Google Maps Returns to iPhone

The wait is over, iPhone users. Google has at last released a stand-alone Maps app for iOS, available as a free App Store download. In a blog post announcing the release, Google boasts that it has redesigned the app "from the ground up … It's a sharper looking, vector-based map that loads quickly and provides smooth tilting and rotating of 2D and 3D views."

It also boasts a number of new features—most notably turn-by-turn navigation. Apple has cited the app's previous lack of turn-by-turn as one of the main reasons it ditched Google Maps in the first place. It also now incorporates live traffic conditions, and provides an "expandable info sheet" on businesses you search for. The Wall Street Journal notes, however, that the app is currently only available for iPhone, meaning iPad users are out of luck. Even so, the Next Web notes that it's already the App Store's most popular app. If you're reading this on your iPhone, you can download the new app here. (More Google Maps stories.)