Google is Bringing Generative AI to Maps

Google announced today that it is bringing a generative AI-based location suggestion feature to its Maps service, initially as an early access experiment with select Local Guides in the U.S.

“Today, we’re introducing a new way to discover places with generative AI to help you do just that — no matter how specific, niche, or broad your needs might be,” Google vice president Miriam Daniel writes in the announcement post. “Simply say what you’re looking for and our large-language models (LLMs) will analyze Maps’ detailed information about more than 250 million places and trusted insights from our community of over 300 million contributors to quickly make suggestions for where to go.”

Results will be organized into categories and will include photo carousels and review summaries that highlight places of interest. You can ask follow-up questions, as we see with other generative AI services. And you can then save the results to a list or share them with others.

“These AI-powered results also come in handy if you’re feeling spontaneous or need to change your plans suddenly,” Daniel continues. “For example, if you’re out and about and it starts to rain, just ask Maps for ‘activities for a rainy day’ to get suggestions for indoor activities.”

I am very curious to try this feature. I am Google Local Guide, as it turns out, so you never know.