Abigail Klein Leichman
March 1, 2020

Last March, Israeli Moovit user Lior Malka joked on Facebook that she needs the public-transport app to tell her, “Cross the street, stupid. This isn’t the right side.”

Moovit felt her pain. In July, the company responded, “Hi, Lior. It took some time but your post worked — we launched a new feature in the app so that next time you won’t get confused.”

Speaking as a person with, ahem, serious directional challenges, I salute Lior for giving Moovit the brilliant idea for Way Finder. And I thank Moovit for following up.

The augmented-reality feature rolled out in February to guide us visually to stops and stations. (It only works in iOS for now because of the iPhone 11’s unique AR platform. Fortunately, I have that phone!)

I’m sure Lior and I are not alone in welcoming Way Finder. Introduced in 2011, Moovit is relied upon by more than 700 million users in 3,100 cities across 98 countries.

Probably a whole lot of us  Moovit users have found ourselves waiting for a bus on the wrong side of the street. But no more.

Way Finder places digital directions and signs on top of the camera view to make it easier to locate correct bus stops, subway entrances, and overall extra guidance. Future capabilities include pointing users toward taxi pick-up points and shared scooter locations.

The new feature was developed by a team of four employees at the company’s latest Moovithon, a 24-hour hackathon held every six months at the Tel Aviv headquarters. Approximately 20 percent of Moovithon projects ultimately become Moovit features.

“Listening to our users about their in-app and urban mobility experiences is really important to us at Moovit,” said Yovav Meydad, Moovit’s Chief of Growth and Marketing Officer.

“Getting around in an unfamiliar place can be quite frustrating and inconvenient. We are so proud that our team took what began as a very creative hackathon project to solve a user’s needs, to new heights. Way Finder makes getting to any destination a better experience, and further helps us in our mission to simplify urban mobility.”

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