Is there a usable online map site for China?
Tonight is my fifth night in China, I've only been in non-tourist places so far where I've seen no other westerners. I'm hitchhiking from the very south to the very north so it's fairly important to have a decent online map. I don't have a smartphone or tablet, just a netbook running Windows.
Google Maps suffers from "My Location" always being wrong by about a couple of hundred metres. I believe this is related to China giving false GPS coordinates to foreign companies, or something like that. Also some of the newer expressways and tollways built in the last three years seem to be missing. Notably the one from the Lao border crossing at Mohan to Mengla in Yunnan.
OpenStreetMap had barely a sketch for the last two cities I stayed in, Mengla and Ning'er.
Bing Maps is a pathetic joke here and other places I've travelled to.
Baidu Maps doesn't have an English option, doesn't seem to have a Current Location feature, and didn't even seem to have Mengla mapped!
I'm actually at the green arrow but Google thinks I'm at the blue dot. This has been the case everywhere in China I've tried so far.
I'm happy with a western or Chinese site, but it needs to have an English Language option.
I need a "My Location" feature because when hitchhiking and not very good at Chinese characters you often don't know your exact street or even city. I don't know what city I'm in right now!
And I need directions. Google Maps is very good for directions so I'm still using it despite the problem finding where I am and some new major roads missing.
(I'm happy to migrate this question to webapps.SE if it's not successful here, but here seems to make sense to start with.)
References
Best Answer
My New Answer
I'm back in China for the third time and I discovered a new map site.
I find it fast, smooth, VPN-free, and very good at finding hostels compared to the other maps that I could get working this time. It does seem to only be in Chinese though.
My Old Answer
I don't think these work anymore, certainly not without VPN.
Almost. There exist a pair of undocumented / unpublicized versions of Google Maps.
ditu.google.comis an English-language version of Google Maps which has correctly aligned aerial imagery and road networks. But "My Location" is still incorrectly aligned.ditu.google.cnis a Chinese-language version of the same, but with some differences.
"dìtú" means "map" in Chinese (?? / ??) .
In fact both sites have differences to regular Google Maps sites. Some of these differences are detailed in the Wikipedia article on Google Maps.
Various posts on forums and blogs speculate Google had to comply with various Chinese laws or regulations to be allowed to use the correct data. I speculate that their not being totally happy about complying to such rules might be why Google doesn't seem to say anything about these sites.
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What do Chinese use instead of Google Maps?
Baidu Maps: Best China Maps Alternative The most reliable and best Google Maps alternative in China is Baidu Maps. This is the app that most Chinese people use. Baidu Maps Advantages: Baidu Maps is the most up-to-date maps app for China. It's also free!What map app can I use in China?
Baidu Maps and Gaode Maps are two popular local map apps in China. While they are good, they only have Chinese versions. If you don't feel overwhelmed by the amount of Chinese characters, however, you can use them during your travels in China.Does China allow Google Maps?
Like all popular Google services, Google Maps too is banned in China. The map developed by Baidu search engine is widely considered the most popularly-used map in China.Is Google Earth Accessible China?
The simple answer is no. Google and Google Maps do not work in China. Google, and all its affiliate pages and apps, is blocked in China, which means that when you're in China and using regular WiFi or data, you cannot access any data from Google, including Google Maps.4 Ways To Access Sites in China If You’re Already There in 2022 🎯
More answers regarding is there a usable online map site for China?
Answer 2
If you have Google Chrome, it recognizes different languages, and prompts you to translate them. So these would be good:
Sogou Map - covers Mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan.
Baidu Map - covers Mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau.
Mapbar - covers Mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau and a general map of Taiwan short of details.
MapABC - covers Mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau and a general map of Taiwan short of details.
51ditu - covers Mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau.
U2MAP - covers Mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau and a general map of Taiwan short of details.
City8 - the world's first project introducing street view service earlier than Google Street View, covering 41 cities of Mainland China, as of October 2009.
EDUSHI - provides 2.5D virtual images for 48 cities of Mainland China and Hong Kong, as of October 2009.
DUSHIQUAN - provides 2.5D virtual images for 26 cities of Mainland China, as of October 2009.
Map Taiwan - mainly for Taiwan
Hope this helped
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