Google Latitude

See where your friends are on a map: Google's location sharing, four years ahead of its time and folded into Google+ in 2013

Replaced
19902026

Google Latitude was a location-sharing feature of Google Maps, launched on 4 February 2009, that let users see chosen friends' phones on a map and share their own location, with a public API, location history and later check-ins and leaderboards. Google retired it on 9 August 2013 in favour of location sharing in Google+, which in turn gave way to location sharing inside Google Maps in 2017.

Timeline [edit]

  1. 2009
  2. 4 February 2009 Launch
    Google Latitude launches in Maps for mobile

    Friends on a map, opt in.

  3. 2010
  4. 13 December 2010 Feature
    Latitude for iPhone
  5. 2011
  6. February 2011 Feature
    Check-ins, badges and leaderboards

    Chasing Foursquare.

  7. 2013
  8. 10 July 2013 Shutdown announced
    Latitude to be retired on 9 August

    Location sharing moves to Google+.

  9. 9 August 2013 Shutdown
    Latitude retired

    API and check-ins end.

  10. 2017
  11. 22 March 2017 Revival
    Location sharing returns to Google Maps

    Google+ location sharing removed.

The site through time

Browse google.com/latitude as it was, via the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine:

2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 Full archive →

Ownership [edit]

Google 2009–2013 Founded

Why it shut down [edit]

Official line: Google announced on 10 July 2013 that Latitude would be retired on 9 August 2013 along with its API, its check-ins and the Latitude features in Google Maps for Android and iOS, and pointed users to location sharing in Google+. Google+ location sharing was itself removed in 2017 when Google Maps gained the location sharing it has today, which is Latitude in everything but name.

Our analysis: Latitude did in 2009 what Find My Friends and Snap Map do now, and it did it when phones had poor GPS, worse batteries and users who found the idea creepy. Google kept it as a Maps feature, added check-ins to chase Foursquare, and then, in the years when everything had to be Google+, moved the feature into the social network nobody wanted. When Google+ faded, the feature came back to Maps. The product was never wrong; it was early, and then it was in the wrong place.

History [edit]

Where are you?

Latitude launched on 4 February 2009 as part of Google Maps for mobile 3.0 on Android, BlackBerry, Windows Mobile and Symbian S60, and as an iGoogle gadget: opt in, choose friends, and see them as small photos on the map, with your own location updated from the phone's GPS and cell towers. It was Dodgeball's idea, which Google had bought in 2005 and shut down, with an actual map. Privacy groups objected immediately; Google answered with per-friend controls, city-level sharing and the ability to lie about where you were, and pointed out that it kept only your last location.

Over four years it gained a public API, a Location History dashboard that showed where you had been, a Location Alerts feature, and, in 2011, check-ins with badges and leaderboards aimed at Foursquare, plus an iPhone app in December 2010. It was never as used as Google hoped, partly because it lived in a menu of Maps and partly because most people did not want to broadcast where they were all day.

Into Google+, and back

In 2013 Google was consolidating everything into Google+, and on 10 July it announced that Latitude, its API and its check-ins would be retired on 9 August 2013 and that location sharing would live in the Google+ app instead. Location History survived as part of the Google account. Google+ location sharing lasted until March 2017, when Google Maps gained the ability to share your live location with contacts for a chosen time, and Latitude's function came home to the map it had started on.

The domain today

google.com/latitude redirects to Google Maps.

Similar projects

Wunderlist The to-do app Microsoft bought to bury 2011–2020 Houseparty The lockdown living room, closed by Fortnite's owner 2016–2021 Secret Anonymous confessions from your own contacts, worth $100 million for about a year 2014–2015 Google Goggles Point your phone at a landmark, a book or a wine label and Google told you what it was, eight years before Lens replaced it 2009–2018 Astrid The to-do app with the friendly squid, four million users, bought by Yahoo and closed 96 days later 2008–2013 Loopt Sam Altman's first company: see where your friends are, years before phones could 2006–2012

Sources [edit]

  1. Where are you? Show 'em with Google Latitude The New York Times (Bits) 4 February 2009 [archived]
  2. Google Latitude to cops: "I don't remember" Wired 5 March 2009 [archived]
  3. Google Latitude shuts down August 9, but Google+ location sharing will go on Engadget 10 July 2013 [archived]
  4. Google is retiring its Latitude location-sharing service on August 9th The Next Web 10 July 2013 [archived]
  5. Google Maps will let you share your location with friends and family for a specific period of time TechCrunch 22 March 2017 [archived]
  6. Google removes location sharing from Google+ as it appears for more Google Maps users 9to5Google 28 March 2017 [archived]

Last verified: 16 August 2026. Spotted an error? Suggest an edit (corrections with sources are reviewed and applied).