Today at its Artificial Intelligence conference in Paris, Google announced a slew of new features in its Maps app for Android and iOS, the biggest update the app has received in years.
Immersive View
The biggest innovation is the universal display service, which the company already talked about at the I / O 2022 developer conference last year, but which will be officially rolled out starting today.
According to the company on its blog, Immersive View is a new way to explore places because it uses artificial intelligence and computer vision to combine Street View footage and aerial imagery to create 3D images with high-quality graphics. Cities, in addition to displaying useful information about the weather, traffic and congestion in the cities supported by the service, which are currently London, Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco and Tokyo, provided that the service reaches Amsterdam, Dublin, Florence and Venice. within a few months.
This feature allows app users to fly over the city and see it from above in high quality, disassemble to walk around the streets, and even enter shops to explore it from the inside.
Google says that it relies on artificial intelligence technology to convert ordinary two-dimensional images into dimensions that reflect the shape of buildings and even the structure of their external materials, resulting in accurate images in a variety of atmospheric conditions, lighting and weather.
Live View
The company also announced the launch of the Live View feature, which uses reality technology to display basic information about the user's surroundings through the phone's camera, such as the location of the phone. B. Names of restaurants, ATMs, parks and stations. Other information, such as information about store hours, reviews and how busy they are.
Walk around
In addition, the company announced the expansion of Live View service support to more than 1,000 locations including airports, train stations and shopping centers in Barcelona, Berlin, Frankfurt, London, Madrid, Melbourne, Paris, Prague, Singapore and Sydney Taipei. the next few months.
The service helps users find their way around large areas such as airports and shopping malls by using augmented reality to display arrows that show the way to places.
Charging station for electric cars
Google also announced new features targeting electric car users, as Google Maps provides information about the location of charging stations with advice on the best way to get there, taking into account traffic conditions, the level of charge of the car's battery, and the expected consumption of electricity.
Users can filter results to show locations that offer fast charging services at speeds of 150 kW or more. In addition, Google Maps will show if a charging station is available at the destination and if the destination is a supermarket, the map will display a special reference message indicating the availability of a charging station.
Show directions from the lock screen
Finally, Google announced the ability to get directions without unlocking your phone, whether you're walking, biking, driving, or taking public transportation. Users can now see information such as the ETA or the next right turn on the lock screen. If the user chooses a different route, the route will be updated automatically. According to Google, the feature will be rolled out to Android and iOS phones in the coming months.
During the event, Google announced a number of new features for its AI-powered Google Lens app.