It was frustrating for me that it’s actually impossible to browse places seeing both location and rating on Apple Maps *, and my first attempt was to find a simple solution for this. But once I started to design and to think about my experience with Maps, how, when and why I use it, I explored other possible improvements and additional functionalities the app could have.

I tried to implement these ideas into the current Apple Maps structure and visual style, aiming to make it more functional without complicating or changing its regular use. So this work is more like an unsolicited change for Maps to include some new features rather than a complete redesign, and it’s not based on any research or real constraints.

*Some detail about why I find it difficult to browse places(search results):

When I search for a new place to try on Apple Maps, mostly my two criteria are simply location and rating. With location I don’t mean only the distance but also where it is located on map. And it’s frustrating for me that either I have to look to pins on map and tap on them to see each one’s rating, or I browse the list and have to select one by one to see their place on map.

Also other apps which I’ve tried, like Google Maps, Yelp aren’t any better. Tripadvisor, Zomato and Foursquare show the ratings on map in different ways like with circles, numbers or colors. But I think reading numbers or tiny rating dots of each pin at a time is not an easy way to scan the whole map view at a glance, and the color differentiation might be better to use for different type of pins -say like restaurants, shopping, transport etc.-