Google Maps is introducing a new feature to protect users’ privacy. Recent reports state that Google is changing how it manages users’ location data. Full location history was previously recorded by the application on Google servers; however, following this modification, users’ devices will now save entirely location history. Timeline is the new name for the location history feature on Google Maps.

It seems that certain people are receiving this feature gradually from Google. On the other hand, December 1, 2024, is the deadline.

Timeline data from Google Maps:

The purpose of this feature is to protect user data. It ensures that the users will continue to have control over their journey history’s location. Users won’t be dependent on cloud servers going forward. All of your Android or iOS device’s location history, including the restaurants you’ve visited, will be locally saved by Google.

Google provides end-to-end encrypted cloud backups for the Timeline in Maps in order to further protect the information. This provides an additional degree of protection by guaranteeing that only the user may access this backup.

Only app users are able to use this feature at this time. There won’t be a web version of the Timeline available online. Users will no longer be able to see their location history on desktop versions of Maps; instead, they will only be able to access it through the online interface. On the iOS and Android versions of Google Maps, the feature will continue to work. As a result, device-to-device location syncing will no longer be possible.

How can I store my Timeline data?

It’s possible that you haven’t yet used the Timeline data feature because it’s still in the rolling process. Google does not want to make this change quietly; when the feature becomes available to you, you will receive an email and a push notification from Google Maps.

Users will be invited to transfer their current location history to their smartphone through an updated app button when they get communication from Google, whether it takes the form of an email or push notice. As it phases out the web functionality, Google could erase all or part of your Timeline data if you fail to do this.

However, what happens if the user switches devices? Google also plans to do that. Google Maps is going to include a backup feature to make sure users don’t lose their data. When changing phones later, the user can restore encrypted copies of their location history from Google’s servers.