As the question says, I’m looking for the best free app please for regular and reliable traffic updates in the UK. Android phone.

Any suggestions please ?

Highways agency or RAC

Or use Waze sat-nav app.

Google Maps traffic layer is quite good, as your other post is what sat nav, Tom Tom with Live traffic (takes a little bit to get the data but was fairly accurate for dealing with Manc rush hour.

I have tried some of the apps but found them a bit hit and miss in terms of accuracy and up-to-date-ness

Now I mostly use the traffic England website which has a nice simple motorway view (so you’re not waiting for a map to load) with loads of traffic cameras. You can setup saved views and bookmark them.

Have also been using the Google maps live traffic info which seems very good too. I think it updates from people’s GPS which is both cool and quite spooky!

Tried RAC app but was way out of date. Google maps appears to be best

Doesn’t google maps consume more data though? I’ve recently been looking at sat nav apps and compared and seemed to think that using google maps as a sat nav uses alot of data relative to the proper sat nav apps?

Probably not alot of data in the grand scheme of things, but it is difficult to get proper information on these things.

Google maps amazes me how accurate it is sometimes. When its stop/start on the m’way for isntance, the red/yellow bits do actually seem to match whats actually happening on the road. I demonstrated this to an older chap at work, while out one day & he was amazed. And its free…!!!

Doesn’t google maps consume more data though? I’ve recently been looking at sat nav apps and compared and seemed to think that using google maps as a sat nav uses alot of data relative to the proper sat nav apps?

Probably not alot of data in the grand scheme of things, but it is difficult to get proper information on these things.
It’s very easy just look at the app data usage

Also never got close to my data allowance unless I leave drop box sync on while tethered.

Does Google maps use data from peoples phones when they are using the mapping? It seems to be able to give traffic info for minor roads, if there is a problem on a trunk route and people divert onto minor ‘c’ roads you often get traffic info.

There is some “tracking” or feedback which is how they ironed out the mapping data bugs. The data seems to be for roads with traffic master stuff on it. The problem I had with the TomTom go was if it was really bad it would just make a route up that avoided the traffic cameras & sensors – easy to spot though it would be 50% faster and wiggle like hell through the city centre