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Google Maps is matching your food pics to the menu

As someone that always browses restaurant listings before committing, Google Maps is now mapping and naming user-generated food pics to the actual menu items. 

This occurs in the Photos tab of a restaurant, cafe, or similar listing. When swiping through images, some are now accompanied by a card at the bottom that has the name of the dish and how it’s described in the menu.

You might also see the price and labels like Popular or Vegetarian: “Dish information is collected from Google users and businesses. Google analyzes the aggregated data, but doesn’t verify every attribute.”

You can also tap Suggest an edit (Edit, Incorrect, or Offensive dish name + Dish not served here) and See the menu to take you to the dedicated tab (but not the actual line item).

Google Maps looks to be using both user-provided captions and object recognition to label the dishes. Not all food pics carry this menu card today, but this is definitely a step in the right direction as descriptions in Google Maps aren’t as common — in my experience — compared to other similar services. 

More on Google Maps:

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Avatar for Abner Li Abner Li

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

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