Skip to main content

You can now tell Google Maps when you’re playing Pokémon Go

With a simple April Fools’ game in Google Maps serving as the early predecessor of Pokémon Go, it’s only fitting that Maps recognizes the global gaming phenomenon. The mapping service’s Timeline feature now allows you to label an activity as “Catching Pokémon.”

Over the past few months, the Timeline feature in Google Maps has received a number of updates that make it a very powerful log for keeping track of where and what you’ve been doing on any given day. Google does its best to automatically recognize what activity you’re doing and has a number of presets from walking, driving, and on a train to whimsical ones like in a gondola lift, horseback riding, and kite surfing.

The latest fun addition is “Catching Pokémon,” complete with a Poké Ball icon next to it. This label has yet to be automatically applied for me, but users can manually set it on the web or in mobile.

Unfortunately, there is a bug involved when selecting the label through the Android and iOS apps. It generically changes the activity to “moving” in the main timeline view, with that classification being synced over to the web. The “Catching Pokémon” label sticks when it is applied via the website, but unfortunately still reverts to “moving” when viewed on mobile.

Being able to label long periods of time spent playing Pokémon Go can either be a blessing or a curse, but it’s an amusing one none the less.

FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.

You’re reading 9to5Google — experts who break news about Google and its surrounding ecosystem, day after day. Be sure to check out our homepage for all the latest news, and follow 9to5Google on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn to stay in the loop. Don’t know where to start? Check out our exclusive stories, reviews, how-tos, and subscribe to our YouTube channel

Comments

Author

Avatar for Abner Li Abner Li

Editor-in-chief. Interested in the minutiae of Google and Alphabet. Tips/talk: abner@9to5g.com