No. If you are searching for this because you are about to drive something tall, here is the short version: the Google Maps app has no place to enter your vehicle height, no truck mode, and no low bridge avoidance. It plans every route as if you are driving a car. Apple Maps and Waze are the same.
That is not a bug, and it is not something you can fix in a settings menu. It is a design decision, and it is the reason rental moving trucks keep peeling their roofs off on Storrow Drive every September. The rest of this post covers what each app actually does, what Google's new truck routing product means for you, and how to get a route that clears every bridge.
What does Google Maps do about low bridges?
Nothing in the app you have on your phone. There is no vehicle profile, so Google Maps has no idea whether you are 4'6" tall in a hatchback or 13'6" tall in a box truck. It optimizes for travel time and traffic, and a 10'0" railroad underpass that shaves three minutes off your trip is, to Google Maps, a good route.
People sometimes point out that Google Maps knows a bridge is there. It does, in the sense that the map shows the road passing under a railroad. What it does not know is the clearance, and even where a clearance appears in the map data, the routing engine never compares it to your vehicle because it has nothing to compare it to.
Two things people try that do not work:
- Avoid highways, tolls, or ferries. These are the only route options Google Maps offers. None of them has anything to do with height.
- Switching to walking or cycling mode to see the route. You will see the same roads with the same bridges, just slower.
What about Google's new truck routing?
In August 2026, Google announced Large Vehicle Routing for its Google Maps Platform. It lets software set a vehicle's height, weight, length, width, axle count, and hazardous goods class, and the routing engine then tries to avoid roads that restrict those vehicles. It is available in the contiguous 48 states through the Routes API, the Route Optimization API, and the Navigation SDK.
That matters for fleets, but read the fine print before you count on it:
- It is a developer product, not an app. You reach it through dispatch and telematics software that has built it in, not by opening Google Maps. Google's own announcement describes it as being for logistics companies, fleet operators, and the developers who build for them.
- Access is limited. Google's documentation says it is available to a limited set of customers and requires a request to Google.
- Google says not to rely on it. The documentation states that drivers must not rely solely on routes returned by the API to be safe or legal, and that in some cases the API cannot find a route that fully complies with the restrictions and will return one that partially ignores them.
So the honest answer to "does Google Maps avoid low bridges" is still no for anyone who is not running a fleet platform, and "sometimes, with warnings" for the platforms that do.
Does Waze avoid low bridges?
No. Waze has no truck or RV mode and no vehicle dimensions at all. Its own support forum tells drivers who ask about low clearance routing that Waze is built for passenger cars and points them to commercial navigation apps. The feature has sat in Waze's public suggestion box for years.
Waze is also the app most likely to route you through a shortcut on side streets to dodge traffic, which is exactly where the lowest railroad bridges tend to be.
Does Apple Maps avoid low bridges?
No. Apple Maps has no commercial vehicle setting and no height, weight, or length fields. Apple's own support community has been asking for a truck setting since at least 2019, and the answer has not changed. A 12'6" motorhome gets the same route as a Prius.
Why can't the big apps just add a height setting?
Because the hard part is not the setting, it is the data. To route around low bridges you need a reliable clearance for every structure, and you need to know which direction of travel it affects. The federal National Bridge Inventory records one clearance per bridge, is updated on a two-year inspection cycle at best, and comes with a warning from the FHWA that it should not be used for route clearance. We wrote about that in detail in Why Low Clearance Bridge Data Is Broken.
A consumer map with hundreds of millions of users cannot ship a feature that is right most of the time. A wrong height once is a totaled truck, so the mainstream apps leave it out entirely.
How do I actually avoid low bridges?
Use a tool that knows your height, then let the everyday apps do what they are good at.
- Plan the route in a clearance-aware tool. Enter your start and destination in the Low Clearance Map web app and set your vehicle height. It checks the route against 27,500+ verified low bridges, tunnels, and overpasses across the US, Canada, and UK, and builds a route around anything too low for you.
- Measure your real height. Measure to the highest point, including roof air conditioners, antennas, and ladders. Rental trucks post the height on a sticker in the cab. Add a few inches of margin.
- Drive it with turn-by-turn guidance. Send the finished route to Google Maps or Apple Maps, or drive it in HeadRoom, which gives voice guidance on Apple CarPlay and Android Auto and warns you before any structure that is too low for your direction of travel.
That last point is the part the big apps cannot copy. Every structure in our database carries Hazard Headings, the compass directions the restriction applies to. A bridge that is 11'0" northbound and 14'0" southbound only warns you when you are heading north. Without that, a routing tool either sends you on pointless detours or misses the hazard entirely.
Where are the low bridges near me?
They cluster in older cities and along railroad lines. New York has more than 1,700 in our database, Illinois more than 1,900, and Massachusetts more than 1,200, most of them around Boston, Worcester, and the Pioneer Valley. Our low clearance bridges by state pages list how many structures each state has, the lowest ones with their town and direction of travel, and the towns where they cluster.
Frequently asked questions
Does Google Maps have a truck mode? Not in the consumer app. Google's truck routing, Large Vehicle Routing, is sold to fleet software developers through the Google Maps Platform and is not something you can turn on in Google Maps on your phone.
Can I set my vehicle height in Google Maps? No. There is no height, weight, or length setting in Google Maps, Apple Maps, or Waze.
Will Google Maps warn me before a low bridge? No. It does not know your height, so it has no reason to warn you. Only a clearance-aware app with a vehicle profile can do that.
Is there a free way to avoid low bridges? Free government bridge lists exist, but they are incomplete, out of date, and not built for routing. Low Clearance Map is $4.99 a month or $45 a year with a 7-day free trial, and one subscription covers the web app and HeadRoom on iOS and Android.
Start a free 7-day trial, set your height once, and never gamble on a bridge again.
