Android Auto comprehensively introduces Google Maps accident reporting

After years of calling for the addition of this feature and over two months after its announcement, Google Maps is finally rolling out support for incident reporting on Android Auto.

Incident reporting was first introduced on Google Maps several years ago, but for a long time the feature was limited to mobile devices only, at the expense of the feature's usefulness. That finally started to change when Google added the feature to Apple's CarPlay in July of this year. Shortly after, the feature was announced for Android Auto in India and then for all users. However, despite the rollout being announced in July, it was still not in use at the end of September.

However, Google finally seems to have flipped the switch.

Over the last 48 hours, we've seen numerous reports, including on Reddit, that incident reporting is now available for Android Auto users through the Google Maps app. We also observed it live during our tests.

As we reported earlier this month when the first users saw the feature, it is accessible via a new triangular danger button that appears below the compass. When you press it, you get reporting options for various road hazards such as accidents, traffic jams, construction zones, lane closures and speed traps.

Interestingly, we found that this icon does not appear when the Android Auto Maps dashboard layout does not provide enough vertical space (in the screenshots below, Maps is using 105 DPI over AAWireless, with 110 removing the icon).

Once the incident report is live, you will also be asked to confirm if there are any remaining road hazards on your route.

Do you see accident reports live on Google Maps in your car? Let us know in the comments if the long-awaited Android Auto update has finally arrived for you.

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