Google Earth just made time travel easier – here’s how to visit the old neighborhood

Last fall, a little-known Google Maps feature went viral for letting users get a glimpse of lost loved ones, old family pets, childhood homes, and even their younger selves.

Those memories are getting a little easier to relive, as Google is bringing its historical Street View images to Google Earth.

Also: This hidden Google Earth slider lets you travel up to 80 years back in time. Here’s how to try it 

To celebrate 20 years of Google Earth, Google introduced a new way to step back into time using its popular map program. Not only can you view historic images through the traditional bird’s-eye view that Earth is known for, but you can drop down to a street-level view too and scroll through photos taken across different years. 

Previously, the street-level photos were only available through Street View in Google Maps or through the Earth Pro desktop app.

When I checked my childhood home, I saw multiple satellite photos for almost every year, all the way back to 1993. Images are awfully blurry pre-2000s, and the photos are in black and white until 2003, but I was still able to find my first car in the driveway and see the now decades-old development beside my neighborhood when it was still trees.

Dropping into Street View, I was able to see about a photo a year of my old home until 2007. 

This isn’t new functionality, but it is a new way to see both historic aerial and historic street photos in the same spot. It’s a great way to see how an area has changed overall through the years. While nostalgia is nice, this is an incredibly useful tool for urban planners to track growth and environmental change.

How to see historical images in Google Earth

The feature works on both the app version of Google Earth and the browser-based version. To access it, tap the layers menu. Below the option to toggle 3D buildings on or off, you should see a toggle for historical imagery.

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