Apple appears to be expanding on the native Apple Maps review functionality that it first introduced in iOS 14, allowing Apple Maps users in the United States the option to review places of interest, restaurants, and other locations.
In the Apple Maps app in iOS 14 and iOS 15, U.S. users can now see an option to provide a thumbs up or thumbs down for most locations. Tapping on the thumbs up/down icon brings up a secondary interface for providing thumbs up and thumbs down ratings for various categories like products, customer service, food, atmosphere, and more, based on the location being reviewed.
Users also have the option to upload photos of the location to the Apple Maps app to be added to the maps listing.
At the current time, the Apple Maps native rating system is displayed alongside the Yelp ratings that are provided for various locations. Apple may eventually be planning to replace Yelp and TripAdvisor integrations, but will need to build up a database of ratings before that will be possible.
There are no options for written reviews at this time, however, so it is not clear if Apple plans to entirely replace Yelp.
Native rating options in the Apple Maps app appear to be new for users in the United States, but Apple has been testing the feature in other countries like the UK and Australia for some time now. Ratings may also be available in additional countries based on the Ratings and Photos Terms legal site for Maps that was shared on Reddit.
Friday October 31, 2025 1:40 pm PDT by Joe Rossignol
The upcoming iOS 26.1 update includes a small but helpful change for iPhones, and it could prevent you from running late to something important.
Specifically, when an alarm goes off in the Clock app, there is a new "slide to stop" control on the screen for turning off the alarm. On previous iOS 26 versions, there is simply a large "stop" button, which could be accidentally tapped.
The new ...
Wednesday October 29, 2025 4:22 am PDT by Tim Hardwick
Apple is about to drop iOS 26.1, the first major point release since iOS 26 was rolled out in September, and there are at least six notable changes and improvements to look forward to. We've rounded them up below.
Apple has already provided developers and public beta testers with the release candidate version of iOS 26.1, which means Apple will likely roll out the update to all compatible...
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Apple has just given a strong indication that it will not be releasing any additional new Macs for the remainder of the year.
Apple's CFO Kevan Parekh dropped the hint during the company's earnings call on Thursday:On Mac, keep in mind, we expect to face a very difficult compare against the M4 MacBook Pro, Mac mini, and iMac launches in the year-ago quarter.Parekh essentially gave a heads up ...
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The upcoming iOS 26.1 update includes a handful of new features and changes for iPhones, including a toggle for changing the appearance of the Liquid Glass design, "slide to stop" for alarms in the Clock app, and more.
Below, we outline key details about iOS 26.1.
Release Date
Given that Apple has yet to seed an iOS 26.1 Release Candidate, which is typically the final beta version, the...
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Apple's iPhone development roadmap runs several years into the future and the company is continually working with suppliers on several successive iPhone models at the same time, which is why we often get rumored features months ahead of launch. The iPhone 18 series is no different, and we already have a good idea of what to expect for the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max.
One thing worth...
Monday October 27, 2025 4:51 pm PDT by Juli Clover
Apple is designing an updated version of the Apple TV 4K, and rumors suggest that it could come out sometime in the next couple of months. We're not expecting a major overhaul with design changes, but even a simple chip upgrade will bring major improvements to Apple's set-top box.
Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos.
We've rounded up all the latest Apple TV rumors.
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Apple's iPhone 18 Pro models could be available in new rich and warm color option, according to a known leaker.
The Weibo user known as "Instant Digital" today suggested that next-year's iPhone 18 Pro models will be available in at least one of the following color options: Coffee, purple, and burgundy.
The iPhone XR, iPhone 11, iPhone 12, iPhone 14, and iPhone 14 Pro were all available in ...
Wednesday October 29, 2025 7:13 am PDT by Tim Hardwick
Rumors are stoking excitement for the next-generation iPad mini that Apple is reportedly close to launching. So what should we expect from the successor to the iPad mini 7 that Apple released over a year ago? Read on to find out.
Processor and Performance
Apple is working on a next-generation version of the iPad mini (codename J510/J511) that features the A19 Pro chip, according to...
Apple launched the Apple TV HD, the Siri Remote, tvOS, and their accompanying App Store a decade ago today, marking a major overhaul of the device.
The new vision for the Apple TV was unveiled on September 9, 2015 during Apple's "Hey Siri" event in San Francisco, where CEO Tim Cook introduced the device with the statement, "The future of TV is apps." The announcement represented a major...
The worst is when you want to look at more than 3 pictures from the restaurant and it takes you to the App Store to redownload Yelp. This will be a welcome addition, I just wish they allowed text to be inputted so we can fully replace Yelp!
Finally, I hate having to open the Yelp app just to read a review or see some pictures. Sometimes deciding between two restaurants or which landmark to visit in a short trip is based on reviews, I think this feature is great.
This is stupid, why build what they can just buy? They should just have bought Yelp. With all the weird and confusing acquisitions all these companies do throughout the years, seems the more obvious ones escape them.
On the flip side, why buy something you can build and source yourself?
This is stupid, why build what they can just buy? They should just have bought Yelp. With all the weird and confusing acquisitions all these companies do throughout the years, seems the more obvious ones escape them.
Yelp reviews aren’t entirely reliable because people go to review sites/apps for two primary reasons:
A. They’re looking for reviews B. They had a bad experience and want to complain
The third and just as important reason isn’t compelling enough to visit a site/app and spend time reviewing: they liked the place.
Ditching the star system is the first good move. A simple thumbs up or down, is going to yield a more universal standard. Written reviews almost always skew negative. People generally write good reviews if the place was off the charts amazing or if they were given an incentive (monetary, promotional, discounts).
Finally, reviews are only as reliable as the most recent ones. Good reviews from years ago may not mean much if the place hasn’t renovated in a long while, the rotating staff of waiters are currently lazy/rude and the star chef hasn’t worked there in a while. Similarly, bad reviews might’ve compelled a business to improve or the place was so bad that it has shut down. So a back catalogue of reviews isn’t all that valuable. Yelp doesn’t have much of an edge due to its ”head start”.
All of this comes together as poor data quality and so Apple doesn’t need Yelp to gradually assemble a more accurate sense of reviews. With its established user base of hundreds of millions, and with the ratings built in natively, Apple can get recent reviews rather quickly. Ultimately, being natively integrated, that picture you took of a steak dinner can be recognized as food by Photos’ machine learning and correlated to the GPS coordinates of a restaurant you went to. A simple prompt by Siri “Did you like it?” with a thumbs up/down, can help Apple fill in those reviews over a short period of time.
UPDATE: This just showed up for me in Canada. I’m a Canadian user with a Canadian Apple ID on iOS 15 Beta 6 Looks like we’re getting a wider rollout.
Yeah I hate seeing Yelp reviews in Maps. I hope this means that Yelp is going away sooner rather than later.
Yelp does nothing but ruin honest businesses with their predatory practices. I am hoping the Apple solution will be little more tolerable for small business owners.
