Google / Saved Places

Google Maps:
Reimagining Saved Places

Company

Google

Year

2020

Project Type

Passion Project

Scope

UX, UI

Platform

iOS

Timeline

1 week

The idea of this passion project came to me as I was traveling and struggled to find a certain restaurant I had previously bookmarked on Google Maps.

I love exploring new places and restaurants and things to do and primarily use Google Maps to keep track of my favorite places – the best ice cream shops, hiking trails, or really anything I want to save for the future. Even though my collection of saved places has been of great help to me, I felt like there was a lack of structure in my lists, so I started thinking about how I could improve the experience for users like me.

Objective

My goal was to make it easier for end-users to find places of specific categories, create an improved list system, and provide more structure and organization to save time and reduce frustration. I wanted to achieve this with little effort and changes to the overall application.

Problem

While the application allows users to create as many lists as they want, there isn't an option to create distinctive lists for specific types of places. All saved places, no matter the list category they were created for, appear the same on the map. For larger collections and power users, this can get pretty overwhelming and confusing.

In the example above, all saved places look like they are of the same category. In reality, those places are actually saved in different lists (Restaurants, Coffee Shops, and Furniture stores just to name a few). At first glance, it's hard to identify which saved place would be great for a full meal and which would be better to grab coffee.

How might we create more clarity and structure so that users can identify different categories right away?

Ideation

Instead of the default list icon, users can customize their new and existing lists by choosing an emoji as the list icon that will be displayed directly on the map. As a result, users can identify the type of place saved at first glance when opening Google Maps and don't have to go click on each icon in order to see what services they offer.

I went ahead and turned my sketches into some first designs in Figma. While I think it's the right direction, it has some issues as well. The icons are overpowering and, compared to the original designs, blend into the map a little too much and some of them, especially the lighter emojis, can be hard to see.

Iteration

To improve the contrast, I decided to place the icons into the default location droppers found in the application. While I gained the default contrast back, the custom icons were now too small and hard to identify. As a solution, I color coded the different categories so they stand out more and are easy to identity even when the map is zoomed out.

With the new designs, it's easier to spot different types of places right away. Instead of clicking on each saved place to see what food or services they offer, users could save time and tell apart a coffee shop from a bar at first glance.

More features

After changing the default icon to emojis for all list categories, I noticed that there can still be scenarios where users want to see an overview of all places saved no matter their category, so I decided to add a toggle feature between the default view and customized view. In the real world, this would also help introducing the new feature, A/B testing it, and giving users a choice to ease into the new view.

North Star

In terms of next steps and how to scale this even further, Google Maps could partner with businesses such as fast food chains or retail stores to have their logo displayed on the map directly.

Another idea is to offer the functionality to upload images that can be used as icons, for example: a company logo to save places for past and future office activities or off-sites, or a photo of a friend to save their favorite restaurants to then book a reservation for their next birthday.

While emojis worked as a quick win, the list item indicators should be custom emojis so they match Google's Material Design system and the overall UI of the application.

2024 Update

I created this as a passion project in 2020 as a Google Maps power user myself, and I'm so delighted and thrilled to see and use some of these concepts in the live product now in 2024.

It's a great and reassuring feeling to know that my thought process as designer is aligned with some of the greatest product teams out there.

Oct 2024 Screenshot of Google Maps – Saved Places

Live product from the team at Google (left), my POC from 2020 (right)

Google Maps: Reimagining Saved Places