Daring Fireball
Apple Announces Ads Are Coming to Apple Maps
https://daringfireball.net/linked/2026/03/27/apple-announces-ads-are-coming-to-apple-maps
Apple Announces Ads Are Coming to Apple Maps

Link to: https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2026/03/introducing-apple-business-a-new-all-in-one-platform-for-businesses-of-all-sizes/

Daring Fireball
Mar 28 at 12:07amDF Tootbot
Show threadbillyok4d ago

@daringfireball "I’m not going to prejudge the actual experience, and you shouldn’t either."

This is ridiculous. By what possible calculus will ads for things I'm *not* searching for, pushing down the things I *am* searching for, not make the experience worse? We all know how this is going to go, why do I have to pretend I don't until it's worse?

Show threadMatt4d ago
@billyok agreed. I'm 100% going to prejudge not just because ads are always terrible, we have experience with Apple's ads in the App Store and they are just as terrible.
Show threadMathias af Jochnick3d ago
@billyok @daringfireball I think the point is that you don’t know that it’ll work the way you describe it.
Show threadPaul McGrane4d ago
@daringfireball It sounds kinda gross, but on the other hand you want to know if the shop is even open! When Apple Maps was new it relied on Yelp for reviews, so I decided to join in and I like Yelp to this day like 15 later!
Show threadRobin4d ago
@daringfireball “all together: make it shitty!”
Show threadSandhu4d ago
@daringfireball Apple’s prioritization of profit over customer satisfaction and loyalty is frustrating, especially as an Apple One family plan customer who now sees ads in Apple News and Maps. I only buy iPhones because my kids won’t use anything else, but I’ll switch to GrapheneOS or a similar OS soon when they’re old enough (almost there) to buy their own phones.
Show threadNit4d ago
@daringfireball yum. Can’t wait. /s
Show threadruffin4d ago

@daringfireball “Here’s Apple’s own screenshot showing what these ads are supposedly going to look like”

My eyesight stinks, but I didn’t see a link to a pic. Maybe you meant at the link. /goes to check

Show threadruffin4d ago
@daringfireball there is one there. For ‘donners, I’ll save you a click.
Show threadJohn Gruber3d ago
@ruffin I forgot to include the link at first. Fixed now!
Show threadadamrice4d ago
@daringfireball I begrudge them. It makes me the product, not the customer. Not like I have a better option, really.
Show threadFuzen4d ago
@daringfireball I wonder how many ads will be shown. One I can accept. If we eventually reach multiple like Google or Amazon sponsored then heaven help us.
Show threadwsm4d ago

@daringfireball

Apple could fix this advancing enshittification with a toggle on Maps.app’s “Choose Map” sheet:

“Turn Ads OFF”

Show threadJohn Gruber3d ago
@weldon Their goal is obviously to monetize Maps. How would they monetize with an option like that?
Show threadwsm3d ago

@gruber

Ads in Maps default enabled would get Tim Apple 80% of what he needs. Giving us the option to turn that layer on, PRN? Less vibration in a necessarily busy graphical environment, a genuinely positive & unambiguous signal to all the lurking bean counters, but most importantly the user back on top of the pyramid. I’ve no objection to ads in the App Store or News (as I wouldn’t in either of their meat space precursors).

Show threadlatca4d ago
@daringfireball Apple One subscribers receiving an ad free tier would be great. However, I’m not holding my breath for it. I still begrudge Apple News+ for having ads. I do enjoy using it, but the experience is diminished because I’m shown ads that I might not have seen in Safari thanks to an ad-block extension.
Show threadNit3d ago
@latca @daringfireball the News+ ads are all kinds of bad. From how large they are to the types of shady content they push. Truly crap.
Show threadJohn Gruber3d ago

@latca The difference there is that with News+, the ads are from and for the publishers of the stories, not Apple itself. It’s up to the publishers whether their articles have ads. The price of a News+ subscription would not cover ad-free subscriptions to all participating publications.

Apple Maps is a service Apple owns and controls. It’s entirely up to Apple whether it has ads, and whether you can buy your way out of seeing those ads.

Show thread🇨🇦 Maverick ✊🇲🇲🇺🇦🇻🇪🇬🇱4d ago
@daringfireball The real problem, as I see it, is that – for whatever reason – Apple is horrible at search in the first place. Everywhere that Apple includes search is a disaster. If you ever find anything you are looking for, it seems like you’ve done it by accident. It’s horrible system wide. Searching for a movie on Apple TV? A song on Apple Music? A business on Apple Maps? An App on App Store? All horrible. Adding ads is going to make this bad experience even worse.
Show threadNienkez 🔻3d ago
@daringfireball enshittification on your route. Great!
Show threadSteven Op de beeck3d ago
@daringfireball that’s just a mafia racket, pay up or you’ll get a bad experience. I paid a fucking arm to get in he door already. #enshittification
Show threadzapw3d ago

@daringfireball The lack of ads is literally the only reason I use Apple Maps over Google Maps. This is terrible.

In the screenshot you posted, in the list view, the ads are relatively clearly marked. But on the map itself, it's *really hard* to distinguish the ads (with a faint blue outline) from the true results.

Show threadSiff3d ago
@daringfireball That sucks! Apple is going the route of Google and that’s the wrong route! There was (and still is) a difference in what they offer, but with ads in Numbers and now ads in Maps, I wonder why I should use them and not Google’s equivalents?
Show threadNicholas Modesto3d ago
@daringfireball someone needs to strap Tim Cook down, Alex DeLarge style, with the ‘1000 no’s for every yes’ video intercut with Tim’s saying, “If you want me to only do things for ROI reasons then you should get out of this stock.”
Show threadEnrico2d ago
@daringfireball I would settle for no ads in settings or wallet. Those are *really* gross. Ads in maps are classy in comparison.