Google hopes that the next time you’re looking for a new restaurant or something to do, you’ll find it with Google Maps. Powered by GeminiGoogle’s generative AI model, Google Maps has a recommendations engine that organizes experiences and suggestions based on your searches. This is one of many new features offered by Google Earth, Waze and Google Maps in the coming weeks.

Instead of using the Google Maps search bar to enter an address or a generic term like “restaurant,” you can be more specific in your requests. A demo shown by Google at a press event Wednesday searched for “things to do with friends at night in Boston,” which brought up recommendations in the city based on both location and context. .

This generates a selection of activities with star ratings, photos and videos, while Gemini summarizes reviews from Google Maps users. You can also ask specific questions about these curated selections further down on the results page. But these Gemini-based tools are only invoked when you start the search from Google Maps, rather than when you query from The Gemini interface on the device or through the Google app. However, Google Search will get similar AI rating summaries when searching for locations and will have the ability to ask further questions about selections in the coming months.

Gemini and other AI chatbots are known to hallucinate, which is why Google is trying to solve this problem using a process it calls grounding. “We look at the billions of pieces of information in Maps to almost verify these answers,” said Miriam Daniel, vice president and general manager of Google Maps. “So the information that you actually see in this experience, you can be sure that this location exists in Maps.”

This AI-inspired tool with Gemini will roll out to all Google Maps users on iOS and Android in the coming weeks. Google Maps will also get detailed lane markings, pedestrian crossings and traffic signs in navigation mode, with guidance on which lane you should take using the blue navigation line. Apple Maps already supports a similar lane guidance system. Weather reports also come to Google Maps to report disruptions such as flooded roads or low visibility on the road.

Waze also benefits from a conversational reporting option powered by Gemini. Show the report button and speak in natural language to document incidents or objects on the road. Follow-up questions can be asked to help categorize the report. I tried an Australian slang term for traffic and after asking a follow-up question he understood I was documenting heavy traffic ahead. This feature is coming to the English Trust Testers program on Android and iOS, and to more users later.

Watch the video above to learn more about the new AI tools coming to Google Maps and a demo showing the features in action.