Google Maps has gained a nifty new feature, reports 9to5Google. As spotted by a Twitter user, Google maps now offers a “popular dishes” section in a restaurant’s listing under the “Menu” header. The “popular dishes” section is made from user-generated content—that is, people who have snapped a pic of their meal.
When did Google Maps get these crowd sourced menu pics? So valuable! pic.twitter.com/hOUOIIfbj9
— Taylor Wimberly (@wimbet) May 3, 2019
It’s not clear whether Google is using people or artificial intelligence to scan reviews and pictures of a restaurant to decide what is a popular dish. In any case, the feature will make choosing what to eat at a restaurant you’ve never been to before much easier.
It should be noted that Google isn’t the first to take advantage of foodie snapshots. Yelp and TripAdvisor have a similar feature. It also appears that Google is only testing “popular dishes” in select areas right now, as not every Google Maps users can see the new section yet.
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