TomTom’s Highly-Anticipated Car Nav App Finally Available on iTunes

Leander Kahney ()

tomtom

TomTom’s much-anticipated car navigation software for the iPhone is finally available on the App store for $99.99.

The software wowed at Apple’s World Wide Developers Conference in June by proving the iPhone could be a platform for industrial-strength software like a turn-by-turn navigation system.

TomTom’s app offers the usual GPS features: route planning, turn-by-turn voice instructions, 6 million points of interest, and auto re-routing if a turn is missed.

But it also boasts tight integration with the iPhone, including pinching and zooming of maps, automatic rotation between portrait and landscape modes, and tight integration with the iPhone’s contact list (tap a contact and the software finds the quickest route to them).

The App also includes TomTom IQ Routes, a smart route-finding feature that recommends routes based on popular driving patterns.

Be warned: the App and it maps weigh in at a whopping 1.21GB. And at $99, the software is more expensive than rivals like CoPilot Live ($34.99), Sygic Mobile Maps ($39.99) or Google’s free Map app; but it doesn’t require a monthly service fee, like AT&T’s Navigator, which adds $10 a month on your phone bill as long as you use the app.

An optional car mount kit (pricing has not yet been announced) includes iPhone charging, a GPS-boosting antenna, a speaker for turn-by-turn instructions, and a microphone for hands-free dialing and Voice Command. The mount kit can be used in horizontal and landscape orientations.

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The TomTom app is compatible with the iPhone 3G and 3GS. It is available on iTunes in four versions:

TomTom US & Canada – $99.99
TomTom Western Europe – $139.99
TomTom Australia – $79.99
TomTom New Zealand – $94.99

tomtom_windscreen

14 comments »

About the author

Leander Kahney

is the editor and publisher of Cult of Mac, and author of three books about technology culture: Inside Steve’s Brain, the New York Times bestseller about Steve Jobs; Cult of Mac; and Cult of iPod. Leander has written for Wired, MacWeek, Scientific American, and The Guardian in London. Follow Leander on Twitter @lkahney and Facebook.

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Posted in iPhone, iPhone 3G S, News, Software |

  • -Vince

    Horizontal AND Landscape… good to know ;-)

    Anyone else notice that the VW in the image has a GPS in the center console? You can just see the corner of the LCD display behind the driver’s right wrist.

  • Matias

    $99.- for the software, and then buy the hardware for another big chunk???

    I rather buy a whole separate unit for that…

    I’ve been waiting for this app to be in the range of $30, and then willing to pay some $50 to $70 for the hardware… but this is way too much.

    Bye-Bye TomTom!

  • Red rover

    Why would you say 99.00 is too much when navigons iphone app is going to be 99.00 after august 31st. Makes no sense what you say.

  • OlsonBW

    I’ve got a motorcycle (a year 2000 1500cc Honda GoldWing) and am really curious about this app. Most notably on how useable it would be if my iPhone was kept in my pocket but at the same time connected to my motorcycle’s sound system.

    I currently listen to play lists while riding (only 800 randomly selected songs through Genius). Yes I’m going to contact them but I’m wondering…

    - can I listen to songs while this app is running?
    - can I receive phone calls (which I would take just long enough to find out who it is and call them back later, yes I have a way to do this without taking my eyes off the road. This is for emergencies and I do take week long trips and would like to know before I arrive somewhere that night)
    - assuming I can take phone calls, does this bounce the iPhone out of the navigation program or can you take phone calls while in the program. It would obviously be dangerous to have to get the iPhone back to the program and get it going again, and a real pain the *** to have to stop each time I get a phone call to do this safely.
    - does voice navigation tell you street names and/or just x hundred number of feet/miles/kms before the next turn).

    I’m sure I have other questions, but that’s all I can think of for now.

  • Matias

    Reply to Red rover:
    ‘Why would you say 99.00 is too much when navigons iphone app is going to be 99.00 after august 31st. Makes no sense what you say.
    Red rover, on August 17th, 2009 at 11:21 am’

    Navigon’s iPhone app is too pricey too.

  • OlsonBW

    Matias – Seriously, you thought this app was going to be only $30? Seriously? Seriously?!!!

