Navigation Guide

Navigation

🇩🇪 Deutsche Version

JourneyPulse guides you step by step to your destination — with voice announcements, turn instructions, speed limit display and (optionally) completely offline. Navigation runs in the Live tab and in CarPlay.

Starting navigation

You choose a destination from:

• search results (Apple Maps),
• saved places, home/work quick destinations and recent destinations (see Places and POIs),
• a voice command via the microphone button in the Live tab ("Where should I take you?"),
• Siri and Shortcuts (e.g. navigate "home" or "to work"), in German and English. Siri only replies once the route is ready and states distance and duration.

After starting, the app automatically switches to the Live tab. There you see the route, next instruction, remaining distance, remaining time and arrival time. During navigation the app keeps location at high accuracy — also in the background. This costs battery, see Energy and Battery.

Display during route guidance. To give the map and turn instruction as much room as possible, the Live tab tidies up while navigation is running:

• The status card at the top shrinks to one line with speed, distance and duration. If a hazard is ahead, its notice (e.g. "Traffic jam in 400 m") replaces distance and duration.
• The navigation banner at the bottom shows the arrow and distance on the left, the next instruction in large type next to it and the following instruction below. The footer shows remaining distance, remaining time and arrival; a delay line only appears when a delay is known.
• The tab bar hides in the Live tab. The round button at the bottom right of the map brings it back for a few seconds so you can switch to another tab. In the other tabs it stays visible, so you can always get back to the live view.

In the route overview and without navigation the Live tab looks as usual.

Waypoints: The route can go via several stopovers. After arriving at one it automatically continues to the next and finally to the final destination.

• Adding during navigation: If you pick another place (for example from search or under Places), the app asks: New destination replaces the running navigation, Add waypoint inserts the place before the final destination.
• Order: With several waypoints you choose Optimal route (shortest total distance as the crow flies, the final destination stays last) or Manual order.
• Move and delete: The button with the count in the navigation banner opens the list. There you move waypoints, swipe to delete them, or re-sort them with "Sort optimally". "Done" applies the changes and reroutes if needed.
• Waypoints survive an app restart. iPhone only so far, not in CarPlay.

Route overview

Before starting, the route overview shows up to three suggestions with distance and travel time.

• The first route is marked "Recommended", the others "Alternative route".
• With the Avoid motorways switch (car trips only) you get routes without motorways. If a route still uses a motorway, it is labelled "with motorway".
• Start takes the selected route, Cancel closes the overview.
• The overview stays open until you close it.

There is also the departure time advisor: if leaving up to 90 minutes earlier or later on the same route has been noticeably faster so far, the overview shows it. For regular trips you can get a notification in advance (Settings → Navigation & Announcements → "Departure time tips"). It only comes on weekdays on which you actually drive the route, and is skipped if you're already on the way or haven't driven the route for 30 days. Tapping the notification opens the route overview to the destination. If notifications for JourneyPulse are switched off, the setting shows a notice.

Appointment reminders from the calendar

If you like, JourneyPulse reminds you in good time to leave for events in your calendar and sets up the route right away (Settings → Navigation & Announcements → "Appointment reminders from the calendar").

• Which events: all events with a location in the next 48 hours, from all calendars on the device. Skipped are all-day and cancelled events, invitations you declined and online-only events (Teams, Zoom, Webex, links, dial-in numbers). If the event location is less than about 800 m away from you, there is no reminder.
• Travel time: from the last known location with Apple Maps' traffic forecast for the expected departure time. If Apple Maps doesn't respond, the app estimates from the straight-line distance. A selectable time buffer (none, 5, 10, 15 or 30 minutes; default 10) is added for finding parking or walking.
• Reminder: arrives with a selectable lead time (5 to 60 minutes; default 15) before the calculated departure and names the event, travel time and departure time. If the lead time has already passed when planning but the departure hasn't, it arrives immediately. Each reminder arrives only once per event.
• Route: Tapping the notification opens the route overview to the event location.
• Focus: The reminder is delivered as a time-sensitive notification and therefore reaches you even with an active Focus such as "Driving" or "Do Not Disturb" — provided notifications for JourneyPulse are allowed and time-sensitive notifications haven't been disabled in the iOS settings.
• Updates: The app re-plans at launch, when returning to the app, when the calendar changes, after every trip and occasionally in the background. That way start location and traffic match the time of departure as closely as possible.
• The setting lists the planned departures. If calendar access is missing or notifications are off, it shows a notice with a path to the system settings.

Calendar access is optional. You grant it in the intro or when switching on the feature. JourneyPulse needs full access for this because iOS only allows reading events that way; the app writes nothing to your calendar.

