Google Maps' Plus Codes Make Navigation Accurate In Rural India: Here's How

Google has announced that it would be introducing support for Plus Codes on Google Maps for easy and accurate navigation and sharing of location information, even in places that don¡¯t have any landmarks.

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To the unaware, Plus Codes are free, open-sourced digital addresses that offer simple yet accurate addresses for any location on the planet, even if the location doesn¡¯t have a formal address.

Plus Codes first came into existence in 2018 and since then they've been adopted by NGOs in India and governments to help connect several people in the rural India. With Plus Codes support coming to Google Maps, we can expect both urban and rural navigation to get more accurate than before.

Amanda Bishop, Product Manager, Google Maps said in a statement, "We piloted this feature in India a month ago, and are thrilled to share that over 300,000 users in India have already found their home's address using Plus Codes. We are looking forward to expanding to more types of places, and are actively looking for opportunities to partner with e-commerce, logistics, and delivery companies, to scale up the experience to more people across the world."

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How does it work?

To the unaware, PlusCodes are based on the latitude and longitude instead of the name of streets or buildings that offer accurate location information without the presence of a landmark.

Now when one saves a Home location on Google Maps, users will get an option to use their current location that would make use of their phone¡¯s location to generate a Plus Code that can later be used as their home address.

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How to share your Plus Codes-based location?

Once you¡¯ve saved the Plus Code, you can just head to a newly added section on Google Maps dubbed ¡®Saved¡¯ tab that would make it easy for you to retrieve, copy and share these addresses.

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The feature has been made live first in India and only for Android users as of now. However, iPhone users using Google Maps will soon receive the feature.

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