How to disable Google Maps Timeline

Having a chat with a friend of yours, who knows a lot more about technology than you do, you learned of something that has left you somewhat perplexed: Google Maps has a function that tracks the movements of users … a sort the timeline of the positions with the history of all the movements.

As soon as you returned home, you searched on the Internet how to disable Google Maps Timeline and that’s how you ended up here, on this tutorial, hoping to find the answer to your computer question. Well, if things went something like this and you actually want to know how to turn off Google Maps’ much-discussed location history, you’re in the spot. In fact, below you will find explained just how to succeed in this intent.

Come on then: make yourself comfortable, take the time you need to concentrate on reading the next paragraphs and, above all, follow the instructions I am about to give you step by step. If you do, turning off Google Maps travel history will be anything but complicated. At this point, there is only one thing left to do: wish you happy reading and wish you a big good luck for everything!

Index

• Preliminary information
• How to disable Google Maps Timeline from smartphones and tablets
• How to disable Google Maps Timeline from a computer

Preliminary information

Before delving into the guide, analyzing in detail how to disable Google Maps Timeline , it seems only right to provide you with some preliminary information that will help you to better understand what the function in question consists of.

As I partially anticipated in the introduction of the article, the Timeline function of Google Maps is nothing more than a sort of position history, which allows you to keep track of your movements (or, at least, those made in “company” of the devices associated with your Google account). Thanks to it, it is possible to trace where you have been and when, which can be useful in different contexts.

However, this has many implications in terms of privacy: a topic that is much discussed today. This is why many users (among whom, apparently, there is also you) prefer to disable the function in question and delete the location history. It will be precisely on this that I will focus in the next lines: keep reading to find out what to do!

How to disable Google Maps Timeline from smartphones and tablets

Let’s first see how to disable Google Maps Timeline from smartphones and tablets. If you usually use Google’s popular navigation app on the go, this is probably the part of the article that interests you the most.

First, open the Google Maps app on your Android or iOS / iPadOS device and tap on your profile photo or, if you haven’t set one, on the icon bearing the initials of your name. If you do not see your profile photo or initials of your name, obviously you have not yet logged into your Google account: to do so, just click on the little man icon and log in by providing your information access in the appropriate form.

In the screen that has opened, tap on the words Your data in Maps and, in the new page opened, click on the word Activate placed under the heading Location history. Once in the Task management screen, move the switch located at the position History of positions to OFF, scroll down the message that is shown on the screen and press the Suspend button.

This way, the places you will go from now on will no longer be tracked. If you want to retrace your steps and reactivate the Google Maps Timeline, know that you can do so by going back to the section in question (following the steps I have just shown you), by moving the lever of the switch located next to the wording History of positions to ON., scrolling the message that is shown on the screen and pressing the Activate button.

If you want to delete the tracking that took place previously, however, after having gone to the screen relating to the activation/deactivation of the Location history function, tap on the item Manage the activity located at the bottom of the screen. Then tap on the Skip item in the box that is shown to you (if necessary), press the black trash can icon located at the bottom left, check the I understand box and I want to delete all the Location History and confirm the operation, by pressing on the item Delete the history of positions. Please note that the procedure is irreversible.

How to disable Google Maps Timeline from a computer

If you intend to deactivate Google Maps Timeline from your computer, you must go to the section of your Google account dedicated to the management of personal information and deactivate the function in question: below you will find everything explained in detail.

First, go to the main page of your Google account and, if you have not already done so, log in . Subsequently, click on the item Data and personalization located on the sidebar located on the left and, in the new page that has opened, locate the Task management box and click on the item Location history.

Subsequently, move the switch located in correspondence with the wording History of positions to OFF , scroll the message contained in the box that has opened in the center of the page and click on the blue button Suspend , located at the bottom right of the same.

Mission accomplished! From now on, the tracking function of your positions is suspended. In case you want to reactivate it, know that you can do it by going to the page in question again (to do so, you must follow the steps I showed you before), by moving the switch located in correspondence with the Position History heading to ON again, scrolling the message contained in the box that appeared on the screen and clicking on the Activate button.

If you want to remove the movements traced in the past, once you arrive on the Activity management page, click on the Manage activity link and, on the page that opened, click on the Skip item in the opened box, so as to close the tutorial displayed the first time you log in to this section of the account.

Then click on the black dustbin icon at the bottom right, check the I understand box and I want to delete all Location History and, finally, click on Delete Location History. Once the location history is cleared, it will no longer be accessible as the action is irreversible.