Apple Wants To Make Money From Maps

Apple is again looking at ways to make money from Apple Maps.

Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reports that Apple is once again exploring including search ads in Maps.

Under the proposal, businesses would pay to be prioritised in Maps search results; certain locations could be shown more prominently on the map.

Gurman writes that this isn’t the first time that Apple has looked at a monetisation proposal.

A proposal around search ads “work similarly to Google Maps where a business could pay Apple to have their restaurant or venue appear higher in search results,” says Gurman.

Apple Maps

Apple is giving this notion more thought, says Gurman. In a recent all-hands meeting for the Maps group, Apple said monetizing the app is a lever it is exploring.

“While there is no timeline or active engineering work being done, the company has again floated the idea of charging for prioritization in search results.

“This is already a fairly large business for Google.”

In his newsletter Gurman also released a schedule of upcoming Apple releases.

M4 MacBook Air

The M4 powered MacBook Air was already shipping out of factories, which suggests it would be ready for sale by March. The Mac Studio and Mac Pro would follow.

“And once those are released, the M5 chip transition will begin — alongside new MacBook Pro models in the fall (Australian spring).

“Then we should get an M5 iPad Pro by the first half of 2026,” says Gurman.

He says Apple’s M5 processor would be released to Macs before coming to the iPad Pro.

This was the reverse order to the M4 chip release. The M4 chip came to the iPad Pro before the Mac.