How To View Photos on a Map in Google Photos
Most of the photos you take are geotagged to know the exact location where the photo was taken. This information is kept intact when you upload photos to Google Photos, therefore, Google Photos knows where you have taken those photos. If you have ever wondered if you could see all your photos on the world map to see exactly where each photo has been taken, then now it’s possible in Google Photos.
In the recent Google Photos design update, a new Explore Map feature was added where you can view your geotagged photos on a map. In today’s post, I am going to show you how you can access and use this feature to view your photos on a map.
Google Photos map view
This new feature is only available on the Google Photos mobile apps. The desktop version doesn’t support this feature currently, so you will have to use your Android or iOS device to use this feature. And of course, the app must be updated to the latest version that contains this feature. Here’s how to use it:
Open the Google Photos app and tap on the “Search” tab at the bottom.
Here you should find the “Explore Map” feature in the second section, tap on it to open it.
This will open a map of your current location with heat patterns on the map where you have taken your photos. Areas where you have taken more photos will be bigger in size and also have stronger heat patterns.
You can tap on a heat pattern to open all the photos near that area. Zooming in will help pinpoint to exact locations where the photos have been taken. You can also scroll through photos and their exact location will update on the map.
Google Photos uses photo metadata, Google location history, and known landmarks in the photos to identify the location. So in most cases, it’s very accurate. However, you may still see some photos with inaccurate locations (usually nearby) as GPS may not always work perfectly.
Ending words
Explore Map is definitely a great way to relive your photos using the exact location where the photos were taken. This feature was also one of the most demanded features as iOS already supported this for many years. I am glad Google took the move to add this feature and honestly, the feature works seamlessly.
What do you think about viewing your photos on a map in Google Photos? Does it really change the way you view your past photos? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.
This is a great feature and as it is combined with other powerful IA engines to automatically recognize animals, people, objects, features it is relatively very easy to retrieve photos despite having 10’s thousands.
However, what I find very frustrating is the differences in functionalities depending on the device you use. Why can’t they make their app having the same features. For instance the Explore map does not exist when using a PC or laptop under windows 10 and using Chrome. This is really annoying because even an ipad screen is relatively small when you want to explore on the map.
I can’t find anywhere any rational explanation
Thanks, otherwise great article btw :)
I agree that this feature would be much more useful if/when they make it available on the desktop PC. Hopefully it is coming.
Found a partial “workaround” on Google Photos Help pages…see this link:
https://support.google.com/photos/thread/5343478/google-photos-web-world-map-view?hl=en&msgid=5344258
Hi Larry,
thank you for this. As you said “partial workaround”. OK for a handful of photos.
I would love to hear the reason why they don’t make this functionality available for PC.
I have also installed Google Photos on Windows 11 and it is not there either.
I can only see this functionality on Android and IOS.
Come on Google, you can do better!!!
I have also found this
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/google-photos-on-map-brow/appnhljekbigckdfnickpoahhledjgab
but it does not work. That is a real shame. It seemed like a great idea…
My photos
It is killing me that this is not available on Desktop. It should be integrated into Google Photos in Chrome, or somehow into Maps.