and up to date database of places. So I want to find an oil change, or a certain restaurant, or whatever, I ask Google for directions. My phone is fairly new and can run the screen for hours before the battery becomes an issue, so if I need to see the map, I just leave it on. Most of the time the turn by turn audio prompts are enough.

When I drive from one city to another, across 100s of miles, I use the stand alone GPS.

The stand alone gps has a battery in it too, but I don't care about that battery. the stand alone gps is usually turned on when a trip starts and left on until the trip ends.

just my opinions