Yandex.Maps is a Russian web mapping service developed by Yandex. The service provides detailed maps of the whole world. It includes a search, information about traffic jams, routing and street panoramas. The service was launched in 2004. Yandex.Maps is the most popular cartographic service in Russia. It has about 11.5 million users in Russia per month, and over 20 million worldwide.
Features
The service initially had maps only of Russia and Ukraine, but now includes world maps. Maps are available in four versions: maps, satellite images, satellite images with captions, and legend. Users can measure distance and get directions by dragging between spots on a map. The search is available by both geographical objects and by organizations. The illumination of the district, city or region is available after searching the organization on the site. Yandex.Maps has a mobile application for iOS, Android and Windows phones.
On Yandex.Maps it is possible to view street panoramas. There are street view even of Pripyat and Chernobyl. In 2016 a "street view" of Everest was photographed.
Map editor
Users can make new data on the map with the help of the Yandex.Map editor. In geographies where it is hard to find providers of good map data, user contributions could be used to increase map quality. Any registered Yandex user can edit the map through a simple web editor pending edit moderation. In the editor there are five special modes for drawing objects:
Scaling and rotation - to rotate objects around their axis and reduce / increase the size.
Angle alignment - makes it easy to draw objects with most corners straight.
Rounding corners - simplifies the drawing of roads and rivers, rounding their corners.
Adhesion - the boundaries of the contours of objects of the same category are joined in one line.
Cutting - helps draw buildings with adjacent borders, as well as high-rise buildings
The editing interface also allows for additional data to be added to certain categories of objects, such as the height of buildings, the direction of traffic at the roads, hours of operation, phone numbers etc.
Yandex.Traffic
Yandex.Traffic is a feature on Yandex.Maps that displays traffic conditions in real time on major roads and highways. It can be viewed at the Yandex.Maps website, or via the app. Yandex.Traffic works by analyzing the GPS-determined locations transmitted to Yandex by a large number of mobile phone users. By calculating the speed of users along a length of road, Yandex is able to generate a live traffic map. It processes the incoming raw data about mobile phone device locations, and then excludes anomalies such as a postal vehicle that makes frequent stops. When a threshold of users in a particular area is noted, the overlay along roads and highways on the map changes color.
Criticism
A satellite mode of Yandex.Maps is not as detailed as Google Maps.
It has detailed maps only of Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Turkey and Kazakhstan.
Street view is available only for cities of Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Armenia and Turkey.
