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Flyover (Apple Maps)
3D Apple Maps feature From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Flyover is a feature on Apple Maps that allows users to view select areas in a 3D setting. Flyover also allows users to take "tours" of these locations through the City Tours feature, showcasing various landmarks in the area. Imagery is provided through the use of planes, which collect fine data on buildings. Flyover is available on all Apple devices which also support Maps, including iOS and macOS.
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Initially founded in 2012, along with Apple Maps itself, Flyover has expanded from its initial 10 locations in the US and Europe to now include over 300 cities, landmarks, and parks across all six inhabited continents through a series of multiple expansions, notably in 2014, 2019 and 2024. Upon release, Flyover was criticized for various visual issues, as part of a larger criticism of the overall release of Apple Maps, however, Flyover has also been praised for its detail and uniqueness.[3]
Similarly to Google Earth, the implementation of Flyover has been prevented in certain areas primarily due to security concerns over the collection of data in sensitive locations, notably in Norway in 2012.
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History
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Pre-2012
In anticipation of the creation of a 3D mapping service that would eventually become Maps, Apple acquired Poly9, a Canadian 3D mapping company, in mid-2010, two years before launching Flyover.[4][5] Poly9, like Apple, was an early competitor to Google Earth, containing similar features to the company, particularly a 3D globe dubbed the "Poly Globe".[6][7] In August of the same year, Apple was also revealed to be the buyer of C3 Technologies, a Sweden-based company which also specialized in 3D imagery, which the company collected aerially.[8][9][10] In addition to Flyover, C3 also assisted with other Maps features, including traffic data and Wikipedia entries for cities and places of interest.[11] The acquisition of both companies led to speculation that Apple would create a mapping service separate from Google Maps, as well as a mapping service which could compete with Google Earth.[5][12][13]
2012–2015
Flyover was announced along with Apple Maps at the 2012 World Wide Developers Conference, and both were released in September 2012.[14] Upon release, Flyover was only available in the iPhone 4s, iPad 2 and the 3rd generation iPad.[15] The 10 initial cities that first received Flyover were Chicago, Copenhagen, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Miami, Montreal, Sacramento, San Francisco, Seattle and Sydney.[16] More cities would receive Flyover in later years, with Apple often adding multiple cities to Flyover at a time.[17][18] In addition to this initial release, more cities were added later in 2012, including Toronto in Canada.[19]
In 2013, Flyover was added to Paris, as well as to smaller cities such as Indianapolis and Baltimore, totaling 16 cities in the United States, Germany, Canada, France and the UK, alongside coverage being expanded in several existing areas.[20][21] In addition, Flyover was also added to London, Barcelona, Cologne,[22] Rome, Madrid[23] and Vancouver.[24]
Flyover was added to several cities and national parks in New Zealand, France, the United States, South Africa, Sweden and Japan, including Cape Town and two Arizona National Parks in 2014,[25] with Marseille, the second-largest city in France receiving Flyover coverage later in the year as well.[20] The capital of Japan, Tokyo, also received Flyover that year,[26] along with Wellington, New Zealand and Yosemite National Park.[27] In addition to adding new areas, the coverage of existing cities with the feature was expanded. In San Francisco, Flyover was added across the San Francisco Bay to Berkeley.[28] In mid-2014, the City Tours feature, which allows users to tour locations supported by the Flyover feature, was publicly released.[29]
Flyover was added to over 20 cities and locations in 2015 in various cities mostly across the US and Western Europe, including Canberra and Venice.[30][31][32] Flyover was also added to Budapest, in Hungary[33] and Prague in the Czech Republic later in the year.[34] In Italy, the cities of Florence and Genoa received Flyover.[35][36] Guadalajara, the largest city in Mexico to have the feature, also received Flyover.[37] Japan also saw more cities with Flyover, with Nagoya, Osaka and Hiroshima being added,[38] and Mannheim, Stuttgart and Neuschwanstein Castle in Germany also received Flyover that year.[39][35] An additional 7 cities received Flyover in June 2015, those being the cities of Karlsruhe and Kiel in Germany, Braga in Portugal, San Juan in Puerto Rico, Cadiz and Jerez de la Frontera in Spain, and Hull in the United Kingdom.[40]
2016–present
2016 saw Apple add Flyover to 20 additional locations in Australia, France, Switzerland, Germany, the US, the Netherlands, Japan, South Africa, Italy and Austria, including Adelaide in Australia and the Virgin Islands.[41][42]
January 2019 saw one of Apple's largest Flyover expansions, with the feature being added to 51 cities in France, Japan, the United States, and others, including Albuquerque, Cincinnati and Key West as well as the entirety of the nation of Monaco.[43][44]
In September 2020, Flyover was added to the city of Amsterdam, in the Netherlands.[45][46] In June 2022, Flyover was added to Vienna in Austria.[47]
Another major rollout of Flyover occurred in 2024, with dozens of cities across North America, Australia, and Europe receiving the feature, including Washington D.C.,[48] Kansas City,[49] and Brisbane,[50] as well as smaller cities, including Chattanooga, Birmingham, Alabama and St. George.[51] These updates continued into 2025, with Lisbon, Frankfurt, Le Havre, Dunkirk and several other cities receiving Flyover.[52][53] In July 2025, Flyover was added to the cities of Brasilia and Ouro Preto in Brazil, marking the first Brazilian and the first South American cities to receive Flyover.[54]
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Use
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Apple collects the 3D data used for Flyover through the use of small military-grade[55] drone-like planes equipped with cameras, which fly up close to buildings to create a more detailed map. The cameras are positioned at designated angles to capture rooftops, edges and sides of buildings, trees, and other visible objects. Flyover imagery additionally collects topographical data which also appears on the software.[36] Once collected, 3D imagery can be generated within a period of hours.[12] As of 2013, imagery used for Flyover is collected by C3 Technologies.[9]
