Feature idea - “Google Recents”

[Chris_Birn]

As a Local Guide who has been contributing photos, videos and reviews to Google Maps for several years, I recently started thinking about something:

What if Google Maps didn’t just show us what exists somewhere, but also what is happening there right now?

My idea is a new Google Maps layer called “Recent”.

It could appear alongside existing map options such as Satellite, Terrain and Street View.

When Recent is activated, users would see recently uploaded public photos and videos directly on the map.

As you zoom into an area, photo and video clusters would gradually appear, showing recent contributions from that particular location.

Users could choose a time period such as:

• Last 24 hours
• Last 7 days
• Last 30 days
• Last 6 months

Why would this be useful?

Imagine planning a trip somewhere you have never visited before.

Instead of only seeing businesses, roads, reviews and older photos, you could open Recent and immediately see what people have recently discovered there.

Maybe someone photographed a beautiful waterfall yesterday.

Maybe a Local Guide uploaded a video from a hiking trail three days ago.

Maybe there is a small café, viewpoint or local attraction that you would never have searched for because you didn’t even know it existed.

Or perhaps you simply want to know what an area actually looks like right now.

This could be especially valuable for tourism and for discovering rural and lesser-known areas.

And this could become much bigger in the future

Initially, Recent could simply use public photos and videos already contributed to Google Maps.

But I can imagine a second stage involving businesses, tourism organizations and events.

And eventually, there could even be integrations with participating social media platforms.

For example, someone publishing a public, location-tagged travel photo on a participating platform could explicitly choose:

“Make this post discoverable on Google Maps.”

That content could then appear geographically within Recent.

Instead of the traditional social-media discovery model:

Person → Content → Location

Google Maps could offer:

Location → Recent Content → People, Businesses and Experiences

You could open virtually any area of the world, activate Recent and get an immediate visual impression of what people are experiencing and discovering there.

I believe this could turn the enormous amount of location-based visual content being created every day into a completely new way of exploring the real world.

I created the attached concept mock-up to illustrate what such a feature might look like.

I would love to hear what other Local Guides think.

Would you use a Recent layer when exploring an unfamiliar area? And what would you want it to show?

[MortenCopenhagen]

I’m trying to understand your suggestion.

We already have a Latest tab for new photos under Places, given there are some recent pics/vids. I believe this covers some of what you are proposing.

Also, on computers, there is a relatively new feature in the left-side panel that shows the places you recently visited on Maps. They are organized by areas as shown below:

These are all pulled from your browsing history on Maps.

Maybe you could edit your topic to reflect how your suggestions are different from these.

I think Google has not implemented the recent layer because the number of recent contributions is mostly limited.

I also recall suggestions in the past where users suggested the sattelite/arial view to be a live video feed rather than static images. I understand your suggestion is more limited and realistic in scope.

[Chris_Birn]

Thanks, Morten. I think I can explain the difference a bit better.

The “Latest” tab works once I already know a place and open its Maps listing. My idea works more like Snap Map on Snapchat: you explore an area and discover places because people have recently posted something there.

So basically:

Latest: Find a place → open it → see recent content.
Recent: Explore an area → see recent content → discover the place.

For example, I could zoom into the area around Mo i Rana in Norway and notice that someone uploaded new photos yesterday from a place about 30 minutes outside the town. I may never have searched for that place or even known it existed, but the recent post makes me curious and leads me there.

The newer a contribution is, the more clearly it could stand out on the map. Very recent posts could be more prominent, while older ones gradually become less noticeable.

That could work for viewpoints, hiking trails, cafés, small businesses, events or simply interesting places you would otherwise never think to search for.

In areas with fewer contributions, users could widen the timeframe from 24 hours to 7 days, 30 days or several months.

So I see it as something similar to the discovery side of Snap Map, but built into Google Maps and focused on finding interesting places through recent photos and videos.

[MortenCopenhagen]

Very interesting.

I never played with a Snap Map.

I found this.

How To Check Snapchat Map

There might be some privacy issues to consider.

You may not want to let other people directly or indirectly know your location just because you added a photo earlier today or yesterday.

Safety and privacy is important to many users.

After all Google recently decided to remove the Follow feature. This would be a step in the wrong direction to protect the privacy of Maps users.

I like your idea, if privacy issues can be avoided.

Looking forward to hear what others think.

[Chris_Birn]

That’s definitely a good point, and I agree that privacy would need to be built into the feature from the beginning.

But I don’t think Recent would necessarily need to show who uploaded something. The focus could simply be on the photo/video, the location and when it was posted - not the contributor’s profile.

It could also be completely optional. When uploading a photo, users could actively choose something like “Show this in Recent”, knowing that the location and approximate upload time will be publicly visible.

Another option could be a delay before posts appear in Recent, especially for sensitive locations. So uploading something would never automatically reveal where somebody is at that moment.

The same principle would apply if social media platforms were ever integrated: only posts that users specifically choose to share with Google Maps Recent would appear there.

For me, the important part isn’t seeing who is where, like some parts of social media. It’s seeing what has recently been shared from a place and using that to discover places you didn’t know about.

So yes, I completely agree with you: privacy would have to come first. But I think there are ways to keep the discovery aspect without turning it into a tool for tracking people.