Google Maps rolls out ‘Area Busyness’ feature

Google Maps has introduced a feature that will highlight the busiest areas of a city.

Called ‘Area Busyness’, it will help people avoid crowds and spot whether a neighbourhood has more than the usual number of footfalls.

The feature works across platforms, including Android and iOS.

Users in India and around the world can start using the Area Busyness feature after getting the updated version of Google Maps on their devices.

Announced last month, Area Busyness combines live busyness trends to show the busiest places of a particular city or town. The trends are claimed to be based on the aggregated and anonymised location history data that Google collects from people who have opted for it from their accounts.

“This data is instrumental in calculating how busy a place typically is for every hour of the week,” Google said in a blog post.

The area nearest its busiest state is labelled ‘Busy Area’ on Google Maps. Users can tap it to see a chart showing how busy the area is at different times of day, along with a directory of restaurants, shops, and recreational places within it.

‘Busyness’ information has been a part of Google Maps since 2016. Users cab find information by tapping a particular place on the maps. Also, last year Google Maps introduced indicators, including ‘Usually as busy as it gets’ and ‘Usually not too busy’, under location names.

However, Google has now expanded its efforts towards that directly by starting to highlight busy areas on its maps.