MapQuest App Reaches No. 1 Navigation Ranking After Keeping Lake Ontario Name

MapQuest has seen a major increase in app downloads after the company decided to keep the name Lake Ontario on its maps rather than adopt the Lake America name change directed by the U.S. government.

The online mapping company announced its decision through its official channels and said the move led to a surge in user interest. The MapQuest app reached the No. 1 position in the Navigation category on the U.S. Apple App Store and climbed into the top rankings across overall app categories.

MapQuest App Downloads Surge After Lake Ontario Naming Decision

MapQuest said it received hundreds of thousands of new downloads after choosing to continue displaying Lake Ontario on its maps. The company said app usage increased to around 50 times its normal levels following the announcement.

Mobile market intelligence firm Sensor Tower reported that MapQuest recorded 184,000 global downloads and 162,000 U.S. downloads during the week beginning Aug. 24. The figures represented more than a 10-fold increase compared with the previous week, while U.S. daily downloads increased 128% between Aug. 26 and Aug. 30.

Doug Berger, general manager of MapQuest, said the company followed the same approach it used during the Gulf of Mexico naming controversy by keeping names familiar to users.

“Hundreds of thousands of people signaled to us this weekend that we got it right by downloading our app.”

The company also shared the announcement on its official MapQuest X account, highlighting its decision to maintain the Lake Ontario name on its platform.

Government Geographic Name Change Creates Map Differences

The name change follows a White House executive action directing updates to the U.S. geographic naming system. The official U.S. database for geographic names is maintained through the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS).

Google Maps said it would update its U.S. maps based on official government geographic sources. The company explained that users in the United States would see the updated name. In contrast, users in Canada would continue to see Lake Ontario, and users outside both countries would see both names.

Google Maps previously made a similar update after the Gulf of Mexico was renamed Gulf of America in U.S. government records. Apple Maps has not announced a similar change for Lake Ontario.

MapQuest Adds Interactive Tool Following User Response

Alongside the naming decision, MapQuest launched an online tool that allows users to create alternative names for Lake Ontario and share the results on social media. The company introduced a similar feature after the Gulf of Mexico naming change.

The tool is available through MapQuest’s Lake Ontario naming page, where users can create customised versions of the lake’s name.

According to MapQuest’s announcement, the company’s recent growth follows decades of activity in online mapping. The service was founded more than 30 years ago and has changed ownership several times.

AOL acquired MapQuest after it became a public company, later became part of Verizon following Verizon’s acquisition of AOL, and was sold in 2019 to the internet advertising company System1.

Sensor Tower estimated that MapQuest’s app has been downloaded 687,000 times worldwide so far this year, up 29% year over year. Since 2012, the app has recorded 24.4 million downloads, with 97% of installs coming from users in the United States.