Apple Maps is available on Android (sorta)

Summary: Apple has made Apple Maps accessible to Android phones, but there’s a catch. The company didn’t release the app, it made the Apple Maps website available to run through browsers. While it’s accessible on Android, there are some features that are unavailable.

Google makes many of its most popular apps and services available to Apple users, but Apple isn’t quite too keen on returning the favor. The company did make a few apps available on the Google Play Store like Apple Music, Apple Music Classical, and Apple TV. However, there’s not much else. Well, you can count Move to iOS if you want.

This shows that Apple wants to keep its most important apps and services exclusive to iOS users. However, every so often, it changes its mentality. According to a recent report, Apple just brought its navigation platform over to Android. Actually, that’s not 100% the case.

Apple (sorta) brings Apple Maps over to Android

If you think that you’ll be able to download the Apple Maps app from the Google Play Store, you’re going to be disappointed. Rather than making a dedicated app for Android, Apple made the Apple Maps website available to use on your mobile browser.

That’s a pretty odd choice, but it actually gets worse. You’re not able to log in to your Apple account to access your saved locations or use many of the features that Apple Maps has to offer. In fact, this implementation lacks all but the most basic functions. You can search for locations, find gas stations, and get directions.

With no ability to access your saved locations and such a bare-bones feature set, it seems odd that Apple even felt the need to make Apple Maps available to other platforms. It’s been beta testing the browser version of Apple Maps since last year, so we know that it’s planning on expanding this platform.

However, for the time being, we don’t think that many people will bother using Apple Maps on their Android phones. Google Maps is right there, fully featured, and much easier to access. Also, it can more easily integrate with other Android-based services.