Waze forum

On the FAQ page, under When do my roads show up in the Live Map? —

Generation of the Live Map should take place daily, but the queue of changes is lengthy, so most map edits should appear in the Live Map within 2 days. [...] Updates to the map on the Waze client app happen at the same time. There can be delays in the map update cycle which will be documented on Waze Status.

From discussion today in #wazeopedia_usa on Discord: updates to the Live Map are "drastically less often and less extensive" than updates to the map on the Waze client app. Additionally, the linked status page is only for map tiles used in the app, "not the web-based Live Map tiles".

From the Waze web application you can look at the Live Map tab and at the lower left of the screen below the map you will see the last update of that map information.

This doesn't actually appear on the Live Map.

Newly recorded roads will not appear in Live Map until they have been edited in the Waze Map Editor. This will need to be done by either you or the appropriate Area Manager.

Along with parts of the first paragraph, it seems this text is (at least currently) suited to answer the next question instead: When do my edits show up in the Waze app?


— In other words, this looks to be in need of a full refresh by someone familiar with the current Live Map update process. This exact text is also located at: Timeline of updating process/Live Map

Also, the Map tiles wiki page would benefit from an explicit caveat that it is about map tiles for the Waze client app — rather than tiles for the Live Map, which "are set up differently (less resolution levels needed, for example) and the [update] schedule is less often and less tiles get updated per update". The page mentions the "live map database" without making any reference to the app.

Thank you!

Yes, we should update these things. Thanks for bringing it up! Would you like to suggest some language to replace these quoted statements?

I agree with your changes. I would say "build" instead of "cycle" and would not capitalize "map release", as the status page is just written with title case. I would add a sentence just before the end: "Any edits made after the last edit time are not included in the current build."

For the Live Map question — I would be happy to, except I don't actually know anything about how it is updated, aside from what I shared here from #wazeopedia_usa. Is there someone who works with Live Map generation that could shed some light on it? (Would that be a Waze staff member?) If it's not possible to learn more details about how that currently works, I feel it would be better to just delete that question altogether from both pages, rather than to leave information here that we know to be wrong.

For the following question — When do my edits show up in the Waze app? — here are the edits I would suggest:

The normal process, is that on a regular basis, the map tiles update process runs on the servers. When it starts, any edits which are complete by that time will be included in the current map update cycle. The map tile updating process can take several days or even weeks on the World server, and are currently happening approximately daily on the North American server. Depending on when you save the edit, on the North America server, it will appear in 1 or 2 days. More details are covered in the Timeline of updating process.Edits made in the Waze Map Editor will not appear in the Waze app until the affected map tiles are rebuilt on the server. Certain edits will trigger a rebuild of the affected tiles during the next map update cycle (which usually begins about every 24 hours). See Map tiles for more details.

Once the map update cycle is complete, the tiles are loaded into the client map and the live mapavailable for the Waze app to load. The datetime that the update processcycle is complete is referred to as the Update DateMap Release, though this can be confusing becausebut keep in mind that the edits which made it into that cycle may be days older. The status page is usually updated with the latest map update cycle information, which includes the "with updates through x date" informationshows the latest Map Release, as well as the last edit time contained in that release. The Waze Map Editor provides a link to this page on the left side of the bottom bar.

Tiles displayed in the app are cached, and are only refreshed when one of the following conditions is met:

• You are showing a specific location on the map from the address search.
• You are navigating to or through the tile.
• The tile is over one week old.
• You use the manual option to Refresh map of my area under Settings >> Advanced >> Data Transfer

More details are covered in Timeline of updating process. Note that the Waze app tends to get the updated tiles before the Live Map on the website uses different map tiles than the Waze app and may take significantly longer to be updated.

Kartografer wrote:I agree with your changes. I would say "build" instead of "cycle" and would not capitalize "map release", as the status page is just written with title case. I would add a sentence just before the end: "Any edits made after the last edit time are not included in the current build."

I've updated this section on the page, incorporating your feedback (and as a result, tweaking my text to avoid using the word "build" except to refer to the map build). I also reversed the order of these two questions on the page — the updates to the Waze app are described first now, since this is more frequent than updates to the Live Map.

ojlaw wrote:at this point in time we know that live map tile builds can be out of date 6+ months at various zoom levels. i think it's worth mentioning that some zoom levels in live map are updated while some are not.

also valuable is even though live map might not show current changes the routing it uses does reflect the most current app tiles.

How about this text then for the Live Map question? Feel free to suggest changes. (It's actually transcluded on the FAQ page from here.)

The Live Map on the website displays different map tiles than the Waze app, and edits made in the Waze Map Editor may take significantly longer to appear. Tiles shown at lower zoom levels are regenerated more often than tiles for higher zoom levels, which can take several months to update.

Note that directions in the Live Map and the Waze app are both obtained from the routing server, which utilizes the current map build in addition to real-time traffic data, reports, and closures.

dpwardgt wrote:The Live Map on the website displays different map tiles than the Waze app, and edits made in the Waze Map Editor may take significantly longer to appear. Tiles shown at lower zoom levels are regenerated more often than tiles for higher zoom levels, which can take several months to update.

Note that directions in the Live Map and the Waze app are both obtained from the routing server, which utilizes the current map build in addition to real-time traffic data, reports, and closures.

I really like what you've got going here, just a few ideas on how it might make the differences even clearer (IMO):

Maybe rejigger the first sentence, to something like:

Edits made in the Waze Map Editor may take significantly longer to visually appear on the Live Map than the Waze app, because the website displays different map tiles than the app.

Maybe also differentiate the routing from the display more by saying:

However, note that directions in the Live Map and the Waze app are both obtained from the routing server, which utilizes the current map build in addition to real-time traffic data, reports, and closures.

at this point in time we know that live map tile builds can be out of date 6+ months at various zoom levels. i think it's worth mentioning that some zoom levels in live map are updated while some are not.

also valuable is even though live map might not show current changes the routing it uses does reflect the most current app tiles.