Recently, a friend shared his location over WhatsApp when I was on my way to meet him. When I tapped on that message, my iPhone opened Apple Maps. To my surprise, I couldn’t recognize most of the interface while I was driving and struggled to keep up with all the icons and symbols. Have you also felt the same while using Apple Maps? Here’s a guide that explains all Apple Maps icons and symbols and what they mean.
Icons on the Map
- Binoculars icon – Look Around feature that lets you explore the area at street level. Doesn’t appear everywhere.
- Double arrow – Expand the Look Around map to full screen.
- GPS icon – Direction
- Car icon – Choose what kind of map you want to use between Explore, Driving, Transit, and Satellite
- Arrow icon – Takes you back to your current location where you are right now.
- 2D/3D – View the map in 3D allowing you to explore more layers of the buildings and objects on the map like buildings.
- Sun/cloud – Weather report and AQI levels of your current location.
- Mic icon – Search the map using voice commands.
- Profile icon – Find locations you have saved in lists.
You will see some areas of the map marked in different colors on Apple Maps. Here is a general breakdown of what you are seeing:
- Green color – forest, parks, etc.
- Yellow color – tourist attractions, landmarks, and other places you may want to visit.
- Orange color – restaurants, cafes, bars, and any place that serves food or drinks.
- Red color – hospitals, medical stores, and other such places.
- Purple color – hotels, motels, resorts, etc.
- Pink color – lounge, arts and cultural, cinema, stores, etc.
- Light purple color – church, temple, and other places of worship.
- Blue color – water bodies like rivers, lakes, and oceans.
Icons on Journey Screen
You will see the below screen when you enter a destination and begin the journey on Apple Maps.
- Car – calculate ETA when driving via car.
- Walking man – calculate ETA when walking to the destination.
- Train – ETA to the destination if the train, tram, or subway route is available.
- Cycle – ETA when traveling via cycle.
- Man with one hand raised – book a ride using an app like Uber.
You will see the below icons when you begin the journey.
- Circle with an arrow pointing right (Proceed to the route) – This will show turn-by-turn instructions with distance as shown in the 3rd screenshot above.
- N compass icon – Points the map to the north if you have rotated the map with your fingers.
- Two dots connected by thread – That will zoom out so you can see the entire route or distance from point A to point B. Tap on it again to zoom in to your current position.
- Sound icon – Reveals three sound options in this order – enable sound for all notifications, receive only critical updates, and disable all sound notifications.
- Up arrow at the bottom right corner – Reveals a menu to add stops, share ETA, report incidents like accidents/traffic/construction, change volume, etc.
Depending on where you live, roads like highways are marked slightly differently. Here are screenshots from India and USA.
- USA (1st screenshot) – State highways are marked with green signs while interstate highways are marked with blue and red signs.
- USA (2nd screenshot) – Blue sign is for county road and the black and white denotes RTE or route.
- India (3rd screenshot) – National highways are marked with yellow signs while state highways are highlighted with green signs.
An easy way to find the Apple Map road legends in your country is to search Google for the city or location name with the road name and number shown on the Map.
Roads and Traffic Symbol
Meaning of icons and symbols you will see on roads while navigating using Apple Maps.
- Red circle with a white hyphen at two points – the road is closed between these two points.
- Yellow exclamation – lane is closed.
- Yellow square with the man working – under construction road.
- Red square with car – accident happened here.
- Yellow and red lines on the road – yellow lines show traffic resulting in slowdowns and red means stop-and-go traffic.
You will find more icons and symbols on Apple Maps for shops, restaurants, hospitals, parks, etc. Tapping on them will reveal a place card with more information like timings, rate, contact details, how to reach that place, menu, and more depending on the place itself.
