Google Maps is a web mapping platform and consumer application that provides satellite imagery, street maps, real-time traffic data, and route planning for multiple modes of transport including walking, cycling, driving and public transit.
Originally developed as a desktop program by Lars and Jens Rasmussen, Stephen Ma and Noel Gordon at Where 2 Technologies in Australia, the service was acquired by Google in October 2004 and launched as a web application in February 2005. By 2020, more than one billion people used Google Maps every month worldwide. The platform combines aerial photography taken from aircraft at 240 to 460 metres with satellite imagery, most updated within three years. Google Maps for mobile launched in 2006 with GPS turn-by-turn navigation, becoming the world’s most popular smartphone app by 2013, used by over 54 per cent of global smartphone owners. The service offers an API allowing third-party websites to embed maps, and since 2017 has incorporated crowdsourced updates through the Google Local Guides program. For adventurers, explorers and field researchers, Google Maps has become an essential planning and navigation tool, enabling route reconnaissance, terrain analysis and location sharing in remote regions.
