Waze andGoogle Mapsshare a lot of the same data sources, but there are still things Google’s navigation-focused mapping app does better than its more ubiquitous sibling. Many people prefer Waze for its real-time traffic reporting and quirky features like a rotating roster ofcelebrity guest starswho can add a bit of flair to turn-by-turn directions, and its parent company has thankfully allowed the app to maintain its own brand identity. Today, another of those uniquely Waze features has been announced, and it’s one that might actually make a difference.
Google announcedthat crash history alerts are making their way into the Waze app for Android and iOS starting today. Now, when you’re navigating, the app will display an alert before you turn onto a road that is unusually prone to accidents.
Waze determines whether a road is particularly dangerous by having AI analyze user reports and traffic data, combined with practical information like whether it’s a freeway or surface street, as well as physical properties such as elevation and grade. If these factors add up to an especially dangerous scenario, the app will display a “History of crashes - next X miles” notification on the summary card at the bottom of your screen.
You won’t get a crash history alert for roads that you commonly travel, as this could be more of a distraction than a benefit. Waze is also aware that an alert taking your attention off of a dangerous road would be counterproductive here, so the app only notifiesbeforeyou enter the dangerous stretch, and it does its best to limit the total number of crash history alerts it issues.
So far, we’re not seeing the feature in thelatest beta build of Waze(version 4.99.0.2), nor have we come across any user reports of crash history alerts in the wild. Google does specify that the feature has launched “today,” though we suspect it will be a staged rollout that takes a few weeks to become available to all users through a server-side update.
Google points out that crashes involving cars are the cause of 3,700 deaths around the world every single day — in fact, auto accidents are estimated to be the eighth-leading cause of death globally. Anything to help reduce those tragic deaths would be a boon for society, but Waze is in a delicate position here, as14% of these deathsinvolved cell phone use, and the NHTSA attributed 3,522 deaths to distracted driving in 2021 alone. Carelessly implementing such a feature could have an opposite effect to its intentions, so it’s good to see that Waze’s engineers have thoughtfully implemented these alerts.
