Open Google Maps on a Sunday morning, type a destination an hour away, and watch the blue line snap to the motorway or the fastest dual carriageway it can find. That is not a bug. That is the product doing what it was designed for: get you there with as little time left on the clock as possible.
Brilliant — when time is the point. A hospital appointment, a school run, a meeting you cannot miss. The trouble starts when the journey is the point: a Cotswolds loop, a Highland day, a coastal potter where the café stop matters as much as the arrival. For those drives, "fastest" solves the wrong problem. This guide is the honest deep-dive — expanding the Google Maps section of our compare page without pretending either tool is bad at what it is for.
What Google Maps is actually for
Google Maps is the default for a reason. Live traffic, road closures, lane guidance, offline downloads, multi-stop itineraries, and a routing engine tuned for duration and reliability. On UK roads it is excellent at what most people ask of a sat-nav on a weekday: the quickest sensible line from A to B.
Officially, Maps also lets you tick Avoid motorways (and Avoid tolls) under route options. You can drag a route on desktop, add stops, and force the line through places you already know. None of that makes it a scenic planner. There is no "pretty drive" mode, no score for curviness or views, and no way to ask for "the long way through the Cotswolds with a café stop." Avoid motorways means: prefer roads that are not classified as motorways. The algorithm still optimises for time among whatever remains — which, in Britain, often means big A-roads and dual carriageways rather than the B-roads and country lanes that make a Sunday feel like a Sunday.
Maps wins when you need speed, traffic awareness, or a tool everyone already has. It is not failing at scenic routing. Scenic routing was never the brief.
What brieflylost is actually for
brieflylost starts from the opposite question. Not how do I get there quickest, but what is the nicest way to get there at all. You describe the drive in plain English — "the scenic way to Bath," "a relaxed loop avoiding the motorway," "Oxford with a café stop" — and it plans along country lanes, B-roads and quieter A-roads instead of defaulting to the motorway network.
That positioning is deliberate and UK-shaped: Lake District, Cotswolds, Scottish Highlands, Snowdonia, the South Downs — places where B-road versus motorway is half the joy. It is built for cars and motorcycles, includes voice turn-by-turn on the free tier, and lets you share a planned route with a single link. Offline maps are listed as planned rather than available today; Premium exists for heavier use, with a free monthly route allowance. Full current detail sits on the compare page — this article will not invent features beyond what the site already states.
In short: brieflylost wins when the scenery is the itinerary.
Side-by-side: the criteria that matter for a scenic day
Routing goal. Google Maps minimises time (with optional motorway avoidance). brieflylost prioritises back roads and scenic character from a natural-language brief. Same destination; different definition of "best."
Avoiding motorways. Maps: a real setting, partial result — leave the M-roads, still often land on dual carriageways. brieflylost: motorway avoidance as default intent, preferring B-roads and quiet lanes rather than "anything that is not an M."
Asking for a vibe. Maps: destinations, waypoints, options menus. brieflylost: a sentence about the drive you want. If you do not already know which ridge road to pin, that gap is most of the difference.
Live traffic and everyday reliability. Maps: class-leading. brieflylost: turn-by-turn and re-routing exist, but it is not trying to replace Maps as your commute brain.
UK focus. Maps is global and superb at that. brieflylost is designed around UK road character — scenic A-roads, Highland passes, hedged B-roads — rather than a worldwide one-size profile.
Price and platforms. Google Maps is free on iOS, Android and the web. brieflylost is freemium (free monthly route allowance including voice navigation; Premium for higher volume), on iOS and Android. Treat prices as stated on the site; they can change.
Not a league table. Two tools with different jobs.
When to use Google Maps
Use Google Maps when you need the fastest reliable route and live traffic matters; when you are coordinating with people who only share Maps links; when you want offline map downloads, web planning, or a tool already installed on every phone in the car; or when you already know the scenic roads and only need navigation along waypoints you are happy to drop yourself.
On those days, brieflylost is not the better Maps. Maps is the better Maps.
When to use brieflylost
Use brieflylost when the drive is the plan — a Sunday loop, a day in the hills, a coastal potter with nowhere urgent to be. When you want back roads by default, not motorways with a scenic accident. When you can describe the vibe ("quiet Cotswolds, café stop, no motorway") better than you can name every B-road. When you are in a car or on a bike and want scenic UK routing without assembling a waypoint necklace by hand.
Keep Maps for the minutes; keep the long way for the rest
If you would rather not rebuild every junction from forum threads and faded atlases, brieflylost is the helpful aside for exactly that day — tell it the scenic way you want, and keep Google Maps for the weekday runs where minutes still matter. Start from the full comparison if you want the feature-by-feature view.
Can you make Google Maps "scenic" with workarounds?
Partly. Tick Avoid motorways. Add stops in villages or viewpoints you already trust. On desktop, drag the route line. Those tricks work when you bring the scenic knowledge yourself. They fall short when you do not know the corridor, when Avoid motorways dumps you on a dull A-road, or when you wanted the app to understand "pretty" rather than "not a motorway."
For Britain's best driving country — famous passes and quieter regions worth a weekend — start with the complete guide to UK scenic drives. The apps only matter once you know what kind of day you want.
Frequently asked questions
Does Google Maps have a scenic route option in the UK?
No. Google Maps does not offer a dedicated scenic or "pretty drive" mode. Its driving directions are optimised primarily for time and efficiency. The closest built-in control is Avoid motorways (and Avoid tolls) under route options, which excludes motorways but still chooses among remaining roads for speed — often large A-roads and dual carriageways rather than enjoyable B-roads. You can add waypoints or drag the route if you already know which scenic roads to force.
Is brieflylost better than Google Maps for scenic drives?
For scenic and back-road intent, yes — that is what brieflylost is built for: plain-English requests, motorway avoidance as the default spirit of the route, and a preference for country lanes, B-roads and quieter A-roads on UK roads. Google Maps remains better for the fastest A-to-B journey, live traffic, offline maps and everyday reliability. Choose by the job: scenery versus schedule.
Why does Avoid motorways on Google Maps still feel dull?
Because the setting only removes motorways from the candidate set. Among what is left, Maps still aims for a fast, efficient path. In the UK that frequently means major A-roads and dual carriageways, which can be almost as featureless as an M-road for a leisure drive. Scenic character — hedges, passes, coastal lanes, village rhythm — is not a ranking signal the standard Maps route is trying to maximise.
Can I use brieflylost and Google Maps together?
Yes. Many drivers already split tools by intent. Use Google Maps for the quickest reliable line or live traffic on a deadline. Use brieflylost for a UK scenic or back-road plan from a sentence rather than a handful of manually dropped pins. They are complementary — the mistake is using only the fastest-route app for every kind of day.
Get briefly lost, on purpose
brieflylost finds the scenic way round, for the journeys where getting there is only part of the day. Free to start on iOS and Android.