Google is putting Gemini into Waze, giving the driving app a pair of voice-driven features meant to reduce the amount of screen tapping required while a driver is already doing the one job that matters: driving.
Waze says it has four updates coming to the app. Two of them use Gemini, Google’s flagship AI assistant. The first expands Waze’s conversational reporting feature, which was introduced in 2024. Drivers will be able to report traffic problems by speaking in more natural language, rather than hunting through menus. Waze says those reports can cover incidents on the road and suggested map corrections, including road closures or an outdated house number.
The second Gemini feature is Destination Search. Waze says drivers will be able to ask for places using conversational voice requests, such as looking for a coffee shop that is open at the moment or a nearby gas station with low prices. In practice, that means Gemini is being used as the language layer between a messy spoken request and Waze’s search and routing tools.
Less talking, more routing
The other two additions are not described by Waze as Gemini features. One is a setting for less verbose voice guidance. Waze says users will be able to make prompts “less chatty,” which should mean fewer interruptions to music or podcasts while navigation is running. Anyone who has had a map app narrate every bend in a familiar road can probably see the product requirement without a focus group.
Waze is also adding a Motorcycle Mode. According to Waze, that mode will account for shortcuts available to two-wheeled vehicles and provide more accurate estimated arrival times for motorcycle routing. The company describes the goal as better route selection for riders, rather than treating every vehicle like a car with different vibes.
A separate routing change will rank options using a driver’s previous trips along with Waze’s own data about local traffic patterns. Waze says that if a user tends to prefer highways instead of local streets, the app will put those kinds of routes higher in the list.
Waze gets AI, but not the full Google Maps treatment
Google has been adding AI features more aggressively to Google Maps than to Waze, according to The Verge. This Waze update is narrower: Gemini is being used for voice-based reporting and search, while the rest of the changes are conventional navigation controls and routing tweaks.
That restraint matters. Waze’s value has long been fast, crowd-sourced road information and route calculation, not a chatbot riding shotgun. Based on what Waze has described, Gemini is being asked to listen better and turn speech into app actions, which is a more useful job for in-car AI than pretending the map needs a personality.
This story draws on original reporting from The Verge.