As the weather warms up, people will naturally start planning their next vacation. In response, Google has added four new features across multiple platforms on smartphones in an effort to help users find good travel deals and build an itinerary.
Arguably the most impactful addition, Google Flights is getting a new Price Guarantee badge to indicate that the current price of a ticket is the lowest it will be for that day. The price point will be monitored “every day until departure, and if it drops,” Google states that it will refund you the difference via Google Pay. The badge is part of a new beta program so its reach will be limited. It will only display information on flights departing from the United States.
On the other hand, Google Search is getting a new Stories-like feature for hotel listings where you can scroll through a series of images to give you an idea of what to expect. User reviews and the website of the site will be displayed on the screen for more information next to the reservation button. The third search feature adds prices for local attractions and tour companies with an accompanying booking link. Popular sites in particular will have suggestions below a list of “relevant experiences,” almost like a “citywide mini-tour.”
Finally, Google Maps You will get a recent tab for your desktop which shows the recently searched languages in the right list. You can then put everything into a new list to be saved in the future or to share with friends. The latest releases will be available “globally starting next week” with no information on the mobile version yet. The same Maps post mentions other notable travel tools, but it’s all the same things we’ve seen before Immersive viewing AR-based Live View
availability
The Google search update is currently rolling out to mobile with some already online. We were able to try out the hotel’s story slideshow, but neither the Trip Guarantee badge nor attraction prices were available at the time of writing. Additionally, we asked Google if the company plans to expand the beta badge program to other countries and upcoming flights to the United States. This story will be updated at a later date if we hear back.
Before you go on vacation, there are several more tools that we recommend that you familiarize yourself with. Google has been launched recently Search extreme heat alerts To let people know about upcoming heatwaves and what to do to stay cool. There is also a map tracker that allows users to share their location with friends in case they get lost.
You can learn more about this tracking feature and more by checking out TechRadar’s listing 10 things you didn’t know Google Maps could do.