You are here

CB » News & Rumors » Waze for BlackBerry Public Beta Now Available
WES 2010 BlackBerry Solution Showcase Spotlight Part II: Gwava, NeverFail, iSec7, TouMetis, Wireless Watchdogs and Grabba Previous
Fixmo Tools 1.1 Available - Delivers Fixes and Adds 4 New Utility Apps to Suite; Trip Around the World Contest Winner Announced!Next
71 Comments

Waze for BlackBerry Public Beta Now Available

By Michael Hepples on 4 May 2010 09:56 am
0
loading...
3
loading...
0
loading...

Waze

Waze, the well-known social GPS app currently available for the iPhone, Android, Windows Mobile and Symbian platforms, has announced they are coming to the BlackBerry beginning today. I have had the opportunity to test drive the beta for the last week, and as of this morning, the app is now available for download.

Waze is a free mobile navigation app that allows drivers to build and use live maps, real-time traffic updates and turn-by-turn navigation to improve their daily commute. Waze also incorporates social elements that give drivers the ability to actively update one other on traffic, police traps, construction, speed cams and more. Since waze is 100% user-generated and routes may not be optimal in all areas from day one, waze learns quickly, so the more people who use waze, the better, it gets. They are even running a contest for those participating in the beta, offering up an iPad for the person who munches the most "road goodies" - small icons worth bonus points - from May 4th thru 14th.

I have to tell you, even though this app is in an early beta phase, the attention to detail and work that has gone into it shine through already. It does have it's bugs, and is somewhat shaky on some functions, but the dev team at Waze has been fantastic with responding to feedback, and are looking for even more from the CrackBerry.com community. Give it a go, and very soon you'll find yourself taking a drive just for the opportunity to play with this little app, and taking detours from your normal route because you see a "cupcake" just one street over.

Topics: Gps Mapping Waze News & Rumors BlackBerry Apps

WES 2010 BlackBerry Solution Showcase Spotlight Part II: Gwava, NeverFail, iSec7, TouMetis, Wireless Watchdogs and Grabba Previous
Fixmo Tools 1.1 Available - Delivers Fixes and Adds 4 New Utility Apps to Suite; Trip Around the World Contest Winner Announced!Next
Michael Hepples Michael Hepples 102 (articles) 2309 (forum posts)
71 comments

devGOD

2.4mb wow... RIM sucks. can't believe i'm debating if this app is worth installing because RIM doesn't give enough space. even with the new BB supposing coming out with 512mb thats still not enough cause the new os 6 will probably eat up close to half of that. i'm going to give waze a go, but my 9700 will be my last BB. hopefully android won't disappoint me.

webmastir

i cannot wait to make the jump either! next year cannot come soon enough!

serpico

My wife's Curve 8330 with OS5 won't even run or have room to install some of these apps now. Sure it's older, but it's not the only device. My 9700 will be my last BB as well. My Nexus One should be arriving today and that will be it. Trying to be 'social' with my 9700 is running it to its limit. I can't imagine any other BB doing any better. The mobile world is changing so fast for us that I feel I'm always behind trying to get any BB device to keep up with everyone else.

charlieradar

I cannot possibly be more frustrated with my BB. Just two more months and I can move to android. Its not perfect but it just can't be any worse.

Kiddo_24

I'm always looking for alternate Map apps. Google Maps is my fav but doesn't have every address . . .

I hope the next updates make this app smaller. Its 2.4mb! Yikes!

Andy71600

This one prob wont get much smaller. There has to be a lot of code for the live updating and other features of the program

Flying_Hellfish

Never mind, no storm support.... it is useless even with compatibility mode disabled.

insanely

confirmed...sure type does not see the second letter, can't change to a different type of keyboard either. also screen isn't calibrated for storm either it seems.

AQucsaiJr

I can't seem to get it to work correctly on my storm... Maybe I am doing something wrong, but it does not seem like it works on the Storm.

