How to get Google Maps in the Taycan?

[Mikey2069]

I think we can all agree that the navigation in the Taycan is pretty terrible. ETA's are way off and the routes are incredibly suspect. I have a 2021 so Android auto isn't available, so I bought the dongle but that is slow and glitchy. Anyone have any ideas on how to get Google maps in the Taycan?

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[Jhenson29]

I think we can all agree that the navigation in the Taycan is pretty terrible.

I don’t agree. I go back and forth between using Apple maps in car play and in-car nav, but I’ve been using in-car nav more lately. I like being able to do voice search and it’s actually been pretty good. No issue with actual navigation and routes.

No thoughts on the google maps though. Sorry.

 

[tigerbalm]

Anyone have any ideas on how to get Google maps in the Taycan?

Car Play and iPhone.

 

[tigerbalm]

I suspect if the internal nav is good or not must be down to the data available in the area's we travel.

I find the internal navigation excellent at:

a] Having a reliable estimate on what the battery SOC will be at my destination – accurate to within about 2-3%.
b] Traffic on-route and lane changes instructions.
c] Preparing the battery for high-speed charging on-route.
d] Integrating nicely with the drivers dash – showing turn instructions – and HUD (if I had one).
e] Voice prompts are accurate and timely.
f] Satellite overview (from Google) on Passenger Display is excellent and entertaining.

Where I find it weaker is:

a] The UI isn't as detailed or pretty as the mobile apps or the PCM in my 2020 Panamera Turbo S.
b] Its suggestions for avoiding traffic on-route can sometimes direct you to some pretty narrow roads – in Ireland – many not the width of the car!
c] Points of Interest's aren't as plentiful as the internet companies mapping data.
d] Setting up a detailed route with many waypoints is a bit of a faff – but I use the Porsche Connect to send detailed waypoints remotely to the car – when its working!

 

[chenner]

Taycan Nav is powered by Google.

But I agree that the Nav is hard to look at. They made the background white and the roads another shade of white so it's hard to distinguish.

 

[W1NGE]

I think we can all agree that the navigation in the Taycan is pretty terrible. ETA's are way off and the routes are incredibly suspect. I have a 2021 so Android auto isn't available, so I bought the dongle but that is slow and glitchy. Anyone have any ideas on how to get Google maps in the Taycan?

Don't agree. Mapping is accurate and timings perfect in my experience.

Get an iPhone and then use Carplay to get Google maps - only option for android folk right now (I'm one of them)

 

[Mikey2069]

Thanks all! And good call on using the app, I'll give that a go.

 

[Yves_0016]

Anyone have any ideas on how to get Google maps in the Taycan?

Just use your phone?

 

[PorscheCH]

I agree with most points, though your underlined title for pros is borderline medical …

Google maps is hard to beat in most cases but offers no battery pre-conditioning , nor a residual soc estimate.

Is it possible to use CarPlay+google maps (or ABRP) and the onboard navi at the same time? I tried a couple of times but as soon as I enter a destination in one, the other is stopped and navigation exited.

I suspect if the internal nav is good or not must be down to the data available in the area's we travel.

I find the internal invagination excellent at:

a] Having a reliable estimate on what the battery SOC will be at my destination – accurate to within about 2-3%.
b] Traffic on-route and lane changes instructions.
c] Preparing the battery for high-speed charging on-route.
d] Integrating nicely with the drivers dash – showing turn instructions – and HUD (if I had one).
e] Voice prompts are accurate and timely.
f] Satellite overview (from Google) on Passenger Display is excellent and entertaining.

 

[tigerbalm]

Is it possible to use CarPlay+google maps (or ABRP) and the onboard navi at the same time? I tried a couple of times but as soon as I enter a destination in one, the other is stopped and navigation exited.

One thing I am working on at the moment is writing a utility that joins ABRP and the Porsche navigation together. I've reverse engineered the APIs to send routes with waypoints to the car navigation. Now I am waiting on ABRP to provide a means to be able to extract an exact route (lat/lng of waypoints) into a CSV file.

If I can get that – I can join them together. The result being that you would be able to do the following:

a] Plan your route in ABRP using all of its capabilities.
b] Extract or share the route to a local file
c] Use my utility to read the ABRP route local file and send that extact route and waypoints to the in-car navigation.

This would have the following advantages:

a] The in-car navigation would be given all the ABRP waypoints so would not be relying on its own route finding.
b] User could plan routes using ABRP on a desktop and send them to the car – saving a lot of typing on the PCM.
c] The car would know the charging stops from ABRP and would activate the battery pre-conditioning as appropriate.
d] There is no need for apps or CarPlay when driving the route.

This is all entirely a hobby reverse-engineering project – when I can find time – and I've a few blockers on the ABRP side right now – but they are not insurmountable.

I am publishing my work as I go here: https://github.com/driven-app/porsche-connect – but hope to get it to the stage of having a easy-to-use utility for anyone by the end of it.

