So much more than just driving directions
Before GPS apps, if you wanted to go somewhere new you had to unfold a large sheet of paper covered with obscure names and symbols, desperately trying to glean some knowledge from the mysteries fixed upon its surface. Worse, once you found your way, you had to write down your intended path on a paper or risk losing your route in the forgotten depths of your memories. Today, we have Google Maps which buffers us from the eldritch knowledge of cartography and helps a billion people a month find out where they are and gets them where they want to go.
But there's so much more to Google Maps than getting directions or finding a sushi restaurant that's open at 9 p.m. Here, we're going to look at 10 of the most useful and little-known Google Maps tricks and features.
Although we've used an Android phone to walk through our Google Maps tips, Apple need not worry. Google Maps for iOS is very similar to the Android app, so you should have no problem following along.
Getting from point A to point B with Google Maps is trivial and has been part of the base functionality of the service since it was exclusively on desktop browsers. But you might not know that it's possible to add more than one destination to your trip. If you're on your way from Kansas City to Denver, plotting a stop in Cawker City to see the World's Biggest Ball of Twine is a breeze.
Before the world attained the enlightened state it's in now, we lived in a world without nationwide coverage and 5G data plans. Today, these deficits persist, and there's a chance you could be left without coverage while you travel. To overcome this, you don't need to give your hard-earned money to Big Map. Instead, you download a map for offline use.
If you're traveling internationally or taking a long road trip, you'll want to download maps for all the areas you plan to visit. Carriers often have limited international coverage and some Android phones have limited band support by region.
Maps will show you the area it will download. You can zoom in or out to decrease or increase the area saved and drag to change the area. At the bottom of the screen you can see how much storage the map will take up on your phone.
Traditional maps are fixed in time, forever showing what was. One of the advantages of Google Maps is that it's updated constantly. And not with just new roads and business information. It also shows you the current traffic, so you can use the little-known shortcut to get where you're going, or at least give your friends an accurate ETA.
Green is for light traffic, yellow is for medium traffic, and red is for heavy traffic.
To see how busy a business or public space is in your browser:
Green is for light traffic, yellow is for medium traffic, and red is for heavy traffic.
To see how busy a business or public space is on your phone:
Some places will show live crowd data, while others will show typical crowd information.
Sometimes, to get where you need to go, a bird's-eye view isn't enough. Sometimes, you need to be on the ground to find your destination or make sense of that tricky intersection. Instead of wasting your time potentially driving around in circles until you figure it out, you can use Street View to scout the area ahead of time.
You'll only be able to drop it on roads that have the blue overlay.
On mobile, there is no Pegman. However, Street View is still accessible.
On both mobile and desktop, you can click or touch and drag to change your view or click or tap to change your location.
Google Maps is an amazing tool for improving your quality of life while driving. It's also a good tool to help you keep driving by quickly showing you where the nearest gas stations are. On a desktop, click the Gas button at the top of the window. On Android and iPhone, the button is there, but you'll have to swipe the top menu bar to the left to see it.
Depending on where you're looking for gas, Google Maps may show you how much gas costs at the different gas stations.
Google Maps is great for finding where you want to go and planning how to get there. But did you know that it keeps track of where you've been as well? Although that straddles the line between "hey, that's neat" and "wow, that's creepy," there's an undeniable nostalgic pleasure in looking back on a year or more of travel.
From here, you can see an overview of everywhere you've been. If you want to get more granular, you can select a specific year or month. If you choose a day, Google will show you its best guess for the route you took on that day's travels
For whatever reason, the Google Maps app has a few more options that you can play with. Drag the menu at the top of the screen to see them all.
Driving somewhere is the easy part of any trip. The challenge begins with trying to remember where you left your car. Whether you left it in a parking garage downtown or baking in the sun in a far corner of your local outlet mall, Google Maps is here to remember where you parked your car.
Save your parking spot on the Google Maps app
Google Maps places a yellow pin on the map to show you where you parked. You'll even be able to make notes about where you are and mark down when you parked. And if you want to let someone else know where you parked, there's an option to share your parking location.
If you go to enough places, you're bound to find a few that you like more than the others. They're the kinds of places that you keep coming back to. To make it easier for Maps to take you back to these places, you can put them in a list of favorite places. Dropping a pin is one of our favorite Google Maps features and have a more in-depth guide to Google Map pins and Google My Maps
To save a location on desktop or mobile:
If you're using mobile, your favorite places will be pinned on your map with an icon according to which list they were put in.
Accessing your list of favorites involves a couple of steps. Still, it's faster than typing or pinching and zooming.
On your desktop, follow these steps:
On mobile, the process is exactly the same, except tap the Saved button at the bottom of the screen to access your list of saved places.
Using a map to get to your destination is all well and good, but what if you need to let someone else know where you are? Google Maps has a handy feature for sharing your live location with someone for a set time. This only works if the person you're sharing with has a Google account.
If you don't have the Gmail address of the person you'd like to share with your contacts, you can still share your location. Instead of sharing directly via your Google account, Maps will instead give you a link which you can copy and share however you'd like.
Driving is cool and all, but sometimes it's just too much energy, it's too far, or it's not worth it to find parking where you're going. That's when you need the marvel of the modern metropolis: public transit. You could go to the transit authority website and look up bus and train times, but you have Google Maps, which can tell you transit schedules and route options in most major cities.
The steps to take advantage of this are the same on desktop and mobile:
Maps will show you a timetable of when the next train, bus, or ferry is leaving, as well as any connections you have to make.
This list is far from exhaustive, and the team at Google Maps has baked in more features than most of us will ever need. In fact, you can even use various Google services to plan your next vacation. And when you want to save a memorable spot that you come across while traveling, drop a pin on your map to save that location or share it with friends.
Daniel writes guides, explainers, and technology news. He especially likes deep diving into niche topics that require more than scratching the surface. He’s been writing in newspapers, magazines, and blogs for over 20 years writing hard news, entertainment, and science stories. When not writing he enjoys reading science fiction, playing music, and raising a rambunctious toddler. The devices you’ll find him using every day are his Pixel 4a, Acer 311 Chromebook, and Amazon Fire HD 10. As soon as he saves up some money he’s getting a 3D printer.