** Guess I was late.

StaticFX

ok wait.. the iphone/android are touch screen devices..... and they didnt do the storm version first!? Yes i understand there are more non touch bb's but really? imo...fail.

as far as the 2.4mb... wouldnt bother me.. got plenty of space left. My hopes for OS6 is the it allows app install on the card. THAT would be nice

Kiddo_24

no storm support . . . Sigh . . .

Hup55

Funny I installed it and rebooted it twice after installing it, still wont work. It opens then closes 3 seconds after???Deleted it will try it out after beta.

andy957

Works on my 8900 but not on the 9700. I am seeing the same thing you are.

Michael Hepples

Did you have your permissions set correctly? I've been running it for a week on my 9700, no issues whatsoever. Hasn't crashed once.

andy957

Please elaborate. I've tried giving it trusted and full access, still crashes.

Dash

It does the same thing on my 9700. it flashes the homepage for a second, and then closes.

specopsteam

I hear everyone complaining about the BB memory, I like everyone else am getting sick and tired of BB screwing the customer and being behind the curve in every aspect other then email. But with that said this program is amazing! Ya it takes up a huge chunk of memory but I dont run a massive amount of apps and for what this program can do not only is the MB's not that much its well worth it.
Im running this program on my Tour, the first boot took a little bit and it lagged for a sec but now it runs super smooth. For a beta version this is amazing!
WAZER great job on creating a amazing program, I look forward to this being fully up and running and out of beta!

ba_hamilton

Wish this was available for the Storm. 2.4MB is not so big for an app. Some themes are approaching 2mb. Now that is getting a little out of hand.

mkrochta

This would be a great app if they made it for the largest selling phone the 8330. Maybe one day. :-(

oldwolf#cb

Anyone know yet if this works on Verizon?

Dr. Bones

I just made the switch to HTC Incredible. I've been a BB user for years... WOW, it makes my 8330 BB look like something that was developed in the back of a cave. BB you are so far behind!!! I loved you but there is no comparison and no looking back.

Oneshortsleeve

You are comparing a 2 year old phone to a week old phone?!?!

Look, I am glad you saved up your allowance to pick up the "latest and greatest", but the D-Bags on this site, including yourself, have emotional issues by feeling the need to come back and tell us you switched.

There are plenty of us who use our Blackberry because it does what we need it to do, including go the full day on a battery charge. Good luck with that, Sport.

By the way, if there is "no looking back", why are you still on Crackberry?

rayman21186

I'm with you on this one! If you guys are so against BlackBerry, then why do you continue to come here and try to put everyone else off from it? And seriously devGOD, why do you feel the need to post on both this, and the CardStar blog post about how the 9700 will be your last berry? Do you think anyone here cares? Why do people act like an app that is a couple mb is sooooo horrible? My 8530 has 108mb free AFTER having ALL of these apps installed:

Cardstar
Mobile Assistant
Waze
Score Mobile
Pandora
Where
Player for Youtube
Google Maps
Photobucket
Poynt
Backup Assistant
Capture It
Appworld
Dictionary.com
Bolt
Facebook
Twitter
BeWeather
Pixelated
Number Cruncher
Hangman

And all of the system files. Honestly, I don't see the issue here. My device runs FLAWLESSLY with all of those things installed. Quit whining people.

frankie923

That list looks pretty damn close to what I have, plus a few themes I keep forgetting to remove. Even so, with all of that and downloaded themes (I know, it's ridiculous) but still, I have a ton of memory free and no problems at all with the functionality of my phone. If you like the droid better bro, go chat it up on droidberry.com. It's like a bunch of little whining bitches and its their time of the month.

jayeverette

Thank you for this comment! its the truth and its funny! well played!

Lovesherbb1915

I love Google Maps, but I'm definitely gonna try this one out. :)

jasonvw

Crashes right away for me on my 9700 with official telus OS.

andy957

Seems like a few of us are having issues with Waze on the 9700.

Brandon 8ch

TAKE NOTE OF THIS.

andy957

Works fine for me, particularly on the iPhone as well.