 

[PorscheCH]

thanks that would be really nice.
though I guess it would make it a bit complicated to manage changes during the drive (e.g. re-route oneself while driving in case of traffic, occupied charging station etc)

is it also your understanding that CarPlay navi (whatever that is google, apple maps or ABRP) cannot be used at the same time of the PCM navi?

One thing I am working on at the moment is writing a utility that joins ABRP and the Porsche navigation together. I've reverse engineered the APIs to send routes with waypoints to the car navigation. Now I am waiting on ABRP to provide a means to be able to extract an exact route (lat/lng of waypoints) into a CSV file.

If I can get that – I can join them together.

 

[tigerbalm]

is it also your understanding that CarPlay navi (whatever that is google, apple maps or ABRP) cannot be used at the same time of the PCM navi?

It is my current understanding that is true. Its a CarPlay thing – it listens to signals from the car on a bus and when it sees an active route from the car's navigation it stops its own – to prevent conflicts and multiple prompts to the driver.

I believe this behaviour is desired by Apple across all CarPlay enabled cars though it could be up to individual manufactures how it operates in principal.

Yes, my goal is to facilitate long road-trip plans – its my thing! – rather than on-the-move adjustments or day-to-day driving.

 

[Yves_0016]

Buy a Brodit pro clip so you can actually use the functionalities of your phone too. Simple. 50 bucks and all is solved.

I allways use Waze (for best route, exact ETA, trajectory controlls, cops,...) and PCM (for residual SOC at destination and battery pre conditioning) simultaneously.

 

[Fish Fingers]

One thing I am working on at the moment is writing a utility that joins ABRP and the Porsche navigation together. I've reverse engineered the APIs to send routes with waypoints to the car navigation. Now I am waiting on ABRP to provide a means to be able to extract an exact route (lat/lng of waypoints) into a CSV file.

If I can get that – I can join them together. The result being that you would be able to do the following:

a] Plan your route in ABRP using all of its capabilities.
b] Extract or share the route to a local file
c] Use my utility to read the ABRP route local file and send that extact route and waypoints to the in-car navigation.

This would have the following advantages:

a] The in-car navigation would be given all the ABRP waypoints so would not be relying on its own route finding.
b] User could plan routes using ABRP on a desktop and send them to the car – saving a lot of typing on the PCM.
c] The car would know the charging stops from ABRP and would activate the battery pre-conditioning as appropriate.
d] There is no need for apps or CarPlay when driving the route.

This is all entirely a hobby reverse-engineering project – when I can find time – and I've a few blockers on the ABRP side right now – but they are not insurmountable.

I am publishing my work as I go here: https://github.com/driven-app/porsche-connect – but hope to get it to the stage of having a easy-to-use utility for anyone by the end of it.

I doft my cap to you tigerbalm.

Reading your link makes me realise I am fairly close to being a complete luddite. ?

 

[tigerbalm]

Taycan Nav is powered by Google.

One of the things I like most about this forum is that it enables members to become very knowledgable about these cars. Often way more so than the public facing staff in Porsche Centres.

As a hobby project of mine is reverse engineering Porsche APIs, I thought I'd share a little insight into why the quoted sentence above isn't the full story.

Here is what I've discovered:

• The mapping data – roads, turn radiuses (used by Innodrive), elevation and POIs come from HERE Technologies (https://www.here.com). HERE is majority owned by a consortium of German automotive companies – it was owned by Nokia for a long time and traces its roots back to US-based Navteq.
• If you pay for Porsche Connect services you can activate a "Satellite View". The data/imagery for that view comes from Google, but it is layered over the HERE data. You'll see a Google logo showing when this mode is active, but it's just the imagery – all the structured data you see on the screen remains HERE.
• Route planning also comes from HERE, including destination and waypoint searching –all from HERE.
• If HERE can't find a waypoint – it has a comprehensive but smaller database of POIs than Google – you can optionally perform what Porsche call a "Online Search" for POIs. You do this by clicking on the large "G" button/logo beside the search entry box on the PCM. If you do this then the text you've entered will be sent to the Google Places API and if something is found, that is returned to you. A hybrid search between HERE and Google's POI database's is therefore possible.
• HERE routing APIs have the ability to take Google Place IDs as well as its own waypoints which is why this works.
• The HERE structured data and POIs for the area you are in and going towards is capable of being stored in the PCM for offline access. This is why you get these "Map Updates" notifications. This allows navigation to continue when in a poor cellular signal area (or external cell access is not working on Taycan – an all too regular occurrence).
• The Google Place IDs or Satellite View data is not cacheable and will not be stored in the PCM – likely for licensing reasons.
• If you are driving in a long tunnel – common enough in Europe – and there is no GPS signal, the HERE Technology is receiving wheel and steering wheel data from the car and can accurately estimate its locations inside the tunnel for around 10km after its last GPS location was received. This is invaluable for giving navigation instructions in long tunnels that have junctions inside them. Something that none of the mobile apps are capable of as they don't receive the data to do this inertial navigation.

Here is an example call for a route that the car makes when plotting a route:

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