Voice announcements and turn instructions

• The instruction at the top is continuously updated based on your position. How long it stays displayed is set under "Keep instruction at top".
• Announcements depend on speed: earlier at higher speeds, just before the maneuver in town. On the motorway there are additional notices further ahead (e.g. 2.5 km and 1 km before).
• Closely spaced maneuvers are combined ("turn right now, then immediately turn left").
• In town the app names landmarks, e.g. "turn left at the traffic lights".
• Roundabouts: The announcement names the exit and the direction ("take the second exit at the roundabout towards …"). The icon shows the direction of travel anticlockwise, matching right-hand traffic.
• Exits and motorway junctions name number, road and destination as on the sign, e.g. "Exit 102 · A 3 · Nürnberg · München".
• Bend warning: Before sharp bends outside towns there is a warning ("Caution, sharp bend to the right"). In towns, in roundabouts and at normal turns it stays silent.
• Limit announcements to the essentials: With this switch the app only speaks the turn instruction right before the maneuver and turning right-of-way roads. Advance notices, bend warnings, hazards along the route and the rerouting notice stay silent; banners and display don't change. The switch is off by default.
• Voice, speaking style and bend warnings are set under Settings → Navigation & Announcements → Voice output. If you choose an English voice, the announcements are in English too — turn instructions as well as hazard, fuel and weather announcements.
• The audio connection via Bluetooth and CarPlay is kept warm so that even the first announcement after a long silence is audible. Music playing is only lowered briefly during an announcement. Under Audio output you can route announcements to the iPhone speaker or the hands-free kit instead.

If you permanently leave the route, the app recalculates it and briefly announces this ("Recalculating route"). The position arrow stays on the route instead of jumping beside it with every inaccurate GPS point — only on a real deviation does the map show your raw position again.

Routing: Apple Maps or offline

Under Settings → Navigation & Announcements → Routing & Offline Maps you choose who calculates the route:

Option	Properties
Apple (default)	With traffic, needs mobile data.
Offline	Routes without a network using the installed map data. No traffic.
Hybrid	Plans with Apple Maps traffic and recalculates offline on the way.

Offline and hybrid need the offline map data (several gigabytes). They are described on the Offline Maps page. As long as no map data is installed, navigation continues via Apple Maps.

With "Automatically optimise route for traffic" the app only switches routes when Apple delivers a noticeably faster alternative. The switch is shown in a banner with the time saved, plus a short announcement.

Speed limit display

While driving, the map shows the speed limit of the current road as a traffic sign — also without navigation and in CarPlay.

• If you're above the limit plus tolerance, the sign turns red and a short tone sounds, once per violation.
• Settings under Navigation & Announcements: "Show speed limit", "Warning tone when exceeding" and "Tolerance" (0 to 15 km/h, default +5 km/h).
• Requirement: installed Offline Maps. Without them no limit is shown.

Moving the map and follow mode

During navigation you can freely move and zoom the map. 15 seconds after the last gesture the map follows your position again; the location button brings it back immediately.

More helpers while driving

• Silent route / destination prediction: On a car trip without navigation the app recognises from your previous trips where you're probably heading and silently runs a route without announcements — with destination and arrival time on the map. A tap starts full navigation; if you deviate it disappears. While it runs silently there are no turn instructions, and the app uses no more energy than a normal recording. Can be switched off under "Predict destination automatically".
• Fuel stop suggestion: If the fuel won't last to the destination, the app suggests the cheapest station along the route as an intermediate stop — on long routes only when the tank has only about 100 km left. The suggestion appears as a card above the navigation banner and in CarPlay as a notice with "Add" and "Ignore"; it disappears once you've passed the station. After the stop, navigation continues to the destination by itself. The price shown is projected to the arrival time ("approx."). Prices come from Tankerkönig.
• Weather warnings: Every 10 minutes the app checks the official warnings of the German Weather Service (DWD) along the route — for the time you'll arrive there — and reports a new warning once: as a banner at the top that hides itself after a few seconds, and as an announcement.
• Tunnels: If GPS fails, navigation continues along the route using the speed from OBD (without OBD with the last GPS speed, at most 2 km). An orange arrow shows the estimated position. The estimate doesn't kick in when stationary, and at low speed (below about 20 km/h) it waits 8 instead of 3 seconds for the next location.
• Hazards on the route: If the app detects a traffic jam, closure or roadworks on your route, it shows a notice and checks for a detour. More under Warnings.

More features

Lane guidance and signposts. Before junctions and motorway exits the banner shows the lanes and highlights the correct ones — on the motorway from 1.5 km, otherwise from 500 m. Also in CarPlay: as a lane bar at the bottom of the map and in the instrument cluster where the vehicle supports it. Needs installed Offline Maps and works with Apple and offline routes.

Personal routing (arrival time from your trips). The app matches your recorded trips to the road network and remembers how fast you actually drive individual sections — separately by direction and time of day. This produces an arrival time based on your trips rather than speed limits; the recommendation is then called "Recommended — based on your trips".

• Switch on: Settings → Navigation & Announcements → "Learn from my trips".
• Learning happens in the background after the trip ends, not during navigation. Everything stays on your device.
• Two safeguards: below 30 observed passes nothing happens, and the correction is capped at 35 percent.
• Needs installed Offline Maps.
• The learned data can be reset or rebuilt; your recorded trips are kept.

Position arrow on the route and offline routing. The arrow snaps to the route, and navigation also works completely offline (see Offline Maps).

Problems?

• No voice announcement: Check navigation audio in the settings, test the voice, and with CarPlay/Bluetooth check the active audio output.
• No speed limit, no lane hints: Are the offline maps installed?
• More hints: FAQ and Known Limitations.