Faced with increasing competition from Apple Maps and its 3D city view, Google today unveiled its vision for the next generation of Google Maps, previewing its new, more "immersive" viewing experience. The improvement, presented in the keynote speech at Google I/O 2022, leverages a combination of computer vision and artificial intelligence technologies to bring together street view and aerial imagery to provide a digital model of the world and new ways to explore cities, major landmarks, restaurants, venues, and other places of interest.
Google says it has blended "billions" of images together to create this immersive view that allows users to explore an area through visual soaring to see what it might look like. For example, if you're planning a trip to London, you can use the feature to check out landmarks like Big Ben or Westminster to get a better understanding of the place, the local life experience, and the exciting architecture. Users can also use the "time slider" to adjust what the area looks like at different times of the day – a feature somewhat similar to Apple Maps' night mode, which activates moonlight at dusk, even when browsing 3D cities.
Google's immersive mode will also allow users to check local weather and traffic conditions to help with planning. This new model won't just stop at representing major cities in a more immersive way – it will also make it easier to explore interior venues, including nearby restaurants and other popular venues.
Users will be able to glide to the street level and click to see the interior of places they might want to go. This can help people figure out what kind of atmosphere a restaurant might have and so on, and also see from this floor how busy the area is and the traffic situation nearby.