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How to go back in time on Google Earth
It's easy to spend an entire day gaping at those fascinating historical photos
Google Maps and Earth have revolutionized how we see the world. Google Maps navigates unknown cities in real time, and Google Earth operates on a larger scale. Google Earth takes us on an immersive virtual tour of our planet from above. You don't need to splurge on a powerful computer to enjoy curated tours if you use the web version of Google Earth. You can experience stunning aerial views even on the most affordable Chromebooks.
How to find elevation on Google Maps
Learn how to find elevation on Google Maps, in the mobile app and browser, so you'll know how steep your route will be in advance
Google Maps is a wonderful tool filled with interesting details about locations around the world, and one of the most useful things to know about an area is its elevation. You might expect it to be easy to find elevation measurements on Google Maps, but it's somewhat hidden.
Google Earth Pro: Everything you need to know
Google Earth Pro offers casual geo-information tools for everyone from students to environmental scientists
Google runs one of the most impressive 3D mapping tools available. It's a reliable go-to for planet zooming, location finding, and basic geo-analysis. But, unlike Google Maps, Google doesn't market it to general users much, so you may not have heard of it. Let's talk about Google Earth Pro, the advanced, publicly available software that lets even casual users play with GIS data or go on a swooping tour of the world.
Create your own maps with the latest Google Earth update
The Android app update will be available gradually through the next week
Google Earth is one rare app we didn’t know we needed. It's designed to give the curious among us a detailed look at the planet and outer space, and it works seamlessly on Chrome, Firefox, Opera, and Edge — perfect for binge-watching the fascinating, immersive views of our planet from above. You don’t have to splurge on this one to get started, even one of the cheapest Chromebooks would do. Now, Google is making its 3D cartography tool even better with new community features, on the web as well as mobile.
Google updates Earth's Timelapse feature with two years of recent data
Data up to 2022 is now available
Google constantly handles enormous chunks of geographical data to improve apps like Maps and Waze, keeping them current with the state of roadworks in your alley. This information gathering also brings us stunning visuals with features like Immersive View and Street View. Over time, Google has collected enough data via satellite, aerial, and on-ground mapping to track the evolution of civilization and changes to the landscape in specific regions of the world. Two more years of the latest data has just been added to one such feature on Google Earth.
Google Earth invites you to look through our planet's past — get ready to feel bad for being a human
Watch 26 years of climate change faster than you can say "climate change"
Google is calling its expanded Timelapse feature "the biggest update in years" to its Earth 3D mapping system. The tool allows you to overlay historical satellite photography on the 3D topographical maps, watching years of change to the landscape in just a few seconds. You can see dramatic shifts to populated cities, or the geological progression of waterways and landmasses. But of course the most obvious application of this tool is viewing climate change in a much more immediate way.
The face of our planet is constantly changing, and nothing shows this better than a timelapse from a bird's-eye view. If you weren't aware, Google Earth already lets you see this with the help of its Timelapse feature that's available on web for both desktop and mobile. But as it turns out, it's also hidden within the Android app and if you're a tinkerer, there's a way to manually enable it.
It's been more than a year since Google launched its system-wide dark theme with Android 10, but the company still isn't done creating dark modes for all of its apps. Many Google Maps users are still waiting for the eye-soothing theme currently in rollout, but if you want a glimpse at what you can expect while you're in satellite view, you might want to download or open Google Earth. Google has announced that the app now finally has a dark theme.
Google Earth has a long and storied history — though not quite as long as the planet it depicts. The product we all know as Google earth was released on June 28th, 2005. Though we're a few weeks separated from that, Google has taken today to celebrate its formal 15th anniversary. But, in fact, Google Earth's history stretches back a little further than that.
Google Earth has a new search interface that shows featured content, search history, and more
Available now on Android, iOS, and the web
Google has just announced that a new search "experience" for Google Earth has rolled out. In addition to simply being more attractive, the new layout shows your search history, offers featured content and must-see views, and lets you search for data layers as well as places.
Take a world tour from your couch with these apps
Walk along streets, enjoy 360 views, and discover new places
With all of us stuck at home because of the Coronavirus pandemic, a supermarket run is starting to feel like the biggest excursion and adventure we can go on for the foreseeable future. Travel is out of the question, local trips are restricted in many countries, and even the simple idea of stepping out of your house is as daunting as an alcohol and paranoia party. I've been yearning for a vacation for a while — I even had a trip planned for May before all of this went down — but since that's been canceled now, I've found myself thumbing through old pics and 360 photos I've taken during my trips, reminiscing about better times and nicer places, then it occurred to me that I could do something similar but also discover new countries and cities I've never visited, all through the magic of Google Maps, Earth, and Street View. Let me to explain how you too can do that.
Some people fly on planes. Other people fly in their dreams. And while we'd have some idea of how it'd feel to be up there looking down on the world, thank goodness for the advent of camera-equipped satellites to give us the best views of our planet. And if you happen to like a good satellite image as your phone's wallpaper, you're now spoiled for choice as Google Earth has added over a thousand high-quality images available for download from its Earth View Gallery.
Until recently, when zooming out in the Google Earth app to get a full view of the globe on your mobile device, you'd see our beautifully blue planet amidst a completely black background. However, thanks to what Google is crediting as advancements in mobile device processing power, you can now get a glimpse of the starry sky right from your phone.
Most of us aren't likely to get the chance to fly to outer space, much less walk on a planet that isn't Earth, but that hasn't stopped Google from helping us reach the stars from our smart devices. When Google introduced a space exploration feature to Maps in 2017, we all got to see our solar system in ways that simply weren't possible before. This week, a Redditor found that Google has added a fun hyperdrive animation that makes it feel like you're really being teleported to a new planet.
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Christmas Eve is only 20 days out, and as such, Google has teamed up with Santa's Elves just in time to spread the festive spirit around the world. Google Assistant will offer you fresh broadcasts from the North Pole Newscast every day, and the Elves have polished up the Google Santa Tracker, which lets you explore Santa's village starting today.
Google Earth got a full makeover two years ago with support for modern web browsers and new apps. Google also rolled out the Voyager program with the new Earth, featuring stories from the BBC, The Jane Goodall Institute, and more. Now, the map-based storytelling tools used for the Voyager experiences are available to everyone in Google Earth on the web.
If you fancy yourself a weather expert or you're obsessed about cloud patterns and movements or you simply enjoy earth's view from space and seeing how things evolve around this blue planet of ours, you can now do so from Google Earth. The app has added a new cloud animation layer that represents the last 24 hours of weather patterns across the globe.
Google launches a lot of things, and some of them don't survive. You're probably familiar with the high-profile deaths like Google+, Allo, and Reader, but there are numerous little-known services that never gain a following before Google kicks them to the curb. That's the case for Follow Your World, which shuts down next month.
Google Earth Timelapse has grown since it debuted in 2013. It started off by giving us satellite windows into certain areas to see how they've progressed across roughly three decades. Since then, it has taken the entire world, made it zoomable and scrollable, and has given us an easy way to see it change year after year after year. But Timelapse has only been available to desktops for the past while up until today, when Google announced it was enabling the program on mobile web browsers.
According to Google, measurement tools have long been the number one feature request for Google Earth. Now, it's finally happening. The company is rolling out its measure tool to the Chrome version of Earth today, and it'll come to Android (and iOS) soon.