I use Waze every day, and the latest Android Auto update completely changed how I drive

Gemini is pretty much everywhere in Google’s world at this point. It’s baked into Pixel phones, across Google’s apps, and has even made its way into Chrome. So whenever I opened Waze, I couldn’t help but wonder why one of Google’s most popular navigation apps was still missing out.

I use Waze pretty much every time I’m behind the wheel — it handles navigation well; it warns me about a speed camera coming up, tells me about a hazard on the road, or gives me a heads-up when traffic starts piling up ahead.

But for an app that already knows so much about the roads around me, I’ve always felt Waze could know a little more about me and how I like to drive. That’s why its latest update immediately caught my attention. It finally brings Gemini into the mix, with a bunch of new features designed to make navigation and reporting feel much more personal.

Waze is finally learning how I like to drive

The first feature I really like is personalized navigation because, after driving the same roads for long enough, I’ve definitely developed my own preferences. For starters, I hate routes with too many traffic lights. Even if Waze says I can save three or four minutes by taking one, I’d much rather drive an extra kilometer on a road that keeps moving than sit through four signals.

But traffic lights are only one example. There are intersections I avoid during office hours because I know they’ll be a mess, shortcuts I’ve taken enough times to know they aren’t really shortcuts, and roads I’d happily drive an extra five minutes to avoid altogether. At night, I’ll also usually stick to a wider, more familiar road rather than follow Waze down some unknown street because it happens to be quicker at that moment.

These are things you learn after driving around the same city for long enough, but a navigation app doesn’t always understand them. It sees one route that takes 32 minutes and another that takes 35, so naturally it wants to send me down the 32-minute one. That’s why personalized navigation makes so much sense.

Waze can look at the routes I’ve taken before, combine that with what it knows about traffic around me, and gradually understand some of these habits. If I keep avoiding the same intersection or regularly ignore one shortcut for another route, it can start factoring that into where it sends me next time.

Gemini can learn how I like to drive and keep those preferences in mind every time I get behind the wheel. That’s exactly what I want from my navigation app. And if that’s not something you want, you can always turn personalized navigation off.

I can warn drivers without lifting a finger

One of the biggest reasons I keep using Waze is its crowdsourced reporting. I’ve lost count of how many times it has warned me about something before I actually reached it — a car stopped on the side of the road, an accident slowing everything down, or something blocking a lane. Even a warning about a pothole ahead can be enough to make me slow down before I suddenly have to swerve around it.

Naturally, when I spot something myself, I want to return the favor. The problem is that it rarely happens. I’ll drive past a broken-down car and think, “I should probably report that,” but by then I’m already a few hundred meters ahead. Or I’ll spot debris in the road, but I’m concentrating on getting around it rather than figuring out where the report button is on my Android Auto screen. A minute later, I’ve completely forgotten about it.

That’s where Gemini makes things much easier for me. If I see a car stopped in the left lane, debris on the road, or an accident I’ve just passed, I can tell Waze what happened in natural language, as if I were talking to a person beside me, and keep driving.

And that’s really all I want from a feature like this. I see something, I tell Waze, and the drivers coming up behind me get a heads-up. The easier Waze makes that process, the more likely I am to actually report what I see.

I can be wonderfully vague with Waze now

The same idea also works when I’m trying to figure out where to go. There are plenty of times when I get into the car without having an exact destination in mind. Maybe I want coffee somewhere along the way, need to find a gas station before I run too low, or suddenly remember that I need to pick something up before heading home. Normally, I’d have to think of a place, search for it on Chrome, look through the options, and then start navigation.

With Gemini, I can be much less specific. I can tell Waze what I’m looking for and continue the conversation from there. So, I could ask for a coffee shop on my way home, then narrow it down by asking for something that doesn’t take me too far off my route.

That’s what makes this feature so handy for me. When I’m driving, I don’t necessarily want to know the place’s name before I search for it. Sometimes I just know what I need, and I’d much rather tell Waze that than tap through a bunch of search results.

Not every Gemini trick is meant for me

Those are the Gemini features I’ll probably use most, but a couple of others caught my attention too, even though they aren’t necessarily made for the way I use Waze. The new “less chatty” mode is a good example. I’m actually on the other end of the spectrum because I keep Waze’s voice prompts completely turned off. When I’m driving, I usually have music or a podcast playing, and I don’t particularly enjoy having it interrupted every few minutes with directions I can already see on my Android Auto screen.

But I know plenty of people still rely on voice directions, and completely turning them off isn’t ideal either. Less chatty mode feels like a nice middle ground. Waze speaks less often and keeps things shorter, but it’ll still tell you about the important stuff, like an upcoming turn, a lane change, or a hazard ahead. Basically, you still get the directions you need without Waze constantly talking over whatever you’re listening to.

Then there’s Motorcycle mode, which obviously isn’t something I’ll use since I don’t ride a motorcycle, but I can see why it matters. Getting around on two wheels can be very different from doing the same journey in a car, and the route Waze gives isn’t necessarily the route that makes the most sense for a rider.

With Motorcycle mode, Waze can account for two-wheeler shortcuts and restrictions when planning a route, and warn riders about potholes, speed bumps, and narrow bridges along the way. And if you regularly ride a motorcycle, knowing about those things probably matters more than Waze shaving another two minutes off your journey.

Gemini gave me another reason to stick with Waze

Waze was already my go-to navigation app long before Gemini showed up. I liked it because it told me what was happening on the road and helped me get where I needed to go without overcomplicating things. Gemini doesn’t change any of that. Instead, it makes Waze feel a little more like it understands how I actually drive.

And that’s probably what I like most about this update. I don’t need my navigation app to do a hundred new things. I just want it to learn the routes I prefer, let me report something without taking my attention off the road, and understand what I mean when I ask for something somewhere along the way. If Gemini can make those moments easier, that’s more than enough to keep Waze on my Android Auto dashboard.