Talk:Google Maps

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Google Maps article.
This is not a forum for general discussion of the subject of the article.

Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic.
New to Wikipedia? Welcome! Learn to edit; get help.

Article policies

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

Archives: 1, 2, 3: 30 days

This level-5 vital article is rated B-class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale.
It is of interest to multiple WikiProjects.

Computing: Websites Mid‑importance

	This article is within the scope of WikiProject Computing, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of computers, computing, and information technology on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.ComputingWikipedia:WikiProject ComputingTemplate:WikiProject ComputingComputing
Mid	This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale.
	This article is supported by WikiProject Websites (assessed as High-importance).

Internet Mid‑importance

	Internet portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Internet, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of the Internet on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.InternetWikipedia:WikiProject InternetTemplate:WikiProject InternetInternet
Mid	This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale.

Geography Mid‑importance

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Geography, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of geography on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.GeographyWikipedia:WikiProject GeographyTemplate:WikiProject Geographygeography

Mid This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale.

WikiProject Geography To-do list:

Here are some tasks awaiting attention:

Article requests : See Requested articles/Social sciences/Geography, cities, regions and named places and Missing articles about Locations
Assess : Tag related article talk pages with {{WikiProject Geography}}. To help assess the quality and importance of geography articles, please see: Unassessed geography articles and Unknown-importance geography articles.
Cleanup : See Geography articles needing attention
Deletion sorting : Listed at Geographic related deletion discussions
Geographical coordinates : See Articles missing geocoordinate data by country
Infobox : See Geography articles needing infoboxes
Map : See Wikipedia requested maps
Notability : See Geography articles with topics of unclear notability
Photo : See Wikipedia requested photographs of places
Stubs : See Geography stubs

Google: Alphabet Top‑importance

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Google, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Google and related topics on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.GoogleWikipedia:WikiProject GoogleTemplate:WikiProject GoogleGoogle

Top This article has been rated as Top-importance on the project's importance scale.

This article is supported by the Alphabet Task Force.

WikiProject Google To-do:

Here are some tasks awaiting attention:

Article requests : Articles for most of the other products listed here and here.
Assess : All articles in the Category:Unknown-importance Google articles and Category:Unassessed Google articles using the project's assessment scale
Expand : Google Mapathon, Google Talkback
Maintain : This WikiProject
Merge : Google Mobile Services into List of Google products
Stubs : Category:Stub-Class Google articles and Category:Google stubs
Update : List of features in Android and Gmail interface#Product integration. Update logos of Google Marketing Platform products
Other :
- Add more stuff to this to do list if you like! (click here...)
- create:
- Help the Google article for a good article status
- Improve the Outline of Google
- Get more members using :
{{subst:Wikipedia:WikiProject Google/Invite Members}}
- Infobox Images with transparent areas needing a different background color

Maps High‑importance

	This article is within the scope of WikiProject Maps, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Maps and Cartography on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.MapsWikipedia:WikiProject MapsTemplate:WikiProject MapsMaps
High	This article has been rated as High-importance on the project's importance scale.

Can Google Map (or satellite) images be used on Wikipedia?

No mention of 3D cities?

There are mentions of satellite views and the new Immersive View, but there doesn't seem to be anything about the massive 3D city views that were created since 2012 using airplanes, e.g. the highly detailed 3D view of London's buildings and foliage. This Reuters article from 2012 seems to be all I could find. --Gert7 (talk · contribs) 11:41, 4 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

WP:SOFIXIT. Be bold and add it with the Reuters source, with additional sources if you can them. InfiniteNexus (talk) 20:05, 4 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Embedding with My Maps

In the My Maps section, it may be worth mentioning that My Maps can be used for embedding maps featuring specific pins and selected map styles on business sites and blogs. Google guide , MakeUseOf Zetagaming (talk) 20:23, 8 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Section regarding political borders

Would it be a good idea to include a piece regarding Google's policy on handling political borders? There are a bevy of sources which touch this topic, such as The Washington Post[1], The Economist[2], and academic studies; [3], [4], [5].

