MapQuest’s mobile app surged to the top of U.S. navigation charts, reaching No. 1 after the 30-year-old mapping platform refused a U.S. government executive order to rename Lake Ontario to “Lake America,” gaining hundreds of thousands of new downloads over the weekend.
MapQuest Reaches No. 1 in Navigation After Refusing Lake Ontario Renaming Order
MapQuest has climbed to the No. 1 spot in U.S. navigation apps following its public refusal to adopt a presidential executive order that mandated updating Lake Ontario to Lake America on domestic maps. The company, known as the OG of online mapping,
announced on Thursday that it would not change the name of Lake Ontario on its maps to Lake America, despite Trump’s executive order directing the U.S. Department of the Interior to update the lake’s name in the U.S. geographic naming service. The company announced on Thursday that it would keep the traditional name in place, sparking a massive wave of user support.
The platform’s decision turned into an immediate viral success. As of Monday morning on the U.S. east coast, the iOS app climbed to No. 4 on the U.S. App Store Top Charts for apps excluding games, reached No. 8 overall across both apps and games, and claimed the top spot for navigation. In Canada’s App Store, the app reached No. 2 overall as of Sunday evening.
Download Volumes Surge Fifty Times Above Normal Levels
Parent company System1, traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker SST, watched its navigation subsidiary experience a dramatic surge in user activity, with the 30-year-old company remarking that it received hundreds of thousands
of new downloads since its decision to keep the name Lake Ontario in place, and saw its app’s usage climb to 50 times above its normal levels. According to third-party data from market intelligence provider Sensor Tower, MapQuest recorded 184,000 total global app downloads and 162,000 U.S. downloads during the week starting August 24, marking a more than tenfold week-over-week increase. In the U.S., daily downloads were up 128% day-over-day from August 26 to August 30.
We took the same approach we did with the Gulf of Mexico: be part of the conversation, and give people an app that keeps the names they’re familiar with, Doug Berger
Berger added in a statement that Hundreds of thousands of people signaled to us this weekend that we got it right by downloading our app.
Diverging Strategies Among Major Mapping Platforms
The naming directive stems from a U.S. government executive order directing the U.S. Department of the Interior to update the lake’s name in the U.S. geographic naming service. The updated map will only be shown to users in the U.S., while those in Canada will see Lake Ontario, and those outside of the two countries will see both names. The order arrived as trade talks broke down, leading the U.S. to impose new 50% tariffs on $20 billion worth of Canadian goods, with Canada poised to retaliate.
Competitors have handled the federal directive differently. On Saturday, Google Maps announced it was complying with Trump’s decision, explaining that it updates Google Maps to reflect the name changes in official government sources, which in the U.S. is the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS). Apple Maps and Google Maps changed the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America last year, after Trump issued a similar name-changing executive order. As of Monday morning, Apple Maps has yet to rename the Great Lake to Lake America and has not issued a statement about its plans.
Viral Marketing Spike Versus Long-Term Retention Challenges
While the sudden visibility pushed MapQuest usage to 50 times historical averages, market analysts are evaluating whether the momentum will translate into lasting growth against dominant competitors like Google Maps and Apple Maps. MapQuest has changed hands several times over the years, having been acquired by AOL shortly after going public, then ending up with Verizon for a time as a result of Verizon’s acquisition of AOL, before Verizon sold MapQuest to internet advertising company System1 in 2019. MapQuest ties much of its revenue model to advertising platforms, and investors should evaluate whether this viral spike creates lasting growth or is merely a short-term marketing event against the backdrop of stiff competition from industry leaders.
To engage new users, MapQuest also released an online tool that lets you jokingly rename Lake Ontario to whatever you want it to be, then share the results on social media, replicating a similar interactive feature the company offered last year after Trump renamed the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America. Sensor Tower estimated that MapQuest’s app has been downloaded 687,000 times worldwide this year so far, up 29% year-over-year. Since 2012, MapQuest has been downloaded 24.4 million times, with 97% of those installs coming from the United States.
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