How to use Google Maps to Plan Your Travels

Complete Guide: How to use Google Maps to Plan Your Travels

Google Maps is one of the most useful apps on our phones and milions of for a normal daily use like navigating to somewhere or checking reviews on a restaurant we are planning to visit. But Google Maps becomes even handier when we are traveling for many reasons such as navigating in unknown cities, checking reviews and opinions about attractions and more. In this post I will share with you the ultimate way to use google maps for planning your upcoming trip like a pro!

Search and Save Places Before Your Trip

The amazing thing about Google Maps is that you can work with the same account (your Gmail account) on multiple devices at once, which means you can search and save places you are planning to visit in your upcoming trip (like attractions, restaurants and more) on your laptop/ PC and see them and navigate to them on your phone, this part alone makes the planning process very easy.

How I ‘m using this Google Maps Feature:

Open the APP/ Website: Open the Google Maps APP or website on my laptop/ desktop or you can just open the Google Maps app.
Pick a place: I’m picking the place that I want to visit/ travel to
Search all of the places I want to visit like sites, restaurants and bars and save all of them in the Google maps folder that I have for this specific location (I will show you how to open a folder next) usually on my laptop/ desktop.
Using my phone to navigate to all of the places I saved when I’m already there.

Use a List for Each Country or Trip

Not many people are using the lists (“folders”) feature on Google maps but this is one of the best features on this app that I’m using all the time. I basically open a new list for any country that I’m currently visiting or planning to visit in the future and just save all of the places I want to visit or just want to have as an option.

The list for each country just keeping all of the locations well organized so I can just open them when I just want to check about restaurants or attractions that I saved at home.

Another great thing about the lists is that the are sharable! so you can basically share there with your friends or family so they can get all of the places you saved for a specific location too.

How I ‘m using this Google Maps Feature:

1.Open the APP/ Website: Open the Google Maps APP or website on my laptop/ desktop or you can just open the Google Maps app.

2. Find the Location You Want: Now, let’s find a location that we want to save for our next trip: it could be our hotel, a restaurant café or anything else.
Once you searched for a place, you can just click on it’s location on the map, a small pop-up window in the bottom of the screen will be open now, it is basically the “profile page” of the location/business you choose.

This profile page contains the name of the location/business, reviews, address and more, make sure it is the right one and then click on the save button.

3. Open a New List: Then you will have the option to open a new list, click on the “new list” button in the top right corner of the screen.

4. Name the List: Give it the name you want, usually the country/city name will be great!

5. Click on Create: Click create on the top right side and that’s it! You have your new list!

Every Time you’ll add another location, just pick your list from the options.

6. How to Find Your Lists: You can find all of your lists under the saved tab in the lower part of the screen.

Now, all you have to do is to save all of the locations you want for future trips and you are ready to go!

How to find good Restaurants or Attractions Around

This is maybe the most common questions when traveling: “how do i find recommended things to do or a good restaurant/ bar close to me?” let me show you how we can do it like a pro! doesn’t matter if you are at home or traveling aboard, this feature is very useful.

How I ‘m using this Google Maps Feature:

1.Open the APP/ Website: Open the Google Maps APP or website on my laptop/ desktop or you can just open the Google Maps app.

2. Click on the Restaurant or Hotels button: click on the Restaurant or Hotels button in the top part of the screen (you can also write in the search bar instead), then you will get a list of the places around you on the map and also in a list at the bottom.

3. Filter The Options: click om the “filters” button in the top left part of the screen and filter the options according to your needs according to distance, reviews and more.