With 49 million daily users, Waze has been the topic of some acquisition rumor drama over the past couple of weeks. Rumors that Facebook was in serious talks to buy the Israel-based navigation company have swirled since early May – but recent reports indicate that those have fallen apart. It appears that Google and a few other unspecified companies are also in the mix, however.
Acquisition rumors aside, Waze is still working on making their app better. Today, they’ve released v3.7 which brings a bunch of new features including Facebook event integration and more.
Now, if you have Facebook connected to Waze, your Facebook events will automatically appear in your Waze navigation lists in the hours before the event is supposed to begin. That way, you can just tap the event when you’re ready to go and get to navigating – no hassle.
“Our vision is to create a completely seamless experience when meeting colleagues, family or friends,” said Yael Elish, VP of Product & Marketing, Waze. “Waze frees you from the hassle of dealing with addresses or coordinating meeting places. One-tap navigation to Facebook Events is only the start…drivers will enjoy much more in upcoming versions soon.”
Waze also added a feature that will show you when your friends are on the way to the same destination that you are. They’ll appear on a new bar on the right-hand side of the map, one which will show you who’s going to get there first.
Here’s Waze’s full list of updates to 3.7:
- Real time and offline “beep beeps” at friends.
- Exclusive moods for map editors – T. Rex, robot and 8-bit.
- Redesigned, sleeker pop-up alerts.
- Inbox has moved to the main menu.
- New 3-state mute button in the main menu (mute, alerts only & on).
- Foursquare check in available from report menu.
- Lock up north added to settings.
- Support for JVC App Link Mode” for compatible in-dash car audio receivers.
- Multiple fixes and optimization and more!
