As Local Guides it’s often amazing which of all of our many photos that we contribute to Google Maps has the most views. We’ve come to call this our star photo and this post is all about such stars. It includes a set of leaderboards that showcase the star photos of hundreds of Local Guides from all over the world and presents a very detailed comparative analysis of their performance.
We all have a star photo, so you can join in to showcase yours and it’s simple to do. Simply hit this link or just leave a comment in this post and someone will jump in to help you.
So what can you learn from the Star Photos Leaderboards?
Well from the very detailed analysis of the star photos of the hundreds of participating Local Guides from all over the world, you can learn a lot about what type of places and what type of photos seem to get the most views on Google Maps and remember, views are important as they provide a fairly good indication on how helpful your photos are to Maps users.
Example Star Photo:
Here’s an example star photo added to Maps by @cuicani, a Level 7 Local Guide from Mexico City. When describing her star photo, Cuicani who joined the Top 100 Leaderboards in mid-December 2024, tells us that she took the photo with a Motorola Edge 30 Neo on the very first day of a tour by the choir that she herself sings with and is of the auditorium at a High School located at Escuela Nacional Preparatoria N° 5 “José Vasconcelos” UNAM. You can read more about @cuicani’s star photo here.
Readme - How to Read the Star Photos leaderboards (December, 2024)
Briefly, this is what you need to know about the leaderboards in this post. For more details see the leaderboard documentation and the Leaderboard System’s online context-sensitive help information.
The leaderboards in this post present details about the star photos of hundreds of participating Local Guides from all over the world. We all have a star photo, it’s our photo that has the most views and we call these, the star views.
As well as an overall leaderboard, you will see leaderboards for different Local Guide levels which provide you with direct comparisons of your star photo’s views performance with that of your peers. Finally, there’s a leaderboard ranking the top 100 star photos by average star views per day which gives an indication on how good your star photo is. To be included in this leaderboard, you must have updated your star photo’s views in the period since the date of the last average star views per day leaderboard as posted here on Connect last month.
The average star views per day is calculated by dividing the star views by the life of the star photo expressed in days. The life of the star photo is equal to the number of days between when you first uploaded your star photo on Maps and the date that you last updated the star views and thus, will be different for each participating Local Guide. Therefore, for accuracy of the information it is important you enter the correct dates. When it comes to the date that you last updated the star views, point #2 above is very important.
As well as the star views and the date uploaded onto Maps, each listing on the leaderboards shows the Maps Category, and a description (e.g. Storefront, Building or Park) of the respective Local Guide’s star photo.
Hovering over any star photo’s Uploaded Date will display that star’s screenshot date.
If the Maps Category of a star photo is shown as a link and if the name of the relevant Place of Interest was provided by the respective Local Guide, then hovering over that link will show you the name of the place and selecting that link will take you to a screenshot with details of that place as stored on the Local Guides, 2024 Star Photos post, a “photo album” if you will, of star photos.
If the Maps Category of a star photo is shown on a colored background then that star photo has been selected as one of the best that meets the formatting requirements as specified in the Local Guides, 2024 Star Photos post. Select that star photo’s category and see why it has been rated as one of the best and read more about that star photo on the “photo album” post.
Preceding some of the leaderboards, you may see a number of featured star photos. If so, these are a selection from those that best meet the requirements as detailed in the Local Guides, 2024 Star Photos post.
Where shown, around leaderboard sequence numbers indicate that this is the first time that the Local Guide has participated on the Top 100 Local Guides leaderboards.
Where shown, ( ) around leaderboard sequence numbers indicate that this Local Guide levelled up/down onto this leaderboard.
An asterisk (*) shown after a Connect Username indicates that that Local Guide is a Connect Moderator.
Double asterisks (**) shown after a Connect Username indicates that that Local Guide is a Googler.
Hovering over a Local Guide’s username will display the integration number that integrates that Local Guide’s details on the Leaderboards System and Connect; the umbilical chord if you will between the two disparate systems.
Selecting a Connect Username will take you to that Local Guide’s Connect Profile.
Local Guides suspended or who have left the Local Guides program as well as those who have hidden their Maps profile are excluded from the Leaderboards.
Local Guides that have not updated their star photo details in the month covered by the Star Photo leaderboards will be excluded from the Average Views/Day leaderboard.
A ? or the words “Not set” in a cell indicates that the respective value cannot be determined or hasn’t been provided by or for the respective Local Guide.
The data for the leaderboards in this post was read at 1130 on Saturday, January 4, 2025 (UTC).
Local Guides included on the leaderboards must check their entries for any errors. If you should find any errors or omissions, please add the details in a comment on this post. Regarding omissions, please note point 17 above.
Welcome to all the newcomers to the Top 100 Star Photos and what a splash entrance @TonysLists has made. We can see how with his great star photo being the feature photo for the Boston Children’s Museum, can create great visibility and hence view counts.
And looking at the 36,927 average views per day, the top of this board, goes to show just how popular this place is. Well done Tony! Great shot! Great view count and excellent average views per day which should mean that we’ll see even higher view count values to come!
I have to ask, how can any photo uploaded AFTER the Feb. 7th change compete with older photos that go 10 times the views under the old system?
My star photo has 1.65 million views ( uploaded Aug. 2023 )
Since the Feb. 7th change, the photo has increased views by about 60K.
But, using the old method, ( the Google takeout download ) it has 4.13 million views.
My highest viewed photo uploaded since the Feb. 7th change has only 191K views.
I know a LOT of WORK went into making these leaderboards, but we are now comparing apples to oranges.
Haha this echo of usernames appears yet again @Annaelisa. I will correct this but in this instance you don’t actually stop others from appearing as the board is nowhere near full.
Adding in the use of Google take out maybe adding a “pear” to the comparison. I have not used the take out method, but my understanding from those who do so regularly is that it has never matched the figures shown in our public profiles. I don’t think anyone has yet found a fair way to deal with the issue created by the changes starting February 7th of last year. I personally believe is that the new system is much more accurate or realistic on the previous one.
Subtract everyone’s numbers as at February 7th so that only numbers show after the change {reset everyone to zero) ?
Everyone is experiencing the same change. While it will definitely take longer for people to hit the famous billion view Club, people are still moving towards the number. I believe some people the issue is being similar to the problem of comparing basketball players and games from before the three-point shot and afterwards, only in reverse.
People are seeing my photos and videos and my numbers continue to go up; that’s good enough for me.