It would be beneficial to explain their policy on geopolitical boundaries. The portion regarding the somewhat infamous example of the Chinese-Indian border (located in the section regarding China) can be expanded as apart of this, as can other examples such as the Western Sahara. Regarding the decision to change the name to Gulf of America; most of the criticism to this point have focused on the executive order to rename the Gulf rather than at Google, but that could change, particularly after the namechange is implemented. AppreciateALittleBreeze (talk) 18:22, 28 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

False information

This app provides incorrect information about place names. For example, it misrepresents the name of the Persian Gulf in some cases. Perfection7798 (talk) 09:11, 9 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Perfection, this issue is mentioned in the Google Maps#Naming disputes section. If you have an issue specifically with Google Maps, please reach out to Google. Melonkelon (talk) 21:51, 9 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for speedy deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for speedy deletion:

Photo on 11-19-25 at 12.16 PM.jpg

You can see the reason for deletion at the file description page linked above. —Community Tech bot (talk) 14:51, 21 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Topic notification

Merging this is will be more productive for developing consensus on content. Consider what a mess Praise of Google would be. In the main article, due weight can more properly be measured and if there are specific topics that need to be forked it will be easier to achieve those forks with a simpler dedication to neutrality Czarking0 (talk) 02:53, 8 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose: Criticism of Google is way too large to be merged here successfully, and would lead to WP:SIZERULE problems.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 07:45, 8 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
That is not a good reason to oppose this merge. If the content was already in this article and a split was proposed, a "critcism of google" split would not be a wise choice. Czarking0 (talk) 04:02, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
A merge here wouldn't really work, but there are some obvious subpages part of the Criticism article can be merged to. For example, "Criticism of search engine" and "Censorship" should be integrated into Google Search. CMD (talk) 07:52, 8 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
No policy based reason provided for "wouldn't work" Czarking0 (talk) 04:03, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose: Such pages are supported by WP:CRITICISM - they are appropriate if criticism is substantial, well-sourced, and relevant to the subject. Similar to @Ianmacm's argument, WP:SUMMARYSTYLE advises splitting large topics into sub-articles. In fact, we already have Google Search, Google Maps, Google Brain, YouTube, etc. Should those all be merged into mother Google or should the Criticism of Google article be fanned out into those pages? I prefer the current page structure.

Cdmx545467 (talk) 04:14, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Why then not make a "praise of google" page? CRITICISM is an essay that is a poor guidance here compared to policies like WP:POVFORK. I encourage summary style and forking. However forking on criticism and praise makes maintaining WP:NPOV a herculean task. I agree that parts of "critcism of google" could better be merged into these other forks and I think that could be a good consensus to find here. Czarking0 (talk) 04:17, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

The answer to the question about "praise of google" is unclear to me, but that's a different question. Clearly, there are many Criticism of <some company> type of pages - Criticism of Apple Inc., Criticism of Netflix, Criticism of Facebook - but not many "praise of" pages. So, we have historic reasons at a minimum and maybe, just possibly such pages run against existing WP policies. I agree that there are WP:NPOV issues to consider (always), but am not convinced they force a merge-back at this point. The most prominent items in this page are notable enough to be split into separate articles, leaving only short summaries here. It may be more practical to reach consensus for such actions (or just perform those splits and see if they stick), as they could be helpful on the way to the more ambitious proposal discussed here.

Cdmx545467 (talk) 04:31, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

I probably would advocate for merging all of those but that is not the question here. PAGEEXISTS is not a policy based rationale Czarking0 (talk) 04:56, 10 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Strongly oppose No one is suggesting a "Praise of Google" here except you. Criticism is a neutral word. WP:NPOV (specifically WP:POVNAMING) and WP:UNDUEWEIGHT. The "Praise of" articles I see on search seem to be due to a name of an episode or song. Such an article would be against WP:NPOV. The nominator is presenting a theoretical scenario versus the reality. The "Criticism of..." article was created as notability was established for it to stand on its own. Merging the content is counterproductive. – The Grid (talk) 04:46, 9 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I am not suggesting "Praise of Google" I am quoting the policy at WP:POVFORK Czarking0 (talk) 04:54, 10 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

There is a link to "Criticism_and_controversies" linking to a separate article. That seems to honor the brevity limits imposed by Wikipedia. I believe that is the better route rather than creating an enormous article that can get a user "lost in the weeds", as it were. Bd64kcmo (talk) 19:40, 13 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Strongly oppose criticism of Google is quite a long article, we're not just talking about a "it happened once" incident. there are many others "criticism of x" articles, and i think that keeping them separate would remove a lot of clutter. also, some of the criticism in that page just doesn't fit into the main google article, for example this.

Emayeah (talk) 10:51, 14 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.