You can use Location Sharing on Google Maps to always know where your family, friends are, and generally to have a tracker for free.
Do you want to know where your child is at all times? Your elderly parent? Your friend in a chaotic department store or your partner while traveling? Google Maps has the ability to become a tracker and inform you about the location of your loved ones.
You don't need to buy a new device and a subscription for this service. It is ready and free on your mobile and can serve you at no extra cost, as long as you have access to the internet.
And yes, along with you, Google will also see where your child is now! As is the company of a tracker. And what happened? You can choose between security and privacy and decide whether to continue reading this article or not.
Share your location with another user
To share your real-time location between you and another user, you must have the Google Maps mobile app installed. You can download it for free on Android ή on iPhone.
The friend should either have the Maps app on their mobile, or simply open Maps on the web (https://www.google.com/maps) and log in to his account.
You should also be willing to share your location with your contact at least once. Then the thing will roll itself.
step 1 : Open the Google Maps app on your mobile device and click on your icon at the top right. A menu will open in which click on “Location Sharing”. If prompted, you must give your permission for Google Maps to use location services.
Also, the permission should be at the "Always Allow" level and use an accurate location.
Case A: You have never done it before!
step 2 : If you have never shared your location before then you will see a warning screen with instructions on what to do if you connect. There click the “Share location” button or tap “Learn what information will be shared” for more information.
step 3 : The next screen will have a list of nine suggested contacts of yours. If the person you want is not in them, tap the three dots at the end of the list to open a second list of all your contacts.
At the bottom of the screen you will see that you can share your location to other different Maps applications, such as Viber, MSN, browsers, Telegram etc.
Last option on this screen is how long you will share your location. You can set it from one to several hours or it won't stop until you manually disable the process.
step 4 : If you have selected the notification time and the person then you will see two new buttons, “Cancel” and “Notify”. Choose the request for you.
If the other user refreshes the Maps page either on their mobile or on the web they will see where you are and how much battery you have on your mobile.
You may see a pink notification at the top that you have not set your phone to allow Maps notifications. Adjust it if you want, otherwise if you go back to the normal Maps screen it will disappear.
You can also stop location sharing whenever you want by simply tapping on the user's name.
Case B: You have shared your location before
step 2 : If you have previously shared your Google Maps location with someone, then you will see their name at the bottom of the screen. Click on it and tap on “Share location with …..”
Here you can ask the specific user to send you their location by clicking on "Send request" located in the "You are not notified" area
You can also ask the user to tell you their location without telling them where you are.
step 3 : If you don't want to send your data to this user but to someone you haven't logged in before, then click on "New Notification" and follow the same procedure as case A.
Find someone with Google Maps
Once someone agrees to share their location with you, you can easily find them on Google Maps either on your mobile device or on the web from a browser.
Go to Google Maps and sign in with Google. You will see the avatar of the user sharing their location with you, where they are now.
Hover the cursor over the avatar. You'll see his photo and initials appear on the map along with the address for his current location.
Click on his avatar and you will also see how much battery he still has on his phone. There is also a button here called “Hide on Map” which simply hides his avatar from the Map.
Tap “Show on Map” to show a contact on the map again.
Finally, to stop seeing a contact's location altogether, you have the option to block them. Otherwise, wait for the notification time frame to expire or hope they decide to stop sharing their location with you.
