Abstract: A navigation or mapping system comprises a display device (240) and a processing resource (210, 490) arranged to process map data, traffic data and location data representative of the location of a vehicle, to produce an output representative of a traffic animation sequence, wherein the traffic animation sequence comprises a traffic indicator (530) on a map, the traffic indicator (530) is representative of traffic and the traffic indicator (530) varies to represent the variation of traffic between a start time and an end time, the processing resource is configured to vary at least one feature of the animation sequence in dependence upon the variation of the location of the vehicle between the start time and the end time, and the display device is responsive to the output from the processing resource to display the traffic animation sequence.