This site may earn affiliate commissions from the links on this page. Terms of use.

Google Earth 2017

Google Earth has been on autopilot for the last few years as Google busied itself with other things. Now, the product is getting its first major update since 2012 with staggeringly cool 3D maps, guided tours, and a whole lot more than. Y'all don't fifty-fifty need to download anything special to check it out on your figurer (as long equally you employ Chrome). But head over to the new and improved Earth spider web interface. For Android users, there's also a new version of the Earth app rolling out.

1 of the most fascinating things about Earth was but scrolling around to come across what the world looks like from in a higher place. Now, y'all can get a much more realistic wait at things. The 3D mode renders the world so you can see things from any angle, based on information from satellites and Street View. The results are impressive (encounter below), but it's not bachelor everywhere. I wouldn't call it photorealistic, either. Objects up shut look a flake like low-poly blobs that happen to representations of the real world.

maps 3d

Google is as well making a large deal of its guided tours, which are called Voyager. These aren't but random algorithmic collections of locations or a mess of Street View photos. Google really worked with scientists and conservation experts to put together Voyager. In that location are 50 tours available at launch covering locales similar the Galapagos Islands, UNESCO Globe Heritage Sites, and "Hemingway's Hangouts."

In that location are tie-ins with the BBC's Planet Earth, NASA, Sesame Street, and more than for additional content when you zoom in on certain areas likewise. Google plans to add more than tours to Voyager on a weekly basis, as least for a while.

If all that'southward not to your liking and you but want to wander around, in that location'southward a new "I'grand feeling lucky" push button. That blasts yous across the earth to a random location and brings up a cognition card then you tin can learn more. The cards include a description from Wikipedia, nearby points of interest, and related searches.

Earth has traditionally been a very unguided casual experience where y'all make your own fun. And if yous wanted actual directions, you'd just apply Maps. This update appears to exist an effort to brand Earth more than a pleasant diversion. The web version of Google World is available to everyone, but the Android version is still in the early stages of an incremental rollout. The version with all the new features is v9.0. Requite information technology a twenty-four hour period or and so, and it should be in the Play Store for everyone.