Navigon finds itself atop TUAW Best of 2011 voting results

Tactical NAV is pretty cool if you're into the military-style navigation apps. I think the price just dropped to $3.99 as well.

www.tacticalnav.com

I like Navigon NAVFree USA for the occasional GPS needs I have. They recently reduced the app size by having users download the maps of states they need.

Navigon used to be great, the latest release is a total disaster, however. I run this app on my iPhone 3GS which, since the last updated, runs at about 0.5 fps and lags like a b*tch, therefore making it entirely unusable. I own both the European and North American apps, neither of which I can now use.

While I do find Navigon a very good navigation solution for the iPhone, a few things means I wont be using it again.

It would very frequently guide me up the off-ramp only to guide me down the on-ramp again while driving on the highway. Came to a point where I would always have to zoom out when it starting giving directions on the highway, just to ignore it if I could see myself coming down again on the other side.

It handles quick successive directions poorly. The overlay illustrating the next action is awesome, but it both disappears too slowly, and doesn't contain information on the follow-up action. Leaving me to almost always miss the 2nd direction, or perform hazardous maneuvers.

It has been a few months since I last used it, so can only hope those things no longer applies, or only affects a very small number of users. I have replaced it with the built-in BMW Professional navigation of my car .. which, despite being quite a bit older, does things a heck of a lot better (imho) ;-)

I'd be curious to know how many of those voting for Navigon are new vs existing customers. I'll not argue that Navigon has the best feature set but their repricing and unbundling of their map updates make the product tantamount to robbery for existing customers. Pay $89 for an app that promises free updates for life, only to be charged for them later makes TomTom the more attractive solution for me.