Michael Hepples

This works just fine in Canada. I'm in Winnipeg, and I've been running it for a week. :)

Trovo05

does anyone have another GPS program that is free and has turn by turn navigation....been looking for a program like this for my phone but with no luck....

can someone please tell me there is a program that works good on the storm with turn by turn navigation for free?!?

jonathon8105

Check out AmazeGPS. I have used it on my Storm for several months and have had no issues. Plus it is free

crownr0yal

hm. when i downloaded it on my 9700, it got stuck on the security permissions. i kept hitting allow and it kept asking me to select allow over and over and over again. will report back after a battery pull.

olivr2

Install on the flip but the screen is all cut off so i'm uninstall due to space

andy957

Installed fine from the OTA link on my 9700, tried to launch it from Downloads folder, Waze splash screen quickly flashes and then nothing happens, back to Downloads folder. Anyone else see the same thing?

(P.S. Bell Mobility 9700 in Canada here)

Also installed on my Rogers 8900, installation fine, app launches fine, but when I went to create account got message that it failed and I should skip that step. After app launched, I went to the "Personalize" menu and set up my own account with no problem, just seems like it didn't work during initial start-up.

But I'm inside so have to go outside now for some GPS reception to test it out.

MarcSMASH

I'm done. No freakin' Storm support. This app is on the Androids and Iphones!! I'm done with this crap. I understand this app is not RIMs fault, but everything else is. Its like RIM put out the Storm series phones with the attitude of "You want a touchscreen? Well here you go. Now go **** yourself." I was excited about OS6 but I'm sure it won't be for my Storm 9530 with my piddly 128mb of memory. Unfortunately, I have to wait until January, but I can promise that when that day comes, the BlackBerry of that time will be far from my list of choices of phone. Cya!

sweeterman85

it launchs on my 9700, won't let me create an account, and will not find the GPS signal, even outside.

Oneshortsleeve

I had the same trouble with the account. When I got the "Failed" message, I chose to log in as a guest. When I went to update my account in the main screen, it took.

Dash

What OS and carrier are you guys with? I can't get it to work with my 9700, and it seems like a few others can't as well.

motoroid7

I really hope they had Curve support soon. At least 8530/8520.

Jude526

I might give it a whirl. But I have the VZ Nav and although it costs 9.99 a month it has never let me down. I have had it for a number of years and I use it a lot. I would love a free app but once it is supported on all devices, then maybe will give it a try.

monkfromwes

I cannot understand how it possible that high school graduates cannot distinguish between "its" and "it's" but the problem with the writers on crackberry is endemic.

It's = it is
Its = possessive

It is bad enough we are relegated to reading about apps that barely work on a blackberry (I'm condemned to use a Storm) although they've been on other phones working fine for ages. Having to read errors high school seniors should be avoiding is even worse.

This error appears constantly on this site. You are big boys, please learn the correct usage.

areyes163

I can understand the correct use of spelling. But atleast they added the "S". Read the first line of your post.
"I cannot understand how it possible that high school graduates cannot distinguish between "its" and "it's".

Anyway I installed this any it works good so far. Keep up the good work.

Dash

HAHAHHAHA. Well done

lovecrack

I waze happy to get this app till it locked up my S2. I waze very happy to remove it.

sedalia066

without a hitch. Had to log in by guest account as someone above mentioned and modify profile to get registered. Looking forward to testing a few days looking for battery usage and memory loss.

So far so good. No complaints today.

muchski

Have used this app last 5-6 months or so, first on Windows Mobile and now on Android. It only keeps getting better and the Waze team works directly with all users taking valuable input to improve their product!

Give it a go, it's strangely addictive! Makes the commute more fun and can save you time showing you the fastest route. The map and live data continue to get better and better as more users join up!

