GoGo Navigator USA & CAN

I'll admit, I have always been a Google Maps kind of girl.  Email yourself the directions before you go, follow the line on the map on your phone while you're on the road.  If you get lost, pull over, and re-route.  Free, easy, and mostly effective.  However, that was before I tried using the GoGo Navigator USA & CAN iPhone app.  I received this app for review on Monday morning, which was handy since I was doing a lot of driving over the next few days - visiting my parents, off to the beach, back home to my parents via the grocery store, back to my own home the next day, and off to run errands the day after.

But I have to say, the developers of this GPS navigation app have thought of just about everything. When you first launch it, there is a warning screen that reminds you not to use the app while driving (you should really just program in your trip before you depart). Once you agree, you are taken to the main screen which shows where you are right now. You can program in your destination (address, points of interest such as "nearest gas station", or Google search) and any stops along the way, and then let GoGo Navigator calculate the route for you based on shortest time or shortest distance. Then as you drive, it gives you excellent directions, with warnings 300m/0.25mi before any turns, and reminders just before the intersections. I found it really nice how it would recalculate my route if I took a different road than it suggested. It also gave me the option of having the prompts given by a male or female voice, in English, French, Spanish, or even Korean (I think...)! The default voice has a Text To Speech (TTS) feature which meant that it didn't just say "turn left", but it would actually say "turn left onto Bananarama Road" (obviously a made up street name, but serves the purpose of giving an example). This is terrific, especially when you don't know the area, because you can see the street names on the signs and be sure that you are on the correct route. The app sometimes got confused in parking lots, since these don't show up on maps (most of the ones around here didn't, anyhow), but this wasn't a big deal because by the time I had reached my destination parking lot, I did not need the directions anymore.

I was really impressed that it knew the speed limit of the roads I was driving on, and both my mom and I found the speed limit warning super helpful. Basically anytime we might have been exceeding the speed limit (you know those roads that go from 80 km/hr to 50km/hr when you least expect it?) the voice in the app would speak up and say "Warning! Speed limit exceeded!" but without any judgement, unlike what some backseat drivers or paranoid spouses might do. My dad remarked dryly that maybe the app was capable of reporting our occasional speed excesses to the police, but so far that does not seem to be the case :-). It is really a useful feature to help you, especially if you were born with a lead foot like I was. There was just one place along the route I drove on Tuesday where this data was incorrect, so it warned me against speeding, even though I wasn't. I would guess that this data would be incorrect in any GPS app, since it probably comes from a common central source.

One other really cool feature that this app has is Live Traffic. I unfortunately could not try out this feature because the data is not available in my home city, but it's available in most large cities across the US and even some in Canada.  I can imagine the live traffic feature would be very helpful on our next trip driving in Boston though! It is a one time in-app purchase for $8.99, but would be worth it if it helped us not sit in traffic with a baby in the back who cries when ever we stop...

I could go on about the other features of this app (metric vs imperial units, multiple stops on itinerary, different route views, zoom in/out, ETA calculation, point of interest search, and much more), but I really think you should imagine all the ways it can help you when you are driving, especially if it's an area where you don't drive often. It will save you time and frustration by guiding you to your destination. I wish I'd had this app when I was in Las Vegas a few years ago, it took us forever (for some odd reason) to get off the highway onto the strip, but if we had this app we could have been out partying much sooner! (OK, I'll admit, I went straight to bed, it was a late flight!). It can also save you from any unwanted arguments with other passengers about asking for directions...that alone is worth the price of admission.

GoGo Navigator USA & CAN is a great deal at only $29.99, it does not require any extra maps to be downloaded, and looks & works great right out of the gates.  It's easy to use, and has a ton of features.  To find out more about GoGo Navigator USA & CAN, you can do so by visiting:
iTunes - http://bit.ly/m7T0FY
Demo Video - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLDY4TLg_mA
Live Traffic Demo - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-cCHZKcNHw
Website - http://www.gogonavigator.com/


*Disclaimer:  Geekmommy Reviews was given free of charge the product/software to review in exchange for featuring this product on http://www.geekmommyreviews.com.  Any opinions or statements given above come only from Geekmommy Reviews and were not influenced in any way by the product vendor.