In a blog post, the company highlighted new features and changes to Maps that will be rolled out in the coming months.

The new version of Google Maps is said to incorporate AI to bring users more accurate search results. It will also display photo results based on images shared by other users. For example, searches for “animal lattes,” “find the best animal latte art,” or “take your dog to the pumpkin patch” will get the most direct priority results. Google says these results are based on billions of photos analyzed by the Google Maps community.

The new feature will launch this week in France, Germany, Japan, the UK and the US, with more countries to follow.

Google is also expanding the Lens feature (formerly known as Live View Search), which helps users orient themselves based on their surroundings, utilizing AR and AI to show the correct path and assist users in finding the right direction. The feature will expand to more than 50 new cities later this week, including Austin, Las Vegas, Rome, Sao Paulo and Taipei.

In addition, Google has done a lot to prepare for in-car maps to better provide navigation for drivers.

A still image shows a phone screen with a highlighted route overview of Google Maps directions to the Natural History Museum. A small, white notification indicates where an HOV lane is available. indicates where an HOV lane is available along the route.

In short, Google will use a variety of colors to depict buildings and help drivers find their bearings. It also provides more detailed lane information, which helps drivers plan lane changes efficiently and safely, especially on the highway.

A still image showing Google Maps navigation on the in-car screen, with exit lanes detailed in blue as the car approaches the freeway exit.

In the U.S., Google has also added data related to HOV (High Occupancy Vehicle) lanes to help better plan routes.

Google will also be using AI to expand its support for speed limit information to help drivers maintain the correct speed. Both features will roll out to Android, iOS, and Google-enabled cars in the coming months.

Starting this week, electric cars equipped with Google’s built-in features will also be able to see information related to charging stations, including charging port compatibility, charging speed, and whether the station is occupied.

Google announced the rollout of Immersive View to Android and iOS in Amsterdam, Barcelona, Dublin, Florence, Las Vegas, London, Los Angeles, Miami, New York, Paris, San Francisco, San Jose, Seattle, Tokyo and Venice.

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After clicking the “Help Me Write” button in the bottom right corner, users type natural language prompts into a specified text box and the AI can then draft the email as requested.

▲ Source Phonearena, below

After the AI has done this, users can refine the completed email to suit their needs, such as making it more detailed, more formal, or shorter.

However, Google also warns that this feature should not be used for medical, legal, financial or other professional advice. Likewise, users are not advised to enter any personal information or sensitive content because the data is networked throughout.

New feature, you need to register for Google Workspace Lab before you can experience it on your own device.

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Canva offers a free application, as well as a paid version with additional features, that will give all its users the ability to generate 100 images per day with the tool.

Loading Canva’s text-to-image feature, you’ll be prompted to “describe the image you want to see” and show some sample prompts as inspiration (for example, “light watercolor of a koi fish in a pond”). You can then choose from a variety of styles (“photo”, “drawing”, “3D”, “painting”, “pattern” and “concept art”) and the tool will generate a grid of four images for you to choose from and add to your design canvas. There is also an option to report images that contain violence, nudity, hate speech and “biased and/or stereotypical” content.

A text-to-image tool generates four images of a panda riding a bicycle.

A screenshot of a text-to-image user interface that allows the user to select different styles: …

A screenshot of a user interface that gives you the option to report bad images: …

“We’re using this as a learning experience for our community,” says Cameron Adams, Canva’s co-founder and chief product officer.” We’re passionate about getting this technology in front of them because it’s an emerging field and the exact way it works and how customers will interact with it is still under development.”

The tool is already being used in a range of applications.” One of my favorites is that students use it to visualize their stories, so they’ll write a story in English class and use text-to-image to generate an image that matches that story. We’ve also seen it used for presentations, flyers and images on T-shirts that they can print through Canva.”

The feature is just the latest example of text-to-image AI tools reaching a growing audience. The launch of Stable Diffusion in particular has accelerated the use of these systems, as its open source implementation allows companies to integrate it into their own products for free. Text-to-image is rapidly becoming a staple of creative platforms, and just last month Microsoft launched its own text-to-image tool, Microsoft Designer (powered by OpenAI’s DALL-E system), as part of its Office suite.

The rise of these systems has also sparked some controversy, especially since they use copyrighted images as training data. Many artists have found that their work has been used to create these commercial products without their consent, even though the companies and researchers responsible say the use of this data is covered by provisions such as the U.S. Fair Use Doctrine.

When asked about these issues, Adams said, “I think there are legitimate questions about the extent to which AI products can be considered fair use, and that will vary around the world. We’re watching this issue closely, but it’s still all up in the air. We have a great relationship with our community of contributors and our users, and we’re working closely with them to figure out these copyright issues. We’re giving ownership of the images to our users, but we’re not claiming that the copyright on these images can be owned by those users.”

Bhautik Joshi, Adams and Canva’s “lead image and video expert,” emphasized that one of the key additions they made to the tool was the addition of filters to stop users from generating NSFW output – especially important if many of the users are school-age children.”

Joshi added that the company is “very aware that [the output] could be problematic, and that’s something we’re actively addressing.”

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