i want to switch my maps back to gulf of mexico

Lawrence Finch wrote:

It’s not actually even the middle; the US “owns” less than half of the gulf; about 45%. The balance is divided between Mexico and Cuba (and a couple of small countries).

In the government's defence, the executive order clearly describes this, "rename as the “Gulf of America” the U.S. Continental Shelf area bounded on the northeast, north, and northwest by the States of Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida and extending to the seaward boundary with Mexico and Cuba in the area formerly named as the Gulf of Mexico." 

This next sentence is interesting too, "The Secretary shall subsequently update the GNIS to reflect the renaming of the Gulf and remove all references to the Gulf of Mexico from the GNIS, consistent with applicable law."

You can lookup these features on the GNIS. This is clearly a US-centric database. It ignores the rest of the world. When I search for "Bay of Fundy", I get a result that is most definitely NOT the Bay of Fundy.

But of all the ultimate ironies here, if you check the actual continental shelf on the US government's own Continental Shelf project and compare that to the actual label position of "Gulf of America" on both Google Maps and Apple Maps, you can see that both Google and Apple have done it wrong. They are both labelling the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America. By that I mean the actual label position is just outside of the boundary of the Gulf of America.

But of course, everyone is trying to make a political point by virtue signalling how much they don't like President Trump. That's a total waste of time. Anyone who has actually read the executive order, and can read a map, can make a strong geographic point that both Google and Apple have labelled the map incorrectly. Now this is not the Google Support Community, so I don't care about Google. How should it look in Apple Maps?

Well, we can start by looking at how the US government itself labels the map. Don't bother checking the GNIS. They have a note stating they haven't fixed it yet. But we can check that State Department site above. This is what their map looks like:

This is correct, folks! For all the trash talk of the US government, they actually can read their own laws and a map. Go figure.

But Apple needs our help. We can overlay the correct government map on top of Apple Maps to see the problem:

This is how it should be labelled on Apple Maps:

(This is just an example. My labels aren't correct either but I'm constrained by transparency and other labels. But this is the right idea.)

If anyone wants to file a bug report citing this correct geographical information, you have my full support.

You can report an issue with any location on Apple Maps. The steps to do that are:

1. Open Maps
2. Navigate to the location you'd like to report. E.g. Gulf of America. (see screenshot)
3. Click on the location and a context menu pops up.
4. Choose "Report an Issue" and follow the prompts.
5. For example, you can choose "Name is wrong". It will let you propose the correct name for the place and submit.

C-F-C-R wrote:

Please change the name on your map back to Gulf of Mexico. And I would also like the option to change it back myself if possible. This is supposed to be a democracy, not a dictatorship. And all our old allies are beginning to hate us and I can’t blame them. I am ashamed of you too, Apple.

This is a user-to-user technical support forum. We have no control over Maps (or any other Apple app). Apple doesn't read here for feedback or suggestions. You can, however, let them know your thoughts here:

Product Feedback - Apple

Please report the issue to Apple Maps team. It’s inside the Maps app under “Report an issue”.

Lawrence Finch wrote:

The map used by Apple and Google is produced by the US Geological Survey, an agency of the US government, who followed legitimate instructions from the President of the United States to change it. The solution is political, not technical. Contact your representatives, and/or work to elect people who better represent your views. And if you think this is the most serious problem facing us you haven’t been paying attention. Learn to pick your fights.

Well said!

CCSilo wrote:

The submit button has been deactivated. Not sure when it was deactivated but it doesn't work on 2/17/2025.

The Submit button for reporting only applies to address correction, business information and navigation errors. It does not allow changing geographical names. For example, you can’t change New York to Nieuw Amsterdam. Or Mount Rainier to Tahoma.

G. Bern wrote:

Apple is so petty on this issue that they actually DISABLED their customer's ability to report the name change. Dear Apple, if you're listening, there is no such place as The Gulf of America. Please correct your Map to reflect the internationally recognized Gulf of Mexico.

It is not a mistake or a problem with the map. Apple is well aware of what the USGS data says.

If you want to provide feedback to Apple about your opinion of this change, the more appropriate place is the dedicated feedback page:

Product Feedback - Apple

go to Gulf of Mexico (wrongly renamed) Report an issue. Select name and update name and leave a comment

betaneptune wrote:

MapQuest still calls it "Gulf of Mexico".

Great, so switch to Mapquest.

Tom Moerel wrote:

As the Gulf of Mexico renaming has not been approved outside of the USA, I demand you remove Gulf of America for customers outside of the USA. Whatever you want to name it inside the USA just go ahead. But please spare the rest of the world from this megalomaniacal stupidity!!

You can demand all you want, but you are only demanding from other users in this user to user forum.

The name comes from the official maps provided by your government geological survey agency, so protest to your government. Apple can’t change what they don’t control.

You can also use MapQuest which has not changed the name.

Tkbwcats wrote:

How silly no one is moving to Mexico because we have a loon running the show. My question was legit in why can’t we as users change it back to how we prefer it? The correct terminology the rest of the world is using!

For the same reason we can't change it to Chactemal. Apple gets their map data from a U.S government agency. They don't create their own maps.

Lots of bodies of water have different names depending on who is making the maps. This is a very strange hill to chose to die on.

Apple is so petty on this issue that they actually DISABLED their customer's ability to report the name change. Dear Apple, if you're listening, there is no such place as The Gulf of America. Please correct your Map to reflect the internationally recognized Gulf of Mexico.

If you want an app that is still “Gulf of Mexico” you can download MapQuest. At least Apple is still letting people post on forums, the only ones I found for google were locked so no one could respond.

The VPN I use didn't change anything, so on my phone and my desktop I changed my location:

Setting>General>Location> change from U.S. to Mexico.

On my phone I also had to then "un-metric" and change ºC to ºF and date formats and such.