Get more out of Google Earth

If you have a question or want to save time when using Google Earth, check out these tips and lesser-known tools.

System requirements for Google Earth

  • Google Chrome 68, Firefox 63, Edge 79, or Safari 11.
  • Make sure that you turn on hardware acceleration.

To turn on hardware acceleration in Google Chrome:

  1. At the top right, click More  >  Settings .
  2. You can also enter "chrome://settings/" in your address bar.
  3. At the bottom of the page, click Advanced.
  4. Under "System," turn on Use hardware acceleration when available.
  5. Relaunch your Chrome browser and Google Earth.

Try Google Earth features

Turn on 3D imagery

At the bottom right, use 2D or 3D icon to switch modes. To switch between 3D and 2D buildings:

  1. On your computer, open Google Earth.
  2. From the map view tap Layers.
  3. Under "Additional Layers," turn 3D buildings on or off.
  4. A blue switch indicates that 3D buildings are turned on.

Turn on Animated Clouds

You can watch the last 24 hours of cloud coverage in a looped animation. Cloud data is updated when new data is available, which is usually every hour.

  1. On your computer, open Google Earth.
  2. From the map view tap Layers.
  3. Under "Additional Layers," turn Animated clouds on or off.
  4. A blue switch indicates that animated clouds are turned on.

Change Dark mode settings

  1. On your computer, open Google Earth.
  2. On the top right, tap Settings.
  3. Under "Application theme," select Dark theme or Light theme.

Change your flight speed

  1. On your computer, open Google Earth
  2. On the top right, tap Settings.
  3. Under "Animations," drag the "Flight animation speed" slider to change the speed.

Load map imagery faster

To make images load faster, turn off 3D imagery. Sometimes a Google Earth image doesn't load fully, which may make the image appear blurry. To see how much of an image has loaded, check the loading indicator at the bottom right corner of the screen.

Change how longitude and latitude are displayed

  1. On your computer, open Google Earth.
  2. On the top right, tap Settings.
  3. Under "Format and Units," select your "Latitude or Longitude formatting."

Change units of measurement

  1. On your computer, open Google Earth.
  2. On the left, click Tools  >  Settings .
  3. Under "Format and Units," select your "Units of measurement."