In line with our Revised Waze Editing Philosophy, our mapping standards have changed in 2020. For more information, see new technology, new mapping standards.
Introduction
A turn instruction is the combination of text, images, and spoken words that Waze provides to the Wazer, enabling the Wazer to follow Waze's route guidance, ideally with minimal thought and without confusion.
More specifically, it informs the driver a distance or time, to turn, keep, exit, continue, u-turn and in what direction to do so. It displays visual instructions by showing what the turn angle resembles, shields used by the roads, and guidance on what lanes to use. A text-to-speech (TTS) engine also verbalises the instructions in a succinct and helpful manner.
Except for the time and distance, all other components can be customised by the editor to assist drivers and are explained in this page below.
Terminology
This picture illustrates the names of key points of an intersection referred to within the documentation.
This page also makes reference to Big Green Signs (BGS). This reference is inclusive of traffic signs of other colours performing the same task.
Before editing turn instructions
Bringing the road and intersection "up to standard" before adding turn guidance will avoid double handling by yourself or another editor in the future, while simultaneously adding value to the app user. Before getting started:
- Check the road is named correctly and has a city. All roads, including ramps need to include a city.
- The ramp naming standards which changed several years ago, make sure any you’re working on are up to date.
- Align roads to the centre of the road. Where an extra lane is added for a turn or exit, align the road as if it wasn't there.
- Remove any micro-doglegs
- Ramps start and end close to the gore point, just past the point the driver can legally merge
- Add missing lane guidance and road width
- Check the angles of the intersection will give the expected voice prompt, and if it does not, be aware you will need to override it in the turn guidance.
Default behaviour
A turn instruction is generated automatically as follows:
- Voice prompt: The angle the inbound and outbound segments intersect with each other determines if a keep, turn, exit, and left or right is used. This setting was previously known as Turn Instruction Override (TIO) but was renamed in 2021 to align with a new turn instruction interface.
- Visual instruction: Based on the voice prompt determined above, a symbol corresponding with the turn angle is displayed.
- Shield: Where the outbound segment has a shield applied and shield number in the primary name, the shield will automatically be displayed.
- TTS: Based on the above collected information, a text-to-speech phrase is played to the driver if the setting is enabled. For example, “in 100 metres, turn left onto ‘A’ 22 Hume Highway”.
Consider the following example:
Lanes
When lane guidance is added to turn instructions, the text-to-speech (TTS) automatically includes the instructions. For example, "In 200 metres, use the left lane to exit left onto A 31 Hume Highway."
See the lane and far lane guidance page for specific advice.
Road width
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Road width is currently in beta and we are awaiting advice on how to proceed with it before releasing it to the wiki. |
Road shields
Shields displayed used in turn guidance must be applied to a street first. See road shields for more advice.
Turn guidance
General principles
Australia has a simplified implementation of turn guidance from that of other countries, see problems implementing turn guidance in Australia in the Discussion page for specifics. Further, it is not possible to exactly match turn instructions with big green signs. Instead, turn guidance is "inspired" by the information detailed on big green signs to improve the user experience.
You may find the community developed script, Road Shield Assistant (RSA) of assistance while mapping turn guidance.
Both distance and time are non-editable components of a turn instruction. For the respective pages for details on voice prompts (previously known as turn instruction override / TIO), lane guidance , and road width.
Permissions
As per country specific permissions, this feature is currently locked to level 3 and above only. However, permission is also limited to the lock level of the segment and in most cases the outgoing segment(s) lock level, similar to editing lane guidance. All editors can view the settings however.
When should turn guidance be configured?
Add custom turn guidance when signage for a particular turn includes more than just the primary street name. In particular, custom turn instructions should be added where:
- directional signage shows something other than the primary name (or shield) of the outbound segment, such is found on most exit/on ramps and wayfinders;
- there is a numbered exit;
- a shield is desired but won't be automatically displayed (as per the default behaviour discussed above).
How to access turn guidance in WME
The turn guidance interface can be accessed by selecting the inbound segment, hovering over the turn arrow and clicking Add/Edit Instructions:
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START: This section is currently under review. |
Where there is a junction box, turn guidance must be applied to the junction box exit rather than the segment turns, else they will be ignored by Waze. Select the junction box exit first, hover over the turn arrow and click Edit instructions:
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END: This section is currently under review. |
Guidance on turn instructions
Visual instructions
Contains the road shield and primary name of the road in the outbound segment, unless the outbound segment is a ramp, then the primary name of the road the ramp leads to is used. Where that primary name (“A3 - King Georges Rd”) contains a route prefix (“A3 - “), omit it and only use the road name. Where there is a shield, it should be displayed before the road name.