With Flyover, certain locations – primarily big cities, landmarks and some national parks – can be viewed from a birds-eye perspective, as opposed to street level imagery provided by features such as Look Around on Apple Maps and Street View on Google Maps.[56] The images provided are three-dimensional, photo-realistic, and users can alter the vantage point on the map through panning or zooming in or out.[2][57]
Flyover imagery has been viewed as similar to that of virtual reality, and it has theorized by some to be a possible precursor to a VR feature on Maps.[3][58]
City Tours
Flyover City Tours were first released in 2014, however the feature was initially not accessible to Maps users.[29] Shortly afterward, City Tours were leaked by a developer, who created a public video showcasing the feature in Paris.[59] City Tours were officially announced by Apple at the 2014 World Wide Developers Conference, and were released with iOS 8.[60] City Tours is a feature that allows users to view various landmarks in a given city via a "flying" animation,[3] a feature only available to cities that already contain Flyover 3D maps.[61] City Tours was added as a feature to Apple Maps on iOS 8 on September 17, 2014, and in OS X Yosemite on October 16, 2014.[62]
City Tours can be accessed via a button available in the search history of Maps. Flyover imagery can be viewed manually without starting the tour.[61] Most, but not all cities with Flyover allow tours of a given city, where the above virtual tour of various landmarks in the area will be shown.[63][61]
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Coverage
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Regions with partial 3D coverage
Regions with full 3D coverage
Regions without 3D coverage
Flyovers are available in over 350[64] cities, metropolitan areas, national parks and landmarks across 30 countries and all six inhabited continents, as of 2025.[65][a] Flyover is currently available in the countries of Australia,[16] Austria,[67] the Bahamas,[43] Belgium,[68] Brazil,[54] Canada,[16] the Czech Republic,[34] Denmark,[69] Finland,[20] France,[43] Germany,[41] Hungary,[67] Ireland,[69] Italy,[43] Japan,[43] Luxembourg, Mexico,[30] Monaco,[43] the Netherlands,[46] New Zealand,[43] Norway, Portugal,[30] San Marino, South Africa,[30] Spain,[43] Sweden,[69] Switzerland,[41] the United Kingdom,[43] the United States,[16] and Vatican City.[69]
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Reception
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Upon initial release in 2012, Flyover received mixed reception among news outlets. Flyover was described positively by several news organizations, including NBC, Yahoo News and the New York Times.[70][71][72] The BBC News in the United Kingdom described Flyover as giving Apple an "edge" over Google Maps, where no 3D imagery was directly available,[73] while USA Today referred to Flyover as a "gee-whiz" feature.[74]
Visual errors
Similar to Maps itself, Flyover saw many visual issues upon release, a notable one containing a massive glitch on the Brooklyn and Anzac bridges in New York and Sydney and the Hoover Dam in Nevada, showing "plunges" on all structures.[75][72] Flyover was also criticized for its early imagery, as Apple was initially unable to properly capture smaller or lower objects or buildings, resulting in structures such as trees having a blocky or otherwise low-quality appearance.[9] Flyover additionally had glitches whilst interacting with other Maps features, including road markings, which would tend to follow the tops of 3D buildings rather than remain focused on the designated road, which particularly became an issue for bridges.[76] Google Earth, which also hosted 3D imagery on their mapping site, was noted to be experiencing similar issues with their image rendering.[77]
As a result of these issues, Flyover was initially criticized for its low quality, as well as being parodied online.[78] Flyover was described by The Atlantic, an American magazine, as "painfully slow, sort of useless", in a 2012 publication.[79] This was part of a larger series of technical issues with Apple Maps, most of which have since been fixed.[78] Shortly after its initial release, Apple began to improve upon their initial criticized imagery.[80]
Security concerns
In 2013, the Norwegian government denied a request by Apple to add Flyover to Oslo, the Norwegian capital, citing security concerns arising from the amount of detail given to buildings, information which could potentially be used to facilitate and carry out terrorist attacks.[81][82][55] Øyvind Mandt, who worked for the National Security Authority, stated that "We do not want it [Flyover] to be shot with such a high degree of precision that it could be used to identify areas that require special shielding."[82] Concern was specifically elicited regarding the capturing of government and military buildings, where outside photography is normally not permitted, alongside increased security inside and around government buildings, primarily in response to the 2011 Norway attacks.[82][83] Another spokesperson for the National Security Authority claimed that the level of detail used to collect data exceeded the amount allowed in particular areas of Oslo.[84]
The decision was met with criticism from Fabian Stang, then mayor of Oslo, who called for the Norwegian government to allow Apple to add the feature, citing the possibility of increased tourism from the addition, also stating that Apple had already been permitted to conduct aerial surveys in "all Western capitals."[82][85][86] A spokesperson for the National Security Authority of Norway stated that obtaining the needed imagery from a "Norwegian supplier" or from the Norwegian Mapping Authority could potentially assist Apple in adding the feature, as said companies are required to produce their imagery in a lower resolution.[87][88] The US embassy in Norway also stated its support for Apple in adding the feature.[86] Outside of Apple, other companies including Nokia were permitted to survey Oslo for 3D imagery.[87]
Flyover was eventually added to Oslo in late 2023, 11 years after the initial incident. Similar security concerns may have also prevented Apple from adding Flyover to other potentially sensitive areas, including Washington D.C., among others.[81]
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See also
Notes
- Note that 3D coverage is generally not limited to the cities targeted for Flyover (see below) and often covers surrounding towns and communities in the area. For example, Los Angeles has Flyover, and in addition to their coverage, all towns and places within that general area, such as San Bernardino and Riverside, also have Flyover.[66]
- Only the southern part of the city.
References
External links
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