This will change your way of using this popular application

Google Maps has just turned 20. The popular cartography application has more than fulfilled, the intention of the company to map the entire world, from the main roads to recondite areas in which they have had to use special cameras installed in backpacks. This application has become one of the most used in countries such as Spain, in which there are few alternatives.

The main uses of the application remain those related to creating routes to go from one place to another, using functions such as the calculation of real -time traffic, the location of refueling stations, etc. But next to that A social layer has been created which is highly valued.

Many times this application opens to be able to locate a restaurant, to see where you can go to do a concrete activity at a specific schedule and to see the assessments and opinions of customers, to ensure that going is not a mistake. But Google Maps has many functions that, although not secret, most users do not use.

Discover plans to have fun. Using Google Maps when we are clear about what we want to do is normal. We can look for a restaurant when we want to eat or check which is the closest cinema. But deciding what to do in the application is not so common.

In the search bar we can put what we want to do with who we want to do and the system will give us a list of options so that we can choose the one we want. For example, we can put “where to eat with friends” or “things to do in Barcelona with your partner”.

In this way, possible plans will be suggested so that we can decide, without having to search the web or use other apps, what to do at a given time. This function will now improve that Google has confirmed that Gemini will be integrated into Google Maps, as it is doing in many other company apps.

See outstanding dishes and menu. When choosing a Google Maps restaurant, it is very useful because it lets us see the contact data, customer assessments and even the opening schedule. But we also have many photos of the dishes and the premises.

However, there are a type of photos that are especially important. We have a section called “prominent dishes”, in which the main dishes of a restaurant appear, and another called “menu” in which we can see the letter with prices, which will give us a more accurate idea than will cost us eat there. Of course, these photos may not be fully updated, so you have to look at the dates.

Travel back in time. Google Maps has an integrated function that allows us to walk through the streets using photographs and 3D maps. It’s called Street View. But what many people do not know is that we can see how those streets were years ago, through a function that allows us to choose the year of photographed from the streets.

Of course, this function is limited to the first year that Google went through a specific area, but in most cases, in acceptably large cities and towns, we can see the last 10 or 15 years in a simple way. For this we only have to click on the see more dates to the address on the Street View screen.

Book Site in Restaurants. There are many restaurants that have been associated with Google to allow table directly from Google Maps. In this way we do not have to be aware that they take the phone or install other applications.

The system works in a simple way, being able to choose the time, the number of guests and, if the restaurant has established zones, one of them. Thus, we can choose the terrace or the interior according to our preferences. There is also a text box in which to leave our requests.

Immersive view. One of the latest functions added to this application is the one that lifts a 3D environment from an area using photos of Google cars and their satellites. It is called immersive view and is available only in some locations, although there are more and more.

To use it you just have to select the specific place and see if there is one in the first place with this name. If there is only one to click on the image and an interface will be opened full for which we can move them, see the weather, etc.

Send the direction to the car. If our car has Android Auto, or some system integrated with Google, such as Tesla, it is possible to share an address or a Google Maps place directly with it.

This makes it easy to have our destination address in the car browser, without having to type it and look for it in the vehicle’s own interface. To share it you just have to have the car linked to the mobile and choose your app when we press on the Google Maps sharing icon.

Know if a site is too busy. Thanks to the Google knowing the number of users of its application that are in a place, if geolocation is activated, it is possible for the company to calculate the assistance to a place. In this way, bar graphs are generated that indicate if a site is very full or not.

In addition, it calculates compared to other similar days, so that we know if it is an especially bustling day or if, it is simply a busy place. It can be filtered for hours and see how the past part of the day we are. To see this chart we just have to go to the section “Summary” of a place of a place on Google Maps.

Establish areas of interest. Within Google Maps adjustments we can tell the application that a particular area interests us. This will increase notifications and notices on the novelties in it, not having to receive notices from other areas of the city.

Type of car. Finally, it is possible to establish the type of motor of a car in the app, if it is combustion or electric, so that the calculation of the routes from one place to another is more efficient, as well as to show the gas stations or electroly. In the search within the route.