For example, the inbound segment is called “M5 - East Mwy”, connects to a ramp named “to A3 - King Georges Rd to Hurstville / Sydney Olympic Park”, which ends up connecting to “A3 - King Georges Rd”. The steps to add the visual instruction would be:
- Remove any default free text instructions present
- Road Shield box containing the matching shield and text “A3”
- Leave the direction field blank (not used in Australia)
- Free text box containing “King Georges Rd”.
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If you are trying to select a shield and it is not in the dropdown, zoom out and pan until you have a segment with the shield on screen. Now, try again by removing the Road shield box and add it again. |
Toward
Contains useful and relevant destinations to reassure the driver. This may include cities, locations (e.g. airport), other routes (e.g. M31 shield) or roads (e.g. EastLink). Destinations should be collected and added from the last big green sign before or at the gore point of the intersection.
Road shields are listed first and with priority over other destinations. Where there are more destinations than will fit within the towards field, include the most relevant, which is usually the closest destinations.
Technically, all destinations are “to” and this standard chooses to ignore it. Where a sign indicates “to <destination>”, the “to” should be ignored, and destinations listed in the toward field.
Multiple destinations are to be separated by a forward slash character /.
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If you are trying to select a shield and it is not in the dropdown, zoom out and pan until you have a segment with the shield on screen. Now, try again by removing the Road shield box and add it again. |
Exit shield
The exit signs component is used to insert an exit number in a dedicated, fixed place. In the app, the "exit sign" is displayed in the top right corner of the turn instruction panel. Do not include the word “Exit”. Where the character limit prevents adding the full exit sign (e.g. “1 North”), directions can be abbreviated (e.g. “1N”). If the character limit is still exceeded, flag it with a map comment and refer it to your State Manager.
Where a BGS indicates a turn connects with a toll road, a yellow exit sign with the word "Toll" should be used. Please ensure you use the correct case i.e. not "toll" or "TOLL", but instead use "Toll".
Text-to-speech (TTS)
Allows the override of the street name component of the instruction. Authorised abbreviations also work here.
Do not use this field to change pronunciations. Submit a TTS change request through the WME interface, ask in the #tts channel on Discord or contact a Local Champ to request a change of the TTS pronunciation for the whole country.
Small adjustments can be made to Waze talk conversationally. For example, add “the” before the name of a destination that is normally preceded by “the” (e.g. “Marsh St to the Airport”).
At potentially busy and complex destinations where the driver needs extra reassurance, such as at the airport or stadiums, TTS may be adjusted to direct the driver to hyper-local destinations (e.g. “Arrivals for terminal 2 and 3”).
Click the microphone symbol to listen to how the TTS text entered will sound in the app.
Emojis
In Australia, the following emojis are permitted for use in turn guidance. Their purpose is to provide an internationally recognisable symbol and save space in the instruction fields.
| Emoji / Symbol | Intended Use |
|---|---|
| ✈️ | Represents an airport or aerodrome. However, this symbol should never be used to represent military installations. |
| 🅿️ | Represents vehicle parking of all types. |
The emojis can be copied and pasted from the above table, or go to the website linked and use the convenient copy and paste function there.
Rules for use of emojis
- These emojis must never be used in a primary or alternative street name. They are only permitted for use in the "visual instruction" and "toward" fields of turn guidance.
- The emojis are to be used on their own and not in conjunction with other words. For example, never use “Brisbane ✈️”. Instead, it should simply just appear as “✈️”, separated by a separating forward slash character / if necessary.
- See above Toward section, in the discussion of what to include in the toward field. If the inclusion of an airport or aerodrome in the list is not warranted, it is okay not to use the emoji. These emojis are not essential for inclusion in every case, only if they are relevant.
- Emojis must always be the last item to appear in the fields; so they always appear on the right of any instruction.
Turn guidance with junction boxes
Turn guidance can also be applied to junction boxes. Care should be taken to avoid blindly deleting a junction box without checking and noting the applied turn guidance. You may end up having to answer to a grumpy peer why you deleted their work!
There will be times when there are too many signs, too much information, the road is major, and the infrastructure is complex. In these rare circumstances, a large junction box can be applied and turn guidance applied to the junction box exit instead. This has the advantage of displaying only the relevant turn guidance for the route through the complex intersection instead of all possible information. Due to the restrictive nature of junction boxes, this is not recommended as common place practice.
Such complex junction boxes should be marked with a map comment bringing it to the attention of other editors, and may be locked to a higher level to avoid accidental deletion.
Below are two examples:
Known limitations
- It is not currently possible to map two shields to the one street ID
- There is not enough space on the screen to display all the info from BGS and so we don’t try to.
- Not all the shields we requested have been implemented yet
- Changes to settings like character limits we requested have not been implemented yet
- Inheritance of turn guidance might occur in the future. We do not know. Any possible future implementation may impact in unforeseen ways.