Sharing your current location with others you trust can often be of great benefit. Google Maps offers you the option of sharing your current location with other Google Maps users, regardless of whether they have a PC, iPhone or Android smartphone. You can limit the location release so that your counterpart can even be there “live” when you are moving and can see the calculated arrival time. I will explain how to do this in this post, as it is quite quick and easy to implement.
Location sharing with Google Maps
This real-time location sharing function used to exist on Google+, but as you know, the social network has been discontinued. In this respect, you can now share this information with other people via Google Maps. Interestingly, you don’t even have to have location history enabled in the default settings. Before I explain how you can share your “live location” with people you trust, I would like to point out that sharing does not work with the Google Maps Go app.
- let others know your location using Google Maps
- Press your profile picture in the top right corner and then select location sharing.
- Here you can enter the duration (from 15 minutes to 1 day or until manually deactivated) that you want to share your location.
- Now you choose the contact by name, phone number or email address with which you want to share your location.
- Now you have to always allow Google Maps access to your location in the settings.
- In case the receiver doesn’t possess a Google account, you can generate a link and
- this via email, SMS, WhatsApp, Twitter or any messenger.
The individual whom you intend to share your location with will receive a notification on their lock screen, indicating your whereabouts. For instance, my colleague Stefan received such a notification on his iPhone in my case.If desired, departure and arrival times can also be shared. Of course, the release can be withdrawn at any time.
Location sharing with WhatsApp
Sharing your location with the popular messenger app WhatsApp is just as easyIn this context, the functionality is referred to as “live location.”
- Simply press the paper clip icon in the corresponding chat window in the message entry line.
- Then you select the green icon for the location.
- Here you can see your current location once
- or share the live location for a limited time.
- You can choose between 15 minutes, 1 or 8 hours.
This selection/release can also be canceled prematurely with WhatsApp.
Undoubtedly, there exist alternative means of sharing your location. I spontaneously think of Samsung with its SmartThings app, Apple with the “Find me” function and the messenger Telegram can also share the location of the respective smartphone for a limited time.
Do you know of another app that can do this and maybe does it much better? Then let us know in the comments. The same applies if you already use one of the functions. For whom and why are you sharing your location?