Best smartphone app i have used yet period. Think googlemaps but made by users, and the ability to record new roads and report on live changes, making it the most dynamic GPS solution out there. Oh and it's free! :D

rayman21186

As far as I'm concerned, this is pretty awesome, but I wish it wasn't so obvious that it was designed for the higher res screens. I wish it looked as good on my 8530 as the pic they have here!

suredrift

I live in montego bay Jamaica and i just installed this app. It allowed me to set up an account and it found a GPS signal but i am not seeing any map showing on my phone. Guess i will stick to Google Maps untill this comes out of Beta.

muchski

there are no basemaps yet for jamaica so the map would have to be recorded from scratch until they make a deal with the local govt like they did for usa, canada, france, germany to name a few. Actually recording a map from scratch is a pretty cool experience!

Flying Dutchman

If I lived in Jamaica I wouldn't care if I got lost or not. In Ohio we need to get from point A to point B as quick as possible before we freeze to death. So where is the Storm 2 support? WAZE up with that?

datdudeike

It seems nice. I use Garmin mobile on my BB but 1. The address input makes no sense 2. Sometimes the GPS is either super delayed or doesn't connect at all. This app connected quite quickly to the GPS satellites and so far after about an hour of use, it seems pretty good. I like BB maps and google maps n but lack of turn by turn is a killer for me. I think ill use this for a little while.

masareti_786

works great on my BB 9700. never got any wierd flashes or error in loading. it started up. shows speed and ETA. but it doesnt follow you as you drive so have to scroll through the map. unless im missing it, could someone tell me how to fix that. thanks

Michael Hepples

While in Navigation, press BB Key>Me on Map

It will center on you and show your "car". It will then follow you.

Summett

...does every gps program not work indoors for me on my 9700, when google maps does? Waze, like the many other gps programs i've tried, doesn't grab gps unless i'm outdoors. GM seems to pick it up anywhere (indoors, outdoors, etc., so i guess i'll stick with that. Maybe it's just my phone.

replica48

Does google use GPS all the time, or is it switching to the cell towers to find your approximate location?

mikeymajor

How do i get this app on my phone from my computer?

pwscott

I was unable to get this to work on a Verizon 9630 Tour with 5.0. I could not verify the new user account no matter what I tried. Then it said it couldn;t find the network even though I have 5 bars and had agreed over and over to the permissions and agreed to let it restart the security timer 6 times in a row with DON'T ASK AGAIN checked. Poor quality release in my opinion even for a Beta.

justmvg

I'm an owner of a curve 8900 and this app works very good for me.

I have tested this for some time..

-Starts very fast
-Nice interface
-Finds GPS like -instant-

Only con:
I don't know if there is a possibility to change the language of the voice to dutch.

Overall.. I really like this app

Greetings, mike

psiclne

played with it for a couple of hours and deleted it, I didnt like that I had to move the cursor to see the lil car icon.

jjlorenz30

Tried it and didn't like it will stick with google maps and sprint navigation for the turn by turn directions.

vallesedgar

Haha im not saying yay because it works on the storm2 but yay because im the only one that has been able to do a work around to get it to work on my storm2.
I know it does not work if you disable compatability but you can type just not scroll . and with compatibility on you cannot type but you can scroll.
In order to create an account and log in and log into foursquare and twitter I used Impatica Viadock which allows me to use the arrows on the keyboard. so i turn on the full keyboard in landscape and move around the app to enter all my info . and after that if i can enter an address in non compatibility mode but since i cannot scroll i can only select the top reccent or favorite. but once i have multiple favorites i turn on compatibility and can select the favorite I want to go to. I know its super time consuming and complicated but i really want to win that ipad (= .. and i hope all my hard work pays off

Druskey

It's an OK app that is worth a try if you have a compatible phone.

It's not as good as the advanced navigation programs out there, but it's neat to have for free. Also, keep in mind that it's a beta version an should get better as time goes on.

One bad thing I should mention is that it's murder on my battery life, but I suppose that could vary from phone to phone.

phoenix raiden

I have this formy Bold 9700 and downloaded it today...its a great app and the car follwos exactly where i go Howver it is not displaying my road names like you see in the pic above! this beta version for the BB needs to be resolved and fast!

Jude526

not spell correctly but when you are typing from your handset it is easy to incorrectly spell a word. You aren't a teacher so quit grading these people.