  • http://www.iphonebiotech.com DMA

    TomTom needs to understand that there are MILLIONS of iPhone users that will probably buy this application at a reasonable price, and $99 is not reasonable for just software (especially since CoPilot is $35). Every sale lost to a competitor is probably one they will never recoup, since we do not get trials with the iPhone. I bought CoPilot at a reasonable $35, despite having used AND LOVED TomTom for at least 5 years. If TomTom had even come in at $50, I would have purchased it and I would have probably waited for the hardware kit to come out later and purchased that as well.

    I don’t know if anyone at TomTom has been watching the news reports lately, but we are in a recession. Money is not easy to come by these days.

  • Eric Longstaff

    Vince, Not all VW’s have a navigation system installed. This could be the deluxe audio system like the one in my GTI.

  • Matias

    Silly me, huh? I guess I’m one of those idealists that think they can still make a fortune by bringing products to the masses making a modest margin on thousands rather than having a huge margin on a few.
    That’s why I insist: Bye-Bye TomTom ;-)

  • Scott

    Too many people with Matias’s outlook on pricing is part of the problem with the app store. There’s no incentive for companies to invest the time and resources to make quality iPhone apps because everyone thinks every app should be 1/3 of its value or less. If you had any concept of what is involved with developing an app like this you would realize that $99 is a pretty reasonable value. I’ve been learning to program for OSX for a while now, but have intentionally avoided iPhone programming because the market is not only totally saturated, but the consumers expectation of what they should get for their $0.99 app is totally out of whack with reality. You see people who are perfectly willing to drop $6 for a beer at a bar who will complain that a $4.99 game is way-too-pricy; it totally baffles me.

  • -Vince

    The standard VW EOS head unit has a different button configuration than the Nav unit, which is shown in the picture. I only mention it, because it seems like they are trying to say that there navigation app is sooooo good you won’t want to use the factory one installed in your car.

    …Although, having used VW’s factory nav for a while, I actually would prefer the tomtom.

  • Matias

    Scott, I agree that developer’s job has been bastardized, but it was bastardized by the same developers. From a consumers perspective, why would you pay $99 for software when for about the same money you can pay for both software + hardware?
    The iPhone itself is the perfect example where a company is doing money not on each individual sale but on mass sales. Initially, it was $599, now it’s only $99. Think big, if you aim for big numbers not only you can reduce the price but you can also monopolize your market in your favor… that’s exactly what Apple is doing with the Smartphone market.
    But… that’s just me.

  • Scott

    Matias, I agree that the developers have painted themselves into a corner with regards to the current race-to-the-bottom phenomena in the app store. I also think that people’s reluctance to pay more for quality software (something that most Mac users are willing to do) is playing a big role as well. It’s like the negative-feedback cycle of the abused wife who keeps going back to her abusive husband.

    Don’t forget that there’s a huge expense in dealing with support for “big numbers” of customers. It’s infinitely better for a developer to have 1 customer buy a $1,000,000 app than it is to have 1,000,000 customers each buy a $1 app. Obviously, that’s not a realistic scenario, but you get the idea that having 10,000′s of e-mails can become a drain on a developer’s time and ability to improve her product.

    The iPhone isn’t really $99, it’s $99 + a 2-year-commitment of roughly $1800 phone/data service. I’d also rather carry one device in my pocket instead of 2, so I don’t see a great advantage in buying a 2nd dedicated GPS device that I have to keep charged and keep secure/worry about loosing etc. but that’s just me.

    I’m not grabbing this update yet myself because I’d like to see them work out all of the 1.0 issues (and I’d also like to see how the competition pans out a bit), but once that happens I’ll gladly drop my $99 for something so useful. I’d also feel good about supporting people who choose to develop for the platforms that matter to me (and thereby making my experience better by having great choices available to me).

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Ava-Roberts/657799436 Ava Roberts

    Tom Tom car kit does have a little adapter for the iphone4, a tiny little black rectangular piece of plastic. Its chip isunder a protective strip of non sticky paper which you need to peel off firstthen you stick it to another rectangular piece that lies at the base of the TomTom car kit before putting the iphone4 in the cradle. Then you go to settings,general, Bluetooth and switch Bluetooth on. It searches fordevices and finds the Tom Tom car kit. Click on it to connect. You can use the Tom Tomcar kit to charge your phone, navigate, listen to music, and have hands freecalling all at the same time. This is a neat little gadget.