Google Maps will get an updated design of tabs on the Android OS

During 2024, Google Maps for Android tested a redesigned design that replaced most full-screen interfaces with more compact tabs. These tabs with rounded corners show a background map more often, making the interface lighter and providing more context when navigating.

To close such tabs, you can press the “x” button in the upper right corner or swipe back from the left/right edge of the screen. With this update, the ability to swipe up on the search bar to just see the map is gone.

Another significant change concerns route finding. The initial interface with fields for entering a destination, choosing a mode of transportation and a list of recent places has remained unchanged and still takes up the entire screen. However, after entering a destination, only the start and end locations appear at the top of the screen, and the transport mode switch is moved to the bottom for better accessibility.

Google started testing the new design in February, but paused it to make some changes and resumed testing in May. In the last few days, the new design became available for Android users of the stable version (11.136.x) of Google Maps. The update is not yet available for iOS.

In the future, Google Maps is expected to simplify the bottom navigation bar, leaving only three tabs.