Google Maps offers an immersive view of routes and more

Announced at I/O, Google Maps is now rolling out Global Route View and a number of other search and navigation features.

Place View lets you view landmarks and even restaurants in 3D under different conditions, such as time of day and different weather. It works using artificial intelligence to “merge billions of Street View and aerial images.”

Google Maps is now expanding this capability to include routes to give you an idea of ​​what to expect on a turn-by-turn basis. Combined with simulated weather and lighting, you can get an idea of ​​what traffic will be like.

You can prepare for every turn as if you were there with detailed, visual turn-by-turn directions, and use the time slider to plan when to exit based on useful information, such as simulated traffic and weather conditions. This way, you can easily avoid riding during rainy weather or heavy traffic.

When you get directions (walking, biking, or driving), you’ll see a button to turn on the overview. It takes a while to load (as it’s streaming from the cloud), and then you can preview every step of your journey, from crosswalks to turns, and see what’s nearby.

The comprehensive view of routes will be released this week on Google Maps for Android And internal control Department In Amsterdam, Barcelona, ​​Dublin, Florence, Las Vegas, London, Los Angeles, Miami, New York, Paris, San Francisco, San Jose, Seattle, Tokyo and Venice.

Meanwhile, Google Lens, which can be launched in the Maps search bar, is now live in 50 new cities starting this week — including Austin, Las Vegas, Rome, Sao Paulo, and Taipei — to provide you with an AR overlay of what stores and locations are available in nearby place. This feature has been officially renamed to “Lens in Maps” from “Search with Live View”.

Google Maps search is updated to support search queries like “animal latte art” and “pumpkin patch with my dog.” Google will search for user-uploaded photos that contain these elements and note where they were taken. You can also get a map view with pins showing those images. This will be rolling out starting this week on Android and iOS in France, Germany, Japan, the UK and the US.

Map search is also getting better at supporting general queries. For example, “Things to do in Tokyo” will appear on collections of places to visit, such as art galleries and cherry blossoms. These recommendations appear in the form of card carousels and will be coming later this year.

Google is updating the navigation map to “more accurately reflect the real world” with updated colors, more realistic depiction of buildings, and improved lane details that better indicate when you need to change. This will be rolled out in the coming months in Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Great Britain, Japan, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Sweden and the United States.

Google is also rolling out HOV routes in the US (over the coming months), while speed limit information will arrive in 20 European countries – including Austria, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Greece and Switzerland – in a similar time frame.

For EV owners, Google Maps search results will improve at showing plug types and whether you’ll get a slow/medium/fast charge, while Google will note when the charging station was last used – such as “used today” – to give you a better idea of ​​its operation. This will be rolling out globally on Android and iOS starting this week. On the developer side, Google provides EV charging information to the Maps Platform Places API for third-party use.