Crowd sourced traffic data from Waze, a company that Google acquired earlier this year, is now included in the official Google Maps application for iPhone and iPad.
The search giant announced on its official Lat Long blog on Tuesday that real time incident reports from Waze users will appear in the official Google Maps apps for both iOS and Android in the U.S. and U.K., as well as France, Germany, Switzerland, Mexico, Brazil, Panama, Peru, Chile, Colombia, and Ecuador.
Google has also updated the Waze app for iOS, as well as Android, to add Google Search functionality. Google's data now joins other search providers in being integrated into Waze.
Finally, Google also announced that the Waze Map Editor has been updated with Google Street View and satellite imagery. This will make it easier for users in the Waze community to correct map errors.Google announced it had acquired Waze, a crowd-sourced traffic and navigation service, in June.
Google announced in June that it had acquired Waze, a popular cross-platform, crowd-sourced traffic and navigation service to bolster its own Google Maps. As of April, Waze had more than 40 million people actively using its service and contributing data.
The Waze iOS application was highlighted by Apple >last year following the launch of iOS 6, when the company promoted alternative mapping applications and apologized for the substandard quality of its own Maps.
Mobile maps have become an increasingly heated space in the tech market, after Apple opted to ditch Google Maps and utilize its own data for the integrated iOS Maps application. But many users still view Apple's software as largely inferior to Google's, and Apple has responded with a number of its own key acquisitions.
Most notably, this year Apple purchased HopStop, a public transit and navigation data provider, as well as Locationary, a crowdsourced mapping data startup. The company has also been looking to improve its Maps team with a number of available positions for Maps experts.
Google, meanwhile, has been working to greater monetize users of its own mapping software on iOS, as the company rolled out new banner ads for the official Google Maps application earlier this month.