With an estimated 27 million users using their mobile handsets for GPS Navigation on both Walk-to and Drive-by navigation, this number would be expected to increase exponentially as many who were not willing to pay the Ovi Maps License fees can now travel and choose Ovi Maps as their most convenient and default GPS Navigation Unit by simply downloading the Map data of the location they are traveling to and using the maps once one gets there.

The New version of Ovi Maps is available for only 10 handset models at the moment. Nokia makes it even easier by including future model releases with pre-loaded local map data and access to Lonely Planet Guide Lonely Planet and Michelin travel guides at no extra cost.

This new version Ovi Maps currently includes turn-by-turn navigation with voice guidance for 74 countries in 46 languages some some of which come with an option of both female and male voices.

Ovi Maps 3.0 also offers free traffic information for more than 10 countries as well as detailed maps for more than 180 countries and over 6000 3D landmarks in over 200 cities around the world. All-in-all, Nokia’s Ovi Maps offers the following features:

• Free Drive navigation
• Free Walk navigation
• Free maps and map updates
• Free Events guides
• Free Lonely Planet guides
• Free Michelin guides

Nokia has several viable reasons to make this move despite the potential revenue loss from License fees on these Maps. Nokia for one is targeting the Ovi Maps developer community, that would shift to be more innovative and take advantage of this huge potential.

Integrating all these services and regions into one device and making it free is a good case for increased GPS Navigation and more so Ovi Maps usage. Anssi Vanjoki, Executive Vice President at Nokia is certainly no stranger to this fact. This surely is bound to change the game as far as GPS Navigation goes as Nokia is known for its high quality map data.

As it stands Nokia is already way ahead as far as Navigation devices goes. With the ability to use GPS as well as cell information for Navigation, the possibilities are endless.

As Nokia lures in a massive user base through this move, it surely sets the stage for Nokia to position it’s self as a market leader in mobile maps, navigation, location-based services, content and features.

For those with compatible phones such as Nokia E52, Nokia E55, Nokia E72, Nokia N97 mini, Nokia 6710 Navigator, Nokia 6730 Classic, Nokia 5800 Navigation Edition, Nokia 5800 XpressMusic, Nokia  5230 and Nokia X6 can immediately download Ovi Maps here. Other models will be included in the coming weeks as the software becomes available.