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How can I transmit my current location to someone else's phone?
My partner and are are sometimes in the position of trying to find each other in a large or crowded space (like a convention center, or if one of us is driving to pick up the other somewhere). We both have phones; it would be great if I could have mine send my location to his (or vice versa) so that the other person could see it in the map app. We don't want always-on tracking like the location tracking that parents do for children's phones; we want to be able to do one-time transmissions or otherwise turn it on and off.
I'm using Android 13 on a Pixel and he's using the current iOS version on an iPhone. We're each using the "native" mapping apps (Google Maps for me, and whatever the Apple default is for him).
Is there a way to accomplish this, preferably with the apps we're already using? Third-party apps aren't out of the question but aren't the first choice; we're both pretty security-minded and every new/unknown app is a potential malware vector.
3 answers
[Update: I just noticed that you are on Android but your partner is on iPhone. I tweaked the wording here to focus more on that scenario]
To share a live, realtime location from Android Google Maps:
- Tap your avatar to open a menu about your Google account
- Tap the Location Sharing menu entry.
- Tap the blue lozenge New Share button, overlaid on the map.
- Fill the short Share real-time location form, to choose whether your current live location should be shared for a finite duration, or until you turn it off.
- If you were sharing to another Android user, then you can also select their contact here, and they will see your live location in their Google Maps. But since you are sharing to an iPhone user, I think you have to use the other alternative, to share as a link, which can be sent to the clipboard, or other apps like SMS, chats, etc.
From here, you can also dynamically control the information that is shown on the pages that previously generated links point to, for example to deactivate a link, or extend the time until it expires.
I don't know how to share the other way, from an iPhone to Android.
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Surely there is a more elegant way, but I simply take a screenshot of the map (with a pip showing my location) and send it to the other person.
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On Android in Google Maps (Googled to get this, but tested and it works):
- Touch and hold an area of the map that isn't labeled to drop a red pin.
- In the search box, you can find the coordinates.
- Press and hold on the coordinates and it will copy to the Clipboard, so you can then paste to something else to send.
On the iPhone (I can't test this, hopefully someone else can):
- Open the Compass App
- Allow Compass to use your location, if you have not already done so.
- The location should be displayed.
- Press and hold on the coordinates